pascale wowak photoblog

Three adorable sisters and...

This wonderful family has THREE girls 5 and under... and mom is pregnant with #4.   A moment of silence please in reverance of this SAINTLY woman!   She is the MOST relaxed mom on the face of the planet... I don't know how she does it!  Although I guess you'd kinda just have to be for sanity's sake!  I'm sure it helps that her girls are a lively, utterly charming, spirited and FUNNY batch of little ones and dad is not intimidated by the fact that he is seriously outnumbered!  I was laughing so much!  The whole shoot was this somewhat controlled state of complete pandemonium with about hundred "costume" changes, (ie clothes flying everywhere), and ALOT of running around! Hilarious!  It wasn't easy but I did manage to snag a few images during the momentary lapses of perpetual movement... :)    This little baby is going to welcomed by three adoring big sisters and a two very loving parents.  Lucky baby!

Luci

I've been fortunate enough to be taking pictures of Luci since she was in utero!  I also photographed her when she was just a few days old and was amazed at how ALERT she was, so in tune with her parents and aware of her surroundings.  She's a pondering/observing/thinking kinda baby..  I am so lucky to get to photograph her every few months as I really get to be witness to her rapid developmental stages (not to mention growth!).  This time, Luci was far too busy observing her surroundings and trying to figure out where she was that even mom's fantastic little dog and pony show just wasn't cutting it.  We could NOT get a smile out of her. Plenty of adorable faces and taunting smirks...but no big smiles... Thing is, Luci smiles ALOT, just not when a camera is pointed at her!  :)

Finally, after a loooong time, Mom says to Luci "Ok, I guess we're all done here, let's pack it up."  And wouldn't you know little miss smartie pants then decides it's time to let the laughter roll...  Little bugger!  We finally got some smiles. Phew.  Enjoy the pictures Kathy, you earned it! :)

I should also point out that none of these were taken with any flash or studio lighting.  All natural light from a large window.  So, you can easily get the studio "look" without the harsh lights and flashing bulbs that both scare and upset your baby... some beautiful window light is all you need.  (And me.)  :)

Emma and Abigail (in utero!)

Emma's mom, Katie, is one of those people who is beautiful both inside and out.  A genuinely super nice person, relaxed, and just a real pleasure to be around.  So even though Emma was not really into the shoot (ie: she kept telling me to go bye-bye!!!), it all went incredibly smoothly.  This was a pregnancy PLUS family package and those take a really long time and the end result is a gizillion pictures! So I posted a fraction of those, like maybe, oh, about a thousand! Haha, just kidding!  Although, I really did post a whole lot of images, I could easily have posted every single image from this shoot.  We had the most stunning light, a porcelain doll toddler, a gorgeous and glowing mom to be and a dad who was actually INTO the shoot as well. Woah.  Needless to say, the results are fabulous (if I can say that without sounding ridiculously obnoxious!?) :)  Like I said, it had more to do with the perfect conditions and subjects than me, but I'll just pretend like I had something to do with it ok? Just allow me that...

Side note: I could not figure out who Katie reminded me of even though it was totally running through my little brain the entire time.  Then I got home and looked at the pictures and it hit me: Angelina Jolie.  They both have that same "ease" about them, a certain mix of confidence and humility all wrapped into one, with a vibrant & contagious smile.  Sweet.

I will post the first one out of sequence because it's my absolute favorite; in fact, it's probably one of my all time favorites.  It's not a traditional family portrait by any stretch but it makes me laugh out loud every time I look at it.  What I see when I view it is this: A happy pregnant couple sitting together on their front porch quietly awaiting the arrival of their baby and then, woah!, lo and behold a child drops out of the sky and straight for their laps! Crazy stork!  I seriously love this picture...

 

PHOTO BOOKS!

I liked the card templates so very much that I also decided to purchase some book templates for these absolutely AMAZING family books (see below).  All I can say is WOW.  I have two companies that I use to order the books from.  One is WHCC which produces super fast turnaround times on their books (but at a slight loss of quality) at lower prices for those on a budget.  And the other company I use is Asuka Books which does truly remarkable work.  Their books are flat out stunning.  Naturally, the cost is a bit more and the turnaround time is an excrutiatingly long 4 weeks from date of order!  So if you are planning Christmas gifts out of these, PLAN AHEAD!  That said, I really do recommend using the Asuka Book option as the quality is remarkable.  The Asuka Books will last a lifetime.  These two sites are only available to professional photographers and cannot be accessed by the general public, so the quality is pretty stringent.  I recommend going to www.asukabook.com to see the various styles available.  Each style has several different pricing options depending on the laminate or varnish option you pick for the pages as well as whether you select a hard cover or soft cover etc...  Contact me for a quote.

