Star sighting!

This afternoon I had the pleasure of lunching with a group of wonderful photographers! One of my favorite blogs to check out each day is Jasmine Star, a photographer here in Southern California. She invited me along with some other photographers in the area to head out to lunch to just talk, share stories, and learn from each other.

I had such an amazing time and I'm so happy to have met such wonderful people! Considering Jasmine's quasi-celebrity status (she was bludomain's photographer of the year!) she is amazing sweet, down to earth, and willing to help! Thank you Jasmine for answering my 101 questions!

A special thanks also to David Baxter, the lone male in our group, who brought all the ladies chocolates. What a sweet guy!

In case you want to check out the blogs of the other photographers at the lunch, here they are:
*Amy of AHS Photography
*David and April of Ohana Photography
*Kimberlee of Boucher Photography
*Marlene of Marlin Munoz Photography

Can I get your card?

I get asked a lot if I have a card that I can give out. I had some low budget cards with my name and email on them but I was always embarrassed to give them out. But now... the answer is YES! I just got my first set of official press printed super fabulous business cards and I'm so excited about them. Here's a quick shot of them testing out my new blog's BIG PHOTO capabilities:



And in other exciting news I have a big Friday and weekend coming up! I'll be shooting a rehearsal and wedding on Friday and Saturday so be sure to check back for photos of those events. I'll also be heading out to Palm Springs on a much needed vacation on Sunday and Monday. Let's just hope I don't bake in the hot sun out there!

new look, new website, oh my!

Hey there blog readers...

you may have noticed a little bit of a change in the way the blog is looking and acting these days (or maybe you read this through something like google reader and haven't noticed a thing).

In any case I've been hard at work trying to give a little more attention to the blog and website to make them just that much more fabulous. On the blog you'll find a new sparkly navigation bar up top with shortcuts to labeled posts, plus a search function and a link to my illustration website and the photography homepage. Pretty spiffy huh?

The website is totally new and still somewhat under construction, but I love it so I couldn't help spilling the beans about it a little bit early :) Check it out here: katyregnier.com

One of the tricky things about DIY web design is getting it finished before you go crazy from too many hours in front of your computer screen. I'm taking a little break for my sanity but when I come back I'll be adding even more photos to the galleries and a couple more cool links as well. In the meantime let me know what you think!

Hope you enjoy!

totally rad actions and a couple more photos...

I've never been one to use photoshop actions much before. On the recommendation of a bunch of photographers I finally picked up the Boutwells' totally rad actions and tried them out this evening. I've got to say that despite my hard action-free work in photoshop on the photos that I posted from Lessa and Christian's wedding yesterday, I really do like the action-packed versions better. What do you think?

Without the actions:

With the actions:

Without the actions:

With the actions:

And a couple of new photos just for fun... yay for new fun actions!

Lessa & Christian's wedding

On Saturday I had the pleasure of helping out my new friend, the incredibly talented Tracy Kumono by shooting with her at Lessa & Christian's wedding. These two are some of the most friendly and genuinely sweet people I've ever met! From the moment we met I felt like we'd been friends for ages and they were so great at having their photos taken as well.

I started the day by getting some guy time and shooting Christian and his groomsmen.

Lessa and Christian had some of the cutest flower girls I've ever seen... here they are at the start of the ceremony.

Lessa and her father are obviously very close and their love for each other was so clear throughout the day. They shared some wonderful father daughter moments at the back of the church just before walking down the aisle.

The church was gorgeous and the ceremony was so heartfelt and touching. Just beautiful!

After the ceremony we headed out for more portraits! I love it when there's lots of time for the fun shots. They guys had a lot of laughs but I managed to get them to give me a straight face for a few minutes.

And of course a few of my favorite couples shots! We had so much fun getting all of these.

I love it when a bride shows off some of her personality on her wedding day... and nothing says personality like a pair of lavender converse. Fabulous choice of footwear!

A couple of detail shots... all of the flowers were absolutely gorgeous!

Lessa and Christian had a wonderful reception full of all of the traditional events... first dance,

heartfelt toasts,

and of course the father daughter dance.

A great time was had by all... young,

and young at heart :)

Congratulations on a beautiful wedding and wishing you years of happiness. Thanks to Tracy for inviting me to be a part of this wonderful event!

Tag ... you're it!

There appears to be a game of photographer tag going around. I was tagged this morning by a fellow Los Angeles photographer Nataly Lemus. The point of the game is to name 8 things about yourself that your blog readers might not know... and then pass the tag along to 8 other bloggers.

Here go my 8 things:

1. I haven't eaten meat since I was 10 years old. Inspired by an episode of Blossom (yes, sad I know) I even convinced my little sister to stop eating meat as well. We've both been vegetarian since.
2. I once was an avid swing dancer (and still have a few tricks up my sleeve when it comes to the lindy hop!). I was in a swing dancing performance group and even taught lessons in college.
3. I rowed crew in college and even participated in the awesome Head of the Charles race in Boston and the Crew Classic in San Diego
4. I speak French pretty darn well.
5. To go along with #4... I briefly lived in Paris, which is where my husband and I got engaged (talk about romantic!)
6. My favorite shoes are my flip flops, I even got married in a sparkly pair of flips!
7. My absolute favorite food is burritos... yum Ricos!
8. I'm a sucker for romantic comedies. Even if I know they're going to be bad I can't resist the lure of John Cusack. Yes I even saw "Must Love Dogs" shameful but true.

And since the game is spreading SO incredibly quickly it's hard to tell who hasn't been tagged. Here are a couple of blogs I follow that I haven't seen a tag post from *yet*

Stacy Cross
Jillian Kay
Emily Allen
Anne Ruthmann
David Baxter
Laura Scott
Eight 20 photography
Zelo photography

You're it!

Quarter century celebration!

For my birthday the family came up for the day on the weekend and we went out again to the Getty Center and out for a delicious dinner. Here are just a couple of quick shots from my quarter century celebration! First up Allison looking quite thoughtful...

Dad taking some photos of me taking photos!

My lovely mom in the gardens. She was the second birthday girl of course, although she was just a hair over the quarter century mark :)

My fabulous parents walking down the hill to the garage.

After dinner we headed to a tasty dinner kicked off by edamame... mmm. soybeans.

Me making cupcakes (photo courtesy of Ben who loves to borrow my camera!)

And here's the tasty results of all the hard work!

And one more just for fun... Mark in the little toy helicopter outside a 99¢ store.

Happy Birthday to me!

For my birthday today my wonderful husband bought me one of my favorite presents of all time... a new macro lens I've had my eye on for a while. This lens is going to be my new favorite toy I can tell! I love that I'm going to be able to take some great detail and ring shots with it and it's so fun just to play around with. Here are just a couple of the first shots with it this morning right out of the box.

First up a shot of the most recent model I've built. This is going to come in quite handy documenting all the model work I'm doing.



And next up just for fun a ring shot of my husband and my wedding bands. They're not quite as shiny and new as they were when this fantastic shot was taken of them but I still love 'em! Thank you Ben for my fabulous new birthday present!



And last but not least Happy Birthday to my mom as well! Yes we do share a birthday. Happy Birthday mom!