A is for awesome, astounding, admirable, amazing and it’s also for Abby and the A game she brought to her senior session which had a little of all of those aforementioned and appropriate words when describing the results. Haha – see what I did there? The whole relationship started off in hilarious fashion when Abby and her mom Sharon walked into the studio for the first time and busted us doing our zany “Sir Doug & Lady Ally” Periscope act and it turns out they just fit right in! Both of them are cute funny and snarky and we had an amazing time together on Abby’s session!
Hi Abby…
So let’s say hello to our beautiful senior…. We started out in the studio and we’ll highlight one photo on the brown background:
“A” also stands for adorable…. 🙂
Before we head out to the location photos let’s take a look at the behind the scenes action from our day as we like to do. First we have our vine for your 6 second looping pleasure and I really love this snippet since it captures much of the story with Abby’s sweet personality!
Next we have the extended replays of the live Periscope broadcasts from our YouTube channel we did which are plenty of fun! You can download the app and follow us on Periscope at @FrameableFaces at this link.
Abby Brings Her “A” Game!
Keep in mind that Abby is a North Farmington Raider (just like us) and we only expect greatness from Raiders so we weren’t surprised at what a pro she was… She killed it – take a look:
Fantastic…
Our conditions were perfect for this shoot – a little hot maybe but not unbearable. And we had some nice breezes here and there out on the dock for the series that produced this winner…
We’ll leave you with this last one in front of the Quarton Lake waterfall in Birmingham which serves as a nice background…
Beautiful!!! And there it is – Abby’s “A” game and an amazing session. We hope you enjoyed the highlights of our day with her!
Ryan’s session is the first official senior guy session for the class of 2017 and he definitely led the way in style! We have known Ryan for a long time but not well – one of those things where we’ve known his family and more specifically his mom Jodie going back to high school days. We photographed him before when we did family photos for them, but this was the first time we really hung out with Ryan for an extended time and we really had a lot of fun with him!
Focused dude…
One of the things that impressed us about Ryan (and you’ll see this if you watch the Periscope replay) is when asked by a couple of viewers of our live broadcast what subject he likes the most and what he wants to study he didn’t hesitate – just matter of factly answered “Econ” and “Business”. I didn’t really have a clue at that age, so kudos to Ryan! As for the session, he came solo and had two different dress shirts for the formal shots to go with the casual stuff. Totally prepared – clean cut and ready to rock (not just with the photos but the kid likes classic rock too – which instantly makes him cool). So let’s get ready to rock here, starting with our studio photos…
We started with the formal look with the grey fabric backdrop – this is a combo we like a lot!
GQ! What a stud.
Next we moved to a little bit more of a casual look with a sweater for this one…
Looking good with the black background!
Before we head to the location photos let’s look at the behind the scenes action shall we? First with our fun 6 second looping Vine where Ally is having a little fun with Ryan – haha!
Even his Snapchat story was pretty epic which you can check out on Slinger at this link!
Next we have the replay of our live Periscope broadcasts from our YouTube channel for your extended viewing pleasure! Download Periscope and follow us at @FrameableFaces and/or watch the broadcasts on Twitter!
Ryan Leads Us…To The Location!
Heritage Park is a great location for outdoor sessions and we got some great stuff with Ryan. This was a later session where we planned to get some off camera flash going and the results are fantastic…
First we have a nice close up with the barn in the background…
And lastly an off camera flash photo…
Cool!
And there you have it – Ryan leads the way for the guys and we are really off and running with this senior class! We hope you enjoyed the highlights of our time with Ryan!
Where do we begin with Taria and her EPIC senior session in the city – the city of Chicago that is!!! Okay let’s start with Periscope – impossible not to start there…
We met Taria’s mom LaTannya on Periscope about a year ago and loved her right away. She’s hilarious and we started hanging out in each other’s broadcasts which led to a visit to our studio when she was in Detroit with her sweetheart of a daughter Taria! That night a random person in the mall popped into the studio with a British accent which is a whole other backstory in itself (which some of our Periscope peeps will be familiar with) and without going into too much detail let’s just say all heck broke loose! Here’s a snippet from Vine…
You can see Ally, LaTannya and Taria all dancing with the friend we made that night!
Flash forward to this year and LaTannya had been saying that she wanted us to take Taria’s senior pictures which we were so excited for! The original plan was for them to come to Detroit, but we received an invitation to speak at Podcast Movement 2016 about Live Video in Chicago so we thought how cool would it be to do the location part in Chicago while we’re there? The invitation to speak at PM16 didn’t come with a ton of advance notice so we got on a Skype together to plan the whole thing out, and we made it happen!
