The White Sessions

I love the clean simple portraits and I love Black and White. I have decided to do a few signature sessions for a limited time in the studio. The first of these sessions is The White Session. We are doing the White Sessions November 13-15 here in our studio. We have set times right now, but may expand the timeframes if needed.

The goal is to create clean, simple portraits of individuals, couples & families (1-4 max) while wearing white. We are working in 20 minute mini sessions on a grey or white background. Bring along your personality :-) Happy, Mad, Sad, Goofy. The choice is yours. We will have fun!

These portraits make great gifts for those that love you!

Please follow this link to the PDF and contact us if you would like to set up a session. I look forward to seeing you here at the studio!

Amanda and Lou - The Wedding

Wrapping up October 2008 with the wedding of Amanda and Lou. What a fantastic day they had! We started at the Omni William Penn Hotel for preparation shots and the rest of the day was spent at the Children's Museum of Pittsburgh. Originally the ceremony was to be held outside, however the weather was being a bit fickle so a decision needed to be made early in the day to move it inside. This did not damper anything. It was beautifully done! We did get a bonus after the ceremony when the Sun came out for a bit and we were able to use the light for formals and some portraits. It was a win win all around!

The Metropolitans provided the entertainment and they rocked it! This wedding was a perfect fit for my style of shooting. We were literally in the shadows just documenting the day. It was great because no one paid attention to us :-) We captured so many fantastic moments!! Week in and week out this year we have been blessed. Thank you to all!

Amanda and Lou thank you for having us along on your day. It was perfect. Enjoy Cabo and please let me know when you return, so you can give me some tips! My next wedding stop is in Cabo!

Enjoy some images from the day.
Emotions after getting into the dress.


Capturing the mood entering the elevator


Amanda's gown is gorgeous


Amanda and her father. Priceless.


Lou looking GQ


I love this image of Amanda's father :-)


Taking advantage of the few sun rays we had available


David Burke Wedding Photographer - Children's Museum of Pittsburgh Wedding - Omni William Penn Wedding

Lightroom 2.1 Update

For all of you photographers out there using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2.0. In case you have not gotten the update notice, you can get version 2.1 HERE. It fixes some bugs and adds some more camera support.

We have been loving LR 2.0. The Camera Profiles are killer for Raw files! The Adjustment Brush is killer too. Photoshop will be a thing of the past soon. At least for our workflow. :-) Enjoy!

A few newborns!

Babies abound! I have been shooting a lot of newborns lately and have enjoyed it tremendously. Two of note that I would like to share with you involve some new clients and some older clients.

First the new clients. Heather and Matt were referred to me through a previous client (Thank you Mary Ellen!), when they were looking for maternity images. I had the opportunity to meet them and shoot the maternity session, two weeks before baby A was born. Baby A is here now and he is beautiful!

Heather and Matt before Baby ;-)


Baby A


I love his little lips!


Secondly, My wedding clients, Karen and Ray, recently welcomed baby E into this world and could not be happier. It is such an honor to watch my clients and their families grow. As you can see Baby E is beautiful!

Baby E = Precious


The Family



I have said it before and I will say it again. Newborns are so much fun to photograph! I think there is something in the water lately.... I know a lot of pregnant women out there ;-) Please give us a call when you are ready for some pictures!

Little after dinner snack

Kimberly and Jim - The Wedding

Ahhh, another fall wedding and more great times!

Kimberly and Jim were married last Friday during an evening ceremony. It was intimate and perfect. They held the celebration at South Hills Country Club and offered countless Hors d'oeuvres and desserts. De-Lish!

Because the ceremony would be held after dark, we started a little earlier at the country club, so we could get some images beforehand. Kimberly and Jim decided not to see each other beforehand though, which is awesome!

During our photoshoot with the guys we had nice even overcast lighting. When the girls arrived, however we were blessed with a little sunshine for some killer backlighting. We had a blast!

Thank you Kimberly and Jim for having us be a part of your day. Enjoy Mexico and see you soon!

The Guys


The Girls


Kimberly is great in front of the camera!


Post-Ceremony portrait


This image really captures the adoration these two have for each other. They smile like this all the time!

