Everybody Jump Jump: Eugenia & Richard’s Family Session!

I had a lot of fun with Eugenia and Richard, along with his energetic kids Zoe and Ryan, during their family portraits in Pasadena!

Eugenia and Richard are both designers of all things fun … including Rose Parade floats. I can tell that their creativity extends to Zoe and Ryan, whose personalities are so much fun! Here are a couple of my favorites from their session:

Thank you for a really fun shoot!

Happy birthday, Grandma

To most, November 11 is Veteran’s Day. To me, it’s my grandma’s birthday. Wilma Lenore Gearhart, who would have turned 98 today, lived a very full life and died peacefully on March 15 of this year. Her husband, Russell Gearhart (my namesake), is a veteran; he died in 1987.

I’d like to share three images I made with my dad before her memorial service in Vacaville, CA earlier this year:

My grandma’s urn was hand built from mahogany by my older brother, Dan, a master carpenter in southern Utah.

Happy 98th birthday, Grandma.

You can also read another post about my grandma by clicking here.

Hey, St. George, Utah … we’re planning a family portrait day!

Guess what, y’all … we’re coming to St. George, Utah for a portrait day!

Portrait day is your golden ticket to show off your family’s personality and individual style. With a “say-anything-but-cheese” philosophy, we aim for real and fun photography, and want to share it with our St. George peeps! We’re offering an awesome discount on session rates for this day only: $50 off a regular session, $25 off a mini session.

With the holidays around the corner, portrait day is a perfect opportunity to create images for Chirstmas cards and gifts for grandma. It’s the best chance to get the gang together for a memorable framed portrait for your living room (those kids aren’t getting any younger!).

The Nitty Gritty:

– When: Saturday, October 16, 2010
– Where: Nisson Park, Washington, Utah
– Limited sessions available! First come, first serve.

Two Packages Available:

“The Small Wonder” -  $125 (usually $150)

– 45 min session
– $25 studio credit toward prints & products
– Easy for couples & families of 4 or fewer. Gives us the time for the basics + a few fun extra photos.

“The Brady Bunch” – $250 (usually $300)

– 1 hr 45 min session
– $50 studio credit toward prints & products
– Best for families of 5 or more, or groups of any size wanting more awesome combinations and extras.

All sessions include:

– Invaluable cheatsheet before session for portrait tips, what to wear, etc.
– A relaxed portrait experience in which we capture multiple images of the entire family, as well as smaller groups (just the kids, just the parents, the whole barrel of monkeys).
– Image presentation and order consultation for wall art and gifts a few days after the session.

What can we create?

– Awesome holiday cards
– Custom framed wall portraits
– Gallery canvas wraps
– Slideshow videos
– Custom-designed keepsake books

There are a *very* limited amount of time slots available for Oct. 16 with this discount. The two best ways to contact us about booking your session:

– By email: contact [at] gearhartphoto.com
– By phone: 818-949-8645 and leave a message.

P.S. — Portrait day falls on UEA weekend, so you can easily plan us into your festivities. Or for those in northern Utah, come down and make a vacation of it! What’s UEA weekend? If you’ve grown up in the state, oh you’d know. Lots of boring education meetings happen up north then. But more importantly, it’s a long weekend for Utah school kids!

Russell Gearhart Photography creates vivid photo stories with a craftsman’s eye, for people who love life. Russell’s roots are in southern Utah, his home studio is in Pasadena, Calif., and his camera is available anywhere with light and good lookin’ people.

Click here to see more of Russell’s portrait work on Facebook … and “like” us if you like it!

A Day with the Nortons!

I had the honor of photographing a family from my home state of Utah! Deb and Jeff Norton took their whole family to southern California for a week of vacationing, and we got in some awesome portraits and a Day-in-the-Life session while they were here.

All 12 of ‘em — which includes the Anderson and the Larsen families once you start counting all the kids — got a lucky comfortable So Cal summer experience because the heat wave hadn’t quite arrived yet.