Each book has a minimum of 20 pages with the option to add as many pages as you want (for additional cost).  The book size is 10X10 inches.  I can obviously customize the text.   For the 20 page book, you pick your favorite 13 vertical images and favorites 13 horizontal images (you can put all color, or, all B&W, or, a mix of both as I've done here) and then let me design the book based on the storyline and sizing available.  We work together to create a fully personalized book which makes a great keepsake heirloom as well as the perfect grandparents gift!  Discounts available for multiple orders of the same book.  Price includes my design time which takes about 3 hrs per book as well as all communication with you to finalize the book to your specifications.

COVER

Pages 2 and 3

Pages 4 and 5

pages 6 and 7

pages 8 and 9

pages 10 and 11

pages 12 and 13

pages 14 and 15

pages 16 and 17

pages 18 and 19

final page

I put the black edging strokes on these pages to show where the middle crease and edges were, they DO NOT show up on the final book!

CARDS!

I've been searching high and low for Holiday Card and Birth Announcement card templates that I would actually use myself.  I'm kinda picky.  So I haven't had much luck.  Until now!   I've posted below some template samples that I purchased just for this purpose.  For these samples I used pictures of my own two little rugrats for the Holiday Cards and my latest newborn session for the Birth Announcement ones.  The fonts and colors are all adjustable, as is the actual TEXT on each card.  It should also be noted that for the birth announcement ones, there are TWO designs color schemes for each sample (one boy color scheme and one girl color scheme) but in the interest of space I only posted one color scheme for each design.  Just know that you can order in either color scheme and if you want to see a sample of a specific one in the other color scheme just contact me.  I also need to be very clear that the only images I can use on these cards are pictures either I personally took for you, or images YOU personally took.  Any other images will require a signed release by the photographer allowing me to use said image in these card designs.  I am a real stickler when it comes to copyright law.   The TRIFOLD card announcements are way cool and allow many more photos to be included that way.  The birth announcements are in either 5X7 or 5X5 size, you can tell just by looking at them.  The holiday cards are all 5X7 unless it's the trifold card which is 5X5 squares.  The pricing package will depend on whether you are ordering the "one sheet" cards or the TRIFOLD cards as well as amount ordered.  Each card will will also come with an envelope.  Just email me for a quote if you are interested.   I am so incredibly excited about these cards!  They are unique and original and classy all at the same time.  Not your standard drugstore card people! :)   

I can think of two no better times in one's life to "outsource" the extremely time consuming and tedious task of putting together cards than during the hectic holiday season and right after giving birth to a child!  Let me custom design the images for you with your input and vision.  You pick the personalized wording as well as the photographs of your choice, and I diligently plug it all in with my attention to detail, artistic eye and handy photoshop skills~ :) 

Abigail

I so love that name! Abigail is a very bright little girl with a perpetual (slightly mischievous) twinkle in her eye.  We had a grand ole time!  I really love it when clients let me photograph them doing something that has special meaning to them as a family (ie: here I took pictures of Abigail reading with her parents) as I find that everyone really relaxes and becomes less aware of the camera.  It also creates memories of activities they all enjoyed during that time in their lives.  Abigail was a really cute little gal who made me laugh nonstop with her many hilarious facial expressions and her folks were incredibly nice people, so needless to say, it was a real pleasure photographing all of them!  I should mention that Abigail had the most spectacular eye color ever, it's a color Ive never seen before, a mix of green and grey and hazel... mesmerizing. Enjoy your pictures Brooke and Tim!! :)

Side note: I've been playing around with a new photoshop trick where I add texture to certain  images(usually the more artistic ones).  The texture process is pretty lengthy in terms of time per image converted so I don't do it too often and I'm still really learning as I'm doing but it's a look that is pretty spectacular (especially when printed up on canvas - almost looks like a vintage painting), very unique looking and certainly a custom creation to say the least.   I will be adding this feature more regularly to my images starting in January, when I'll also be announcing some big changes (all good stuff don't worry!)...  See if you can spot the two textured images (one is obvious the other is not).

 

Skyler & Grace

Talk about BEACOUP energy!  This whole family was full of life!    There are the occasional sessions where the child's agenda differs greatly from the parents (& the photographer's) agenda.  Frankly, there's just very little you can do about that sometimes (ie: bribery doesn't work!), so the only thing left to do is go with the flow and that's exactly what we did here.  Virtually no sitting still or posing whatsoever was going to happen so we played and engaged and what you get are images of life unscripted.  And there's as much beauty in that as a smiling and serene "sitting still" portrait.   So this is to reassure those parents who have high energy kids that they too can have their portraits taken, it'll just be approached differently, with much more candid results.  And yet, the outcome will still end up being many beautiful images that fully represent your child(ren) at that moment in time and that's all that really matters.  My favorite image of this series (besides the ones of me making Grace laugh!) is the last one.  I just love those hilarious moments when mom looks at me and I look at her and we both crack up knowing that it's time to wrap it up for this session :)

   

Mama got a brand new lens!