A Taste of Traffic, Weather, & General Madness…
This was a session that had a little of everything in the way of obstacles and challenges – a ton of traffic for LaTannya and Taria coming downtown, A Taste Of Chicago going on in the area we were shooting, storms hovering in and around Chicago, protests, blistering heat, and a couple of creepy dudes. And yet, teamwork prevailed and we kicked some butt, Taria was a superstar and the session turned out amazingly! And we made another friend which we’ll get to later, but in the meantime let’s get into the photos!
We started at Grant Park and this was the part of the session we broadcasted live on Periscope. That alone was a surreal experience since we met on Periscope and it wasn’t lost on us that an app brought us together in such a wonderful way! We’ll start with this smiling close up of Taria:
What a beauty!
At this point the rain started to come down and we took shelter for the delay… Before we get back to the rest of the photos let’s take a look at the behind the scenes action from the day – first with our fun Vine for your 6 second looping pleasure:
Next we have the replays of the live Periscope broadcasts from the day from our YouTube channel. The second part includes the hilarious Uber ride to the Adler Planetarium for our night time skyline shots. Denise the Uber driver was amazing and once again it turns out that making friends seems to be a theme when we get together….lol.
Once the rain let up we headed into the Taste Of Chicago for an idea we had for Taria posing with a bunch of people around in the background. We got a few great photos but it was amusing to see people walking in front of Ally oblivious to the fact that a photo shoot was going on – not that it was their fault at all – we were the ones who picked a crowded event to just plop down and start taking photos. Meanwhile we got some great results including this one:
We did have a chuckle at one point when LaTannya took matters into her own hands and decided to “direct” traffic a little…. here’s a shot of that scene that didn’t quite make it into the proofs… Haha!!!
…and that’s why we LOVE LaTannya.
At this point we headed back over to Michigan Avenue where there are some great old buildings with some great textures for another series of photos in another outfit. Here’s one of those:
Love it. Taria was really feeling it at this point – such confidence!
Taria In The City…
And here is the coup de grace… After a break for dinner and some deep dish Chicago pizza we had our awesome Uber driver Denise take us out to the Adler Planetarium as you saw in the video for the best night time vantage point of the skyline for some off-camera flash photos. Denise waited for us while we hopped out to set up the shot, and this was no easy task. This is where I personally marvel at Ally’s ability under pressure to change camera settings, position off camera lighting, bump the flash power up or down and even position LaTannya with the hand held Ice Light to get the proper lighting and focus. Here is one of the results….
And there you have it! This may actually be “part 1” here on the blog, because there may still be some follow up studio photos here at Frameable Faces with Taria in the near future. Until then…. we hope you enjoyed the highlights of Taria’s session!
There is always something special about our first official senior photo session of a new class – we love photographing seniors and the first session signals so many things for us – new friendships, a new summer, and tons of fun! Mikaela was no exception on all three fronts – great girl (and great mom Jill), great summer day, and lots of fun!
A Session of Firsts…
Not only was the session fun but it represented some true firsts for us. Not only the first senior of the season, but our first session on the ice, and our first time photographing in Royal Oak! But before we get to the ice and the outdoor fun let’s start in the studio briefly where we began the session:
Stunningly beautiful on the black background!
Mikaela Leads The Way…
Before we head out to the location sneak peeks let’s take a look at some of our fun behind the scenes action! First our 6 second vine for your looping pleasure!
Next we have the three part replay from our live Periscope broadcasts from the day. Mild disclaimer here – the second snippet when we are on the ice starts with me shaking my head… I didn’t start the broadcast that way but for some reason a piece of it was missing on the replay… Haha – ahhh technology! If you haven’t followed us yet on Periscope you can download the app and follow us at @frameablefaces at this link. Enjoy!
For now you can watch the replay on the YouTube channel HERE.
Okay now back to more awesome photos…
First we have a close up against a natural backdrop – like I said we had a perfect day!
….and a perfect model.
Next we have a photo from the ice. This was a fun challenge – ice is actually kinda slippery you know…. It was a little treacherous – I was out there with the off camera flash and Ally – well let’s say she’s been known to wipe out once or twice in her day… Okay so have I…. But we pulled it off and got some great results including this one:
Last but not least we have one more photo up close and personal with our wonderful first senior with a little city texture:
Those eyes!!! And there it is – we hope you enjoyed the highlights of our epic day with Mikaela – a fantastic way to kick off the new class!
I am NOT a professional photographer. Let’s get that straight – and I will not be any time soon. I have always loved photography, always had a camera and have always had a nice amateur eye. So being in the photography business with my amazing professional photographer wife Ally has given me a chance to be involved in it, and to play around with the behind the scenes photos when I’m creating content to promote what we do.
iPhoneography…
Meanwhile the cameras on iPhones and smartphones in general have become better and better – the quality is quite amazing for everyday amateur use and the tools and filters let you have a lot of fun. We’ve always said that the more people appreciate everyday photography the more they will appreciate professional photography, and we embrace the technology and use it to highlight the photos we take for our clients.
