Jessica and Grant - The Wedding

I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas! We had a blast with the kids. We are still enjoying everything :-)

Saturday, the 27th, I was honored to document the wedding of Jessica and Grant. It was a glorious December day in Pittsburgh. To the tune of 68 degrees and Sunny.... Unbelievable. It was a wonderful day. They were married at St. Winifred's Church in Mt. Lebanon and had the reception at Hilton Garden Inn @ Southpointe. I love the Hilton Garden Inn, because it is 5 minutes away from home!

I met with Jessica and Grant over a year ago, so it was nice to see the day finally arrive. It was a bonus Christmas present to be shooting this past weekend. My good friend and photographer, Dan Speicher came along to assist and shoot. Thanks for your help Dan!

Instead of posting a bunch of pictures I put together a slideshow. This is something that I have gotten away from, but am eager to get these rolling again. They are so much fun to make and more importantly for you to enjoy.

Thank you Jessica and Grant! Enjoy the honeymoon!!!

Happy New Year!

Merry Christmas!

I want to take this opportunity to wish you all a Merry Christmas from the Burke Family! We are so thankful for so many things and grateful to all of you that have supported us through the years. Our Families, Friends and Clients are the heartbeat of what we do. We look forward to 2009 being another incredible year and ultimately welcoming our newest addition to the family! Bridget is due in June, so we have a few more months of anticipation. We are doing our best to keep the sex of the baby a suprise. Who knows if we will be able to refrain from finding out.

Enjoy this Christmas and Holiday season. Love and Hug often!

See you in the new year!

Love,
The Burke Family

Rebecca and Jason

It has been too long since I posted some images, so I wanted to share a few of Rebecca and Jason. These two will be tying the knot next June! I finally got to meet them in person a few weeks ago and am very glad that I did! I was fortunate enough to meet Rebecca's mother this past summer, after just speaking with Rebecca on the phone. It was nice to put a face with the name :-) Also meeting Jason was my pleasure! He is hilarious!!! I am really looking forward to the wedding.

Enjoy these few!

Christmas with Weezer.

There really is a Santa Claus
I just came across this Gem on Amazon.com (under $5). Merry Christmas.

(I love Weezer)

Christmas With Weezer
*Update* Includes 'O Holy Night' - my all time favorite Christmas song.

A few new books for Inspiration

I love photography books! Recently I added a few to my collection, for inspiration. 2 are filled with images and one is more of an explanation of the process by shoot.

1. Annie Leibovitz at Work

Annie is a living legend, :-) She is one of my all time favorite photographers. Both her portrait setups and photojournalism are fantastic. This book explains how she thinks when shooting and takes you through the process of creating the image. So far, I love it.

2. Mario Testino: Let Me In!

Another highly sought after photographer is Mario Testino. Mario has such a raw style of shooting that I can't help but be drawn to it. His imagery is powerful, simple, fun. I think a lot of the impact (even with Leibovitz) has to do with who is in the photograph. (I would love to hear comments about this.) I sometimes think that if I were to take shots like this of the average Joe, they would not be as powerful, simple and fun. At any rate, I still love the images in this book.

3. Vanity Fair: The Portraits

I have always been drawn to the imagery in Vanity Fair. I guess it is no suprise since Leibovitz and Testino both have had many images throughout the magazine. Actually Annie has a long term contract with Vanity Fair, so her imagery is always in there. This book has portraits from the past 100 years. The book is huge and heavy. This equals Huge, Beautiful Portraits to view. I love this as well.

Please leave some comments to what Photography books inspire you. I like to get 1 or 2 every few months. I have also started cutting images from my favorite magazines and putting them on my office wall, so that I can always see them and be inspired before I go out and shoot. It is a great way to keep pushing your abilities.

Have a great weekend!

Chatting with Bryleigh

We have really been working with Bryleigh's words. Here are a few: (My favorite is "Happy". She scoots around and says Happy all day long.)

One Image

Every once in a while I make an image and just love it. This is one of those images.I won't ramble on here with words, I hope you like it too!

Shoot N Learn - December - POSTPONED!

I hate to postpone the Shoot N Learn at the last minute, however due to my workload and priorities, I have no choice. I will reschedule and post soon for after the New Year. We can start Fresh and catch up! I have been thinking a lot about future SNL's and have a lot of ideas to share. I hope you all have a wonderful Holiday Season!

In the meantime, here is an objective for you. Commit to shooting with a different camera a few times over the Holidays. A point n shoot digital, Film camera, Polaroid, Holga, etc... Try it. It is so much fun and can reignite creativity and ideas. I have been using my little Nikon Coolpix L18 that I picked up for $100 at Target (over the summer). I am also going to pick up some polaroid film before it is all gone and take some with my polaroid as well. I have been shooting with my iPhone camera too. It really pushes you to get a good exposure!

Here is one of my recent favs with my point n shoot.


And one from the iPhone


I want to see pics too. Upload them to my Facebook group David Burke Photographers and share.

MediaStorm

While browsing, recent tweets, I came across this incredible website. Mediastorm. I have watched a few of the stories that are a mix of video, stills and voice overs. A. These are extremely inspiring from an artist standpoint, but more so the stories themselves are so interesting. These videos are put together so well. The photojournalism is exquisite. You become a part of each story just by viewing and listening.

Thanks to Jeremy Cowart for sharing this gem.

Off to bed now ;-)

Catching up...

...is hard to do!

The past few months have been a whirlwind due to travel, weddings, shoots, business planning and lots of family stuff!. All of the excitement has taken a toll on my blogging abilities. I am so far behind blogging the many wonderful shoots I have had over the past few months. I am taking some heat from some folks, because they have not appeared on the blog yet (I will not name you... you know who you are! LOL!!!) Stay tuned, as I promise to get you all on here!

In all seriousness this year has been unbelievable for us. We have met so many wonderful people and have made so many friends. The work continues to come and we feel nothing short of blessed and honored to be a part in all of your lives. Thank you all! We have been smiling and groaning as we feel growing pains throughout our systems. We are working "on" these systems as much as we are "in" them, so going into next year we will continue to polish and improve. Thank you for being patient with us as we continue to work and improve everyday.

In the meantime look at this lovely image. I want to feel like this every day, don't you???