Check out this video of their Day-in-the-Life session:

And here are some of their awesome portraits:

After jumping on all the beach rocks in La Jolla, we went for pizza. The kids then got dressed in Maltilda Jane clothing and we finished the day at Golden Spoon, a frozen yogurt shop in north San Diego county. It made a perfect backdrop!

The camera loves this family!

My Grandma Gearhart

My grandmother, Lenore Gearhart, passed away nearly two weeks ago. Losing a dear family member is a supremely difficult emotion to endure, but I am buoyed by the fact that dad’s mother lived a wonderful and full life of 97 years.

This weekend, I’m flying to her funeral in Vacaville, CA, fitting the trip between two wedding shoots on the same weekend. Funerals, meant for the living, are odd and uncomfortable to me, but I’m sure I’m not the only one. Their unspoken purpose to unite families by sharing in a celebration of the person, much like a wedding can do, is noble and worth every moment.

Before it was clear that I wouldn’t be booked on the funeral date, I prepped a portrait of my grandma to be printed and sent to my parents for framing, so that it could be displayed.  I have admittedly few photographs of my grandma that I deem frame-able (a tough admission for a photographer) .  But one is enough.

With Grandma protesting the whole time, I made this portrait of her in my parents’ backyard on a gorgeous day in 2003. She was worried about her clothes, her makeup, her wrinkles. I fussed with her collar and her necklace, and worried whether I could make the same trivial jokes that I make with high school seniors and newlyweds for a smile. In the back of my mind was the faint idea that the image could be important to me, and perhaps my family, one day.

When I pulled it from the archives last week, I discovered something I’d forgotten — I’d made it on film! So I cleaned a few squeegee scratches and dust particles (something I hadn’t done to any photo in a few years) and marveled at how lovely and beautiful she is –  just the way I’ll always know her to be.

A few images from my Grandma’s past, courtesy of my cousin Debbie, showed me how others have known her.

Her high school senior portrait from 1931 was splattered with something at some point, but I kind of like the fact that life and time can affect art. The weathering and eventual breakdown of old prints just add to a life story, rather than detract from it. I know, I know … I cleaned the scratches from my own image of Grandma. But even that resulting print, fresh as it is now, will hopefully age with the same grace.

She wrote a message on a hand-painted portrait given to my grandpa (also named Russell) on their 20th anniversary.

This is my grandpa, grandma, and my dad, Larry, in that overgrown coat on Rio Verde Street in San Francisco. I’ll have to ask my dad what the dog’s name is. My dad has talked of climbing the fence of the nearby Cow Palace. I’ll have to ask him to repeat those great stories as well over the weekend.

May we all be so lucky to live a full and blessed life.

Here’s Edward, the newest addition to the Jenks Family!

Way back in 2006, I had the honor of photographing Trisha + Jon’s Oahu wedding. In 2007 they asked me to photograph baby Catherine. And just two weeks ago, I got to see their new little one, Edward, in front of my lens!

Edward is about 8 weeks old. When he’s awake, Edward is wide-eyed and takes it all in. Catherine, who is almost 2, is a very smart girl with a love for Yo Gabba Gabba and fruit snacks.

We shot this session at my friend and fellow photog Kelli Maguire’s studio in old town Whittier. Kelli is always so generous and upbeat, and is wonderful with children. I have so much fun hanging out with the Jenks family … I can’t wait to see what their next surprise is! Here are the photos:

Ok, maybe that last one is a lil’ too “Anne Geddes” for my usual tastes. It was Kelli’s awesome idea, and it was fun trying to “homage” the style. Mere millimeters out of frame is Kelli on the left and momma Trisha on the right, making sure Edward stayed floating on his mark. Kelli was right in the “spray zone” too, and bravely took one for the team.

Thanks, Jon & Trisha; it was a blast!