To that end I’ve become fond of the Panorama option on the iPhone, and I made sure to grab a pano of each spokesmodel session for the class of 2017. I thought maybe these could make a fun blog post and so here we go…..! These are unfiltered by the way with the exception of Ally brightening one or two of them.
2017 Spokesmodel Panoramas!
Lily
With Lily we went to Heritage Park in Farmington Hills and I got Ally here in action with Lily under this pretty trellis.
Haven
Haven rocked it in the studio on this purple background with the light wood floor – I got up high for this angle…
Nick
Bending an alleyway in Birmingham as Nick mimics Ally’s pose…
Lacey
Our Lacey at Belle Isle where if you look really closely you can see the Detroit skyline in the distance to the right …
Ilyssa
Ilyssa with the blue on the blue door in Pontiac on a cold and overcast day…
Marie
Marie lounges on the “throne” in the studio on the red background and the dark wood floor…
Ben
Ben chilling on a footbridge – another bend in reality…
Aria and Maya
Aria and Maya go back to back in downtown Detroit with the awesome murals of “The Belt“.
Kinda neat huh? We hope you enjoyed these class of 2017 spokesmodel panoramas! Let us know what you think!
Nick is next up in our Class of 2017 blog posts, and yes he’s the subject of the last of these, but he’s far from the least! This guy is great – bursting with personality and we liked him the minute we met him. Funny enough we ended up sealing the deal with him representing our studio as a spokesmodel when Ally and I went out to eat at Social Kitchen and Bar in Birmingham – Nick was the host that night and we didn’t even know it! He was the first person to greet us when we walked in (we had already met with him and his mom Sally)! Everything about that night was pretty cool as a side note – the restaurant has owners who are parents of one of our seniors, three of our former seniors work there, and now we’ve got Nick! You should eat there – it’s awesome.
Nick Is Next…
But back to Nick. This guy showed up with what seemed like a whole closet of clothes (according to him only a third of his wardrobe) and let’s just say the kid has style! We joked that day and since that ya gotta have options! Lol… Let’s start with a formal shot on the black background:
What a stud.
At this point we headed outside because we wanted to get some variety in Birmingham, but before we look at those let’s see some behind the scenes action – first with our 6 second Vine for your looping pleasure…
Now for your extended viewing if you like here are the replays of our live Periscope broadcasts from our day. If you haven’t downloaded Periscope yet you can do so and follow us at @FrameableFaces at this link.
Okay now for the location photos… Shades, sun, flowers, steps, casual pose – cool!
And more steps….but a totally different aesthetic….
And we’ll leave you with this one – we like cityscapes with brick, alleys and the like!
Another awesome spokesmodel and another awesome session! We may still have some fun recaps coming about our Class of 2017 team, but even more exciting we’ll have new seniors to present soon – including a new round of posts featuring this awesome crew of 9 as they return for their own senior pictures!
You know when the great Gabby makes her return you’ll be in for some, well…greatness! Hehe… But seriously – the fact of the matter is we have now photographed Gabby 4 times! First as the little sister in her sister Rachel’s senior session a couple years back, as a spokesmodel for us for the class of 2016, again for the spokesmodel mural currently in our window and now for her senior session which we present highlights of to you now!
Great Gabby Makes Her Return…
We started out here in the studio and we kept it pretty simple. Just the black and the white backgrounds. We’ll share one on the black here… just a great representation of Gabby being her cute smiley self:
From there we’re going to head to the location photos since that was more of the focus of this session, and for the outdoor shots we went to Heritage Park in Farmington Hills which has a ton of variety to work with… Before we look at the photos though here’s our behind the scenes fun from our day – first with our 6 second Vine for your looping pleasure:
Next we have the replays of our Periscope broadcasts from the day – in this case we have the video without the comments scrolling on the screen but you’ll get the idea, and we love that Gabby’s mom Lisa makes an appearance and it’s really fun towards the end when the two sisters take over the broadcast for a few minutes! You can download Periscope and follow us at @FrameableFaces at this link:
Now let’s get to the rest of the photos!
First we have this fun photo of Gabby on the back of a trailer – we used a tractor, a trailer…. we had a good laugh and this photo is awesome!
Next we have a close up and more thoughtful pose of Gabby and something about it just really shows off her beauty…
Lastly a pop of color from some nearby flowers help to make this photo a gem!
And there you have it! We had a blast with Gabby and we hope you enjoyed the highlights of her session!