Loving the Fall Light

Happy Monday!

Man, this September and October have been fantastic for lighting! I have forced myself to create images of my children. The light is so beautiful this time of the year. If you know me or follow my work, I am a huge fan of backlighting. I know my subjects can attest to me saying "backlight is my absolute favorite lighting." All of my personal favorite images are backlit in someway, shape or form. I don't know what it is about it, I simply love it. When I am out and about without a camera, I see that backlight on people and objects and just say "aahhhhh, I wish I had my camera!"

Yesterday I spent about 30 minutes in the late afternoon sun. We were in the backyard with the kids on the swing set and playing in the leaves. We had a blast. I was also able to capture a few images. I am trying to shoot as much as I can this fall (on my personal time) and learn new ways to use backlight. I am getting a lot more flexible with the exposure and making a lot of mistakes! Mistakes is how I learn best :-)

I am also keeping it as simple as possible. Using 1 lens, 1 camera, no assistants, no reflectors, no artificial lighting. As much as I love the technicalities of lighting an image to "perfection", I love the "imperfections" more. I am experimenting with warm tones, cool tones, more contrast, desaturation, blown highlights, rich shadows, etc... It is so much fun to get out and shoot for yourself. I am on a journey and it sure is fun. I will continue to share.

Here is a favorite of my two littlest ones playing in the leaves. They are so stinking cute!

Patty and Adam - The Wedding

Last Saturday was another glorious day! Definitely the peak weekend here in Western, PA for the fall colors. Patty and Adam were blessed with this fall beauty. I had not seen them since their engagement session in April. It was great to finally see them again!

Patty and Adam are so sweet. They were so happy to getting married to one another. They chose to have their reception at Shakespeare's which was an absolutely gorgeous backdrop for us to photograph upon.

The wedding season is definitely coming to end for us, and I could not be happier with the way things are ending. It is always amazing to me that each wedding is so unique and each couple is perfect for each other. Meeting all of these wonderful couples and families is the highlight of my job. Being a part of it is truly and honor.

Patty and Adam, I hope you are enjoying your honeymoon and we will talk soon!

Here are a few from the day. A big thanks to Beth for assisting me on this one!

I love this image of Patty, her nephew and mother looking on.


A candid of Patty


The ceremony was in a very intimate setting


Mr. GQ!


The warmness of these colors are tasty!

Jessica and Ed - The Wedding

Friday October 10 was a gorgeous day for a wedding. Jessica and Ed were happy that this day was chosen for them!

It is not too often where we have a double wedding weekend, but to have both Friday and Saturday be PERFECT days, was incredible. I will be blogging Patty and Adam shortly. Can't wait!

So Friday we made our way to St. Vincent's and Greensburg Country Club for Jessica and Ed's wedding. My friend Greg assisted and grabbed some great images as well. It was fun because we both shoot the Nikon D3 :-). It made processing the files easy as pie too!

Jessica discovered me from a wedding that I shot a few years ago and told me "I knew then that I wanted you to capture my wedding someday." That was the sweetest thing she could have said to me.. So needless to say "She had me at Hello!" LOL! Thank you Jessica for finding me and including me in this Incredible day!

We had a great day and I look forward to sharing all of the images with Jessica, Ed and family. Here are a few favs. Enjoy!

The church


Jessica has the greatest smile and laugh!


Ed and his guys arriving


I love this moment ;-)


A portrait


First Dance

Brayden the Biker

28, originally uploaded by burkedt.

This morning Brayden wanted to ride his bike. I thought it would be a great opportunity to tell a story with my camera. To see the whole set check out my flickr set.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidburke/sets/72157608058482169/

New Life...

Lots to catch up and post about, but could not resist posting this image showing interaction between a newborn baby girl and her mother, softly comforting her. I knew when I pressed the shutter that this image was going to speak volumes (at least to me).

Being the softy that I am, I cannot help but marvel at how perfect and precious a newborn is. When I look at newborns, I see nothing but Perfection. I am so fortunate that I have these opportunities to Document Life at its Best.

Here is baby A and mom. Don't ya just love her???


More posts to follow!