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH! I almost fainted when it got delivered!  I have been drooling, no, obsessing, no, fantasizing, no, coveting - yeah, that's it - this lens for soooooooooooooooo long.  I saved and saved and saved and was finally able to get it for my christmas gift this year - a couple months early!  It's the Canon 35mm f1.4L USM prime wide angle lens.  Dreamy.  It's the PERFECT indoor lens.  Great for wintertime. 

So, naturally, I tear open the box with my bare hands (not really!), throw that puppy on my camera and grab my poor unsuspecting kids who are trying to PLAY and not have to POSE thankyouverymuch... My son is running around wearing only his superman underwear and my daughter has just a skirt and diaper on.  Poor kids.  I don't even take the time to put clothes on them.  I plop them down in front of a sliding glass door in our kitchen and just shoot and shoot and shoot.  My son starts out  a bit demure (he's been through this before...) but a little competition of who can make the loudest nose snorting sounds (I bring out the big guns when I'm desperate people) brings on the hearty laughs.  My daughter is totally not into it (see below) until I sit her on my lap and hold/shoot the camera with one hand looking at us.  Then she's ready to rumble.  Notice how , at the very end, she tries to cover the lens with her hands just to mess with me, she knows I sorta flip out when she goes for my camera.  And then she was totally not interested in my lovin' either.  But throughout it all I just have this big goofy grin on my face despite the total lack of cooperation cause, well, I gots me my lens.  Ergo = I am happy.

This post really is to show that you don't need plenty of planning, or fancy clothes (or hardly any clothes apparently!), or a nice background (my kitchen is horrendous and my tile is literally straight from the 70's...) or even cooperative subjects to get nice pictures.  I turned on the camera, plopped them down and went with the flow of what was happening.  I'm not saying these photos are good neough to grace my walls but they are fun to look at and will do quite nicely in the baby albums telling a great story :)  So if you're waiting for the "right" occasion to take pictures of your little ones, stop waiting and just take out the camera, get down on the floor, engage (or ignore!), and start capturing life as it really is.  Life as you will keenly remember it to have been, warts, silliness and all :)

The undefeated grand master of nose snorting sounds....

So incredibly NOT into this mom....

the thinker...

starting to get more animated...

her "blankie" had to be in the picture too...

Logan C.

Logan (aka the Gerber baby) was so cute and plump!  Babies this age are so expressive and he was no exception as I was rewarded with many adorable and endearing little facial expressions, the kind that make you say "Aaww" out loud.  What a sweet little dude with parents who love him oh-so-much!  Enjoy your pictures!!!

Che

I photographed little Che when he was a tiny little baby and I couldn't believe how "smiley" he was back then. He just smiled and smiled and smiled throughout the ENTIRE photo session.  So I was definitely curious to see if he'd have the same disposition at this next session.  Well...he did!  Between his huge doe eyes, hilarious smile and chipmunk cheeks all I could think while photographing him was 'gobble-gobble-gobble'...I just wanted to eat him right up!  He's truly delectable, see for yourself... and no, you can't have him, I'm first in line!   

Jenny G.

I defy anyone who, after looking at these photos, DARES to tell me that a pregnant woman is not gloriously SEXY.  Wow.  Jenny's done some modeling in her past (she refers to it as "many moons ago" but she's still got it as far as I'm concerned) and there's a wonderfully symbiotic relationship between photographer and (ex)model.   I've done a couple specialized training seminars down in L.A. working with professional models in the studio setting and lest you think modeling is an "easy" job I can assure you that it is not.  The really good ones are always aware of the light, the angle, the position of their bodies, they can look like a completely different person every few seconds...  They are PROS in every sense of the word.  And they are positively delightful to work with.  They never complain, you can put them in all kinds of really uncomfortable poses and they hold it for as long as you need them to.  Jenny was like that.  I had her sitting in sharp pokey iceplant and she never skipped a beat. I had her leaning this way, that way, sideways, nearly upside down and she never looked at me like I was a crazy lunatic asking all this of her.  She was always aware of her body and the light source.  And she had that superb comfort in front of the camera that I am fortunate to get with so many of my clients.  At one point a wave washed up on shore and rolled under her.  The water is COLD right now.  Most people would have tried to run away or screamed...not Jenny. She barely even flinched.  Jenny rocked.  Here's a few favorites.  I also want to assure you all that I have Jenny's explicit permission to post all of these pictures, I double checked with her before even posting them and she was totally cool with it. Jenny, it was so much fun, thanks for giving me full reign to be artistic and creative, enjoy your photos!

Katelyn & Haley

These two sisters were so beautiful and perfectly attired!  I felt like I was shooting a Gap Ad Campaign the whole time! :)  I have to say that this is quite possibly the most delightful age to photograph in terms of the "easy" factor.  Erica, it was great meeting you and your girls, thanks for driving all the way down to SC on Labor Day weekend for this, I hope I made it worth the 3 hrs each way! :)  Enjoy your photos!