friends, family, health, our faith, and, of course, dog ears that just do their own thing:

recently i offered a helping hand to a few new moms who received support from the gabriel project, a faith-based support network. i applaud their decision to bring life into the world and rewarded them with a portrait session.

introducing 3 m.o. evan:


and 3.5 m.o. willa:


and 7 m.o. abigail was there to offer a helping hand, too:

apparently, we do not feed him enough of his two favorite foods, cheese and canned pumpkin. dash has resorted to taking prisoners, including his bunny.



non-violent peace talks are currently underway. we are hoping for a quick resolution.

i stretched my creativity at the break of dawn in the mountains of phoenix on thursday. i experienced a few saguaro cactus while on a hike and found them to be quite strange beings, yet can be photographed just like a person, sans posing or make-up.


and it’s diptych neighbor at a different location and time (around 3pm).


upon closer inspection, this big guy was a bit rude.



a few full-power flashes easily over-powered the sun in this cacti portrait.


on-axis fill, off-camera sb-600 to camera left blends with natural break of dawn.


a self-portrait using an off-camera sb-600 with a cto warming gel to replicate early morning rays.

if there was an award for the world’s longest, cutest eyelashes, dixie the schnauzer would take grand prize. dixie brings a world of joy to melissa jill. i got to meet them both last night and had a wonderful time talking photography with melissa. as we drove around phoenix, dixie was such a cuddle bug and sat so nicely on my lap, of course alerting us to strangers un-met friends on the street.

schnauzers have a legacy in the kern family. my father grew up with schnauzers. i can still remember the dog collar jingle (and the bark :) of my grandmother’s schnauzer, gretel, named from the german origin, ''hänsel und gretel.”

and if there was ever a united nations dog conference, our vizsla dash from hungary would probably sit right next to dixie from germany :)



dixie’s regal stride:


dixie runs to pick out her latest pattern and paw accessory as melissa watches in the background. gotta love those paws!


and we have a winner!


what a great model!


dixie is starting to take interest in boy dogs (she’s almost a teenager in doggie years). apparently, the stocky and stout breeds are just her type :)


dixie wasn’t a big fan of the stairs. i’d be a bit afraid, too, if i had to climb stairs up to my chin covered in dried bubble gum splotches as big as my feet.


what a happy team!


a favorite moment cast in the lingering rays of sunset.

here’s what you get when you put two guys together on a day off, a license to fly, some strobist on-the-run on-axis fill inspiration, photoshop fun, and justification for higher education:

okay, okay. before i start getting calls from forbes, the cover is pure fun. no, it wasn’t really published. no, i don’t work for forbes. but yes, those are real airplane keys. and yes, that is my buddy, gino siller holding the keys about ready to pilot. not only is he a good pilot, but he’s got some great photoshop talent as demonstrated above!

on tuesday’s Veterans Day, we paid tribute to America’s military veterans by joining the friendly skies. the day before, i called up gino. 60 seconds later, we had a guy’s day out planned. spousal approval wasn’t easy... but forgiveness was better than permission on this one (thanks, hon :)

we headed for the airstrip around lunchtime. after gino completed the pre-flight checks, i grabbed my nikon d-300 with my favorite nikon 12-24mm f/4 anti-portrait lens, an sb-600 and triggered this shot using my radiopoppers. metering the sky was easy. f/11, 1/320 sec, iso 100. the pop-up camera flash was dialed down minus 2.5 in the i-ttl mode and the off-camera sb-600 was set to i-ttl “0.” this allowed the my sb-600 to blend in with the sun to serve as my main light (sunglasses prevented blindness.... not something to you want to bestow on your pilot prior to take-off).

i chose the 1/320 second which made it easier to bring down the ambient light and over-power the sun just a tad. new concept? check out the wrap-up from the coffee-shop class 8 about metering with a flash, kern-photo style.

the nikon d-300 pop-up flash served as on-axis fill made famous by dan winters and explained by the strobist’s on-axis fill article. on-axis fill might be against instinct for some pros. but it has an un-canny ability to increase shadow detail, creating a spiffy 3D pop i like.

funny enough, i nailed the exposure on the first shot, thanks to nikon’s awesome flash metering! i took a few more, but chimping on the back of the screen made me underestimate and over-expose a few shots. next time, i should trust my equipment better.