Shoot N Learn - October

I am happy to announce the next Shoot N Learn. This month's Shoot N Learn will feature Cory Ann Ellis from South Dakota. Cory Ann is a very talented photographer specializing in Weddings and Intimates. Cory Ann has agreed to share her knowledge on shooting and marketing 'Intimates' with us. I would venture to say that this workshop is definitely geared towards the ladies in photography :-) I personally do not shoot Intimates (for obvious reasons!), but I think there is a TON of value in what Cory Ann has to share. If you are interested in Intimates photography, I can refer you to a wonderful friend of mine... Heather Lahtinen! Heather will be here as well, since she is hosting Cory Ann at her home.

We would love to have a shoot demonstration so we are looking for a model that will be comfortable posing in a Bikini Top, Jeans and/or a White dress shirt. I promise it will be very tasteful. If you know of anyone that would like to model, please shoot us an email to david@davidburkephoto.com. If we do not have a model Cory Ann has enough discussion material that we can chew on. Marketing alone is a fantastic topic to cover.

I am super excited for this month's Shoot N Learn!!! Hope to see you all here and see some new faces!

• When: 10/15/08 @ 7:30 PM


• Where: David Burke's Studio (633 Washington Road Pittsburgh, PA 15228)


• Who: YOU


• Topic: Marketing and Shooting Intimates - Cory Ann Ellis

Great Blog Post - Seth Godin

Seth Godin writes a blog that I like to read. Seth is a very talented writer specializing in marketing. He has a great post on his blog today "Is effort a myth?". It is some good food for thought!

Check it out.

Click on the Pic of Seth to check it out:

New Portfolio site.

Hi All,
I have a new Portfolio site that I am excited to share with you. I had not updated my main website in such a long time, because it was so cumbersome to update. I finally found a great solution to host my portfolio and could not be happier! It is so easy to update, so I will update often! I promise!

The actual site is hosted at http://davidburkephotographers.com but is accessible from http://davidburkephoto.com by clicking on Portfolio. I want all of my sites to be accessible from my main domain of davidburkephoto.com. It is still a work in progress, but we are getting there!

This new Portfolio will showcase my Wedding and Engagement work only. I may launch another site in the near future to showcase my other work. Since Documentary Weddings are my primary focus, they need to be separate.



Since my goal as a Wedding Photographer is to be Real, Classic & Timeless, it was important that my site be clean and simple. I did not want anything too flashy. I also decided not to use music. I always find myself turning the music off when I visit websites. What do you do? I would love to know. If you like music on sites, please do tell ;-)

I am working a lot on my brand and have a lot of things coming down the pipe so that I can continue serving my clients with the best of me. I look forward to sharing!

Elizabeth and Jason - The Wedding

Saturday was the day for Elizabeth to marry Jason. What a day it was. Elizabeth had all of the details aligned and the entire day flowed perfectly! We started at La Pompanee and then headed over to their home. Elizabeth's gown was custom made from Tomasina. Absolutely gorgeous and perfect for her!

They were married at St. Bernard's in Mt. Lebanon and held the reception at Hyde Park, which was excellent for an intimate gathering. To top it off, it was Pittsburgh's 250th Anniversary! We were blessed with an amazing fireworks display to end the night. This day could not have been planned any better. I also had my associate, Jen on hand to capture moments as well. It is always great to have another pair of excellent eyes on hand ;-)

Enjoy your honeymoon! Thank you all for your generosity and hospitality on Saturday! Here are a few of my favs.

Jessica and Ed

More Blogging goodness!

Meet Jessica and Ed :-) We went into the city for an engagement shoot a few weeks back and had a blast together. I can't wait for the wedding!

Enjoy these few images:

Kerry and Gene - The Wedding

This post is long overdue! A few weeks ago we had the distinct pleasure of spending the day with Kerry, Gene and their families. What a great day it was! The weather was perfect. It was a great wedding to document and be a part of. They held their ceremony and reception at Chartiers Country Club which was gorgeous. The late afternoon sun backlit the ceremony and provided beautiful lighting for the family portraits. I can't wait to share all of the story with Kerry and Gene. Thank you all for having us and being so hospitable!

Here are a few of my favs!