Ben leads the way for the two guys we have in our class of 2017 spokesmodel crew! Ben is another one of our daughter Lacey’s friends and Ben’s parents are friends of ours too. Ben is sharp guy – smart and driven and we like him a lot! He did a great job on this session which is cool because not all the boys dream of posing for pictures for a couple hours. I think Ben had more fun than he expected which is usually how it goes!
Ben Leads…
After a string of 7 straight girls Ben is our first guy spokesmodel for this class and we started off with the GQ formal look here in the studio on the grey background…Dapper dude…
One more in the studio with a more casual look…
At this point before we head on location we’ll take a look at the fun behind the scenes footage from the day! First we have our 6 second vine for your looping pleasure:
Next we have the replays of our live Periscope broadcasts from our YouTube channel. You can subscribe to the channel and you can also download the Periscope app and follow us at @frameablefaces there at this link. It’s fun! Ben’s awesome mom Gina makes an appearance and so does Lacey as a guest host for a couple minutes!
Okay now let’s take a look at the location photos from the trails behind the West Bloomfield Library – it’s really nice back there…
Definitely one of our favorite shots of the day! Blue shirts bring out blue eyes nicely…
We’ll leave you with this last one by the city hall…
Good stuff! We had a great day with Ben and we’re happy for him to lead the way for the class of 2017! Stay tuned – Nick is up next on the blog! We hope you enjoyed these highlights of Ben!
Ilyssa has never been afraid to go after what she wants. When she was three she decided that our Lacey should be her friend and she made it happen. She brought our families together in doing so and we’ve been friends ever since – going on 14 years! So this was another of those surreal sessions that we have with family or long time friends and it was quite fab indeed. “Lissy’s” older sister Rachel was also a spokesmodel for us a few years ago so this is the second time around with these guys… but as a crew they’ve been in here every holiday season for their holiday cards so this was a familiar scene!
Ilyssa & Lots of Fab…
We started out in the studio on a day we weren’t so sure about – unseasonably cold and potential rain… We broke out the damask pattern for the first shot and we love the hat – hats are way underrated for girls – they almost never fail!
She looks amazing!
At this point we noticed that there was much more light coming in through the center court skylights than we thought – so we made the snap decision to go on location to Pontiac right then and there. It was really cold but the lighting was pretty good and it was dry so we went with it…
We spotted this doorway and combined with Lissy’s dress it was a total winner! Love the blue on blue!!!
Before we show our last two sneak peeks let’s see our fun behind the scenes footage from our day! First with our fun 6 second looping vine:
Next we have the replays of our Periscope broadcasts which are always fun from our YouTube channel. Subscribe to us there and follow us on Periscope at @frameablefaces! You can download the app at this link.
Okay let’s get back to a couple more sneak peeks!
Ilyssa had an outfit change on location and we got this cool shot on this staircase…
Now if you remember we kinda raced out to the location when the weather appeared to break, but we still had some studio work to do, so back to the studio we went to wrap it up on the black background…
Oh – hey beautiful! Love the shades.
And that will do it for now!!! A little bit of Ilyssa and a whole lot of fab! We hope you enjoyed the highlights of our day!
Nadia is a natural – a beautiful photogenic, athletic, softspoken and all around nice girl. We had a lot of fun with her and her mom Thyawana over a long period of time which is kind of nice. Not a typical session because we broke this one up into multiple seasons, but it’s nice to put together a session that is out of the box once in a while especially when snow is involved!!! Every year a few seniors want the snow and we’ve had some amazing snowy sessions – this was one of them.
Nadia’s fall photos….
But before we get to our winter wonderland we got together on a cloudy day last fall for a few photos over at Nadia’s high school Birmingham Groves for some really nice shots on the field and in front of the school – they had this all planned out for what they wanted and the results are awesome. Here’s a representative photo from that day of Nadia in her letter jacket on the school sign that we think is so much fun!
Now before we switch seasons, let’s take a look at some of our fun behind the scenes action from the session(s)! Let’s start with our six second vine for your looping pleasure:
Next we have the replay of the live Periscope broadcasts from both of those days – the first broadcast has comments and the second does not but they’re still both fun! If you haven’t downloaded Periscope yet you NEED to – you can do so and follow us at @frameablefaces at this link.
To The Snow…
We reconvened on the West Bloomfield Trail in a snowstorm for these amazing photos. Huge fluffy flakes that at one point were so thick they actually posed a challenge for Ally to find Nadia through the flakes! Here is a prime example:
Incredible! Nadia is just stunning too…
This is one of our favorite snow photos which several of our seniors have rocked over the years:
Let’s leave you with one more with this fabulous full length photo of Nadia….
So there you go! Nadia was definitely a natural and the different seasons made our time with her quite memorable! We hope you enjoyed the highlights!