i like simple lighting. with no time to set up big strobes, i chose to decrease the distance to my subject and use small flashes instead. by taking a few steps closer, my small flash downed a can of spinach and became that much stronger (call it the “popeye effect”).


post-processing magic assisted by the totally rad actions.  here's the recipe:  to desatuarate, i ran "bullet tooth" with decreasing the opacity of "gain" and "tone tweak" masks in the advance settings down to about 20-30%, then selectively added back a bit of blue using "big blue" and yellow "green with envy" (selectively painting them where i wanted).  next up, lightly used "pro retouch" on the skin before painting with "can-o-woop-ass" to bring out shirt shadow details and compress highlights a bit.  final touches included: sensor spot removal, resizing, and running kevin kubota's magic sharpen. (total processing time: 5 minutes). btw: there is some funky over-sharpening going on on the right image, but it is getting late and my pillow is calling my head.

and now for the rest of the story...

checking the radio frequencies (we’re not lost, we promise):


landing a centennial airport for lunch, one of the smoothest landings of my life :)


hanging out the window with my fish-eye lens to capture the view 1500 feet above mile-high denver. the wind was sooo strong. i have no idea how pilots in those open-cockpit planes ever did it.


just kidding, honey :)

in actuality, this was intended to be a family portrait session... but 3.5 y.o gage made it more about him, in a good way:) this is the third year photographing the hauptman family. each year we get better and better!!! gage was our youngest wedding guest, weighing in at 5 weeks of age. he’s now the perfect model.




what a ham!


i keep thinking... this kid has some major modeling talent. gage was a pure natural in front of the camera.


my favorite million dollar christmas card photo.


yes, those eyes have attracted a few girlfriends for gage :)


then we headed to bear creek park in lakewood for some more natural colorado landscapes at sunset.


we’ve known these two for many years in training with paragon martial arts. when outside the dojang, i still have a tough time not calling him “master hauptman” (he is a 6th degree master instructor in the american taekwondo association). and faun is a 1st degree black belt... but an honorary 9th degree black belt in the household, or so i’m told :)


gage was super curious about the off-camera flash, asking all sorts of questions about how it works. while the shot is a bit overexposed, it turned out to be a great expression showing his excitement for photography and lighting... my kind of 3.5 y.o.!


rocks & crocs. love it!


i’m not sure the world is ready for this:


ps- and if you are looking for a good realtor, look no further than bill and faun hauptman. they’ve both been super awesome, patient, and wise in helping us take advantage of this buyer’s market :) official house Christmas shopping begins tomorrow for us and we are like kids with 8 shots of espresso and a new puppy.

this dynamic duo in love are good with numbers.

last saturday = [(engagement session - stress + chill) x (boy makes girl laugh)⁴] / 0

the answer, according to my TI-83: undefined.



if their love was represented by infinity, does infinity + infinity + infinity = infinity?



derrick gets the award for knowing how to make janae laugh.


what a cute burberry purse!


derrick does not know serious:


a favorite relaxed portrait.


a great colorado fall day:


the adventure begins:


a true cigar cattail aficionado:

on my last evening in anchorage, before the dreaded 12:45 am flight (that would be a red-eye) to start my journey back to denver, i continued my tradition of sleuthing out as many espresso carts as possible within about an hour.  i was successful in finding another 12 carts, all within the vicinity of anchorage, alaska.  

after researching all 25 espresso shacks, major conclusions include:

+ they are all drive-thru 

+ most, if not all, are plopped on top on cinder blocks at edge of a vacant parking lot 

+ the more colorful or tacky, the better

+ most are locally-owned and staffed with high school kids who make a decent wage (better than flipping burgers)

+ why just serve coffee? some boast bbq, smoothies, hot dogs, and yes, tea.

+ most average less than 100 square feet in size.  that is smaller than a single car garage.

+while the coffee is better than starbucks, there's room to improve in the customer service department

+ they open at an un-Godly hour of 5am, some even earlier.  they usually shut down around 7pm.

+ catchy and not-so-catchy names work the same.  the norm: a cup on the run, java king, hot shot espresso, sugar shack espresso, cool beans coffee shack.  the ones meriting a bit more giddy intelligence: morning moose calf-e, how you bean espresso...

i posted a few favorites below and also the rest here to see all done-up with spiffy, dynamic viewer.