Back in Cabo again!...

Its always a blessing to be back here, one of my wife's top favorite spots in the world. I kinda like it too.  There are Tropical rainstorms for the next two days in the forecast, but hopefully it will be nice for our shoots down here before we head back home at the end of the week.  Here, the Cabo San Lucas airport, packed with planes and you can imagine what that does to the customs lines.  Still getting back into the US takes me the longest.  No complaints however, every travel down here is fun and when I'm with my with wife, I'm always at home!

- Mike Larson 

www.mikelarson.com/blog

Sent from my iPhone

Grace Ormonde Ad

I know the magazine came out a month ago or so, but i wanted to just share my excitment about our new magzine ad. Grace Ormonde who i think is one of the best magazines right next to YWD. I am honored to be one of the select few who were able to have an ad and I wanted to thank Grace, and her staff for letting me share with that magazine. If you are not aware of it, check it out and go to a fine local Bookstore and pick up a copy. It sets the standards for the industry.

Fun In Amsterdam...

(Somehow this didnt get posted on the 19th, but here it is!)
Amsterdam, surprised me, I really had no idea what to expect, you could see the town on the horizon as we got close, but it was not like NYC or LA. Much older, many of the buildings were only 4-6 stories tall. We had such an enjoyable time there. Everything was pretty clean and easy to get around. Almost every turn, every walk, had something unique, I never felt like i was walking down a sketchy road.

The first thing i took a photo of in the city, I thought it was fitting.
I cant believe how much the buildings are leaning, its crazy. As in Piza.

The streets were so quaint and peaceful. The trees, still green from a rainy summer, but some were startiing to drop their leaves, and you could smell fall in the air.

I wonder if they built these buildings at the same time, cause they are so tall and narrow. Below, boaters travel around on a lazy sunday afternoon. This reminds me of a mix between Venice and Boston. Charm, clean, very nice people

This is the Bike town of the world, i saw more bikes here at the same time than i EVER had in my entire life. Having raced in a 5,000 person triathlon, i have seen 5000, but these bikes were lined up for almost as far as the eye could see in a line down a street. Below, I loved these orange bikes, screaming ride for two!

Weather takes a toll on the metal, and many bikes had some cool aging to them. Despite that, very few were locked up. And when they were in use, people would sit on the back, saddle style, feet out to one side, and riding along with the biker.

The city really felt aged to perfection.

Some of the most coveted property is rented by the city, and people "dock" up their boats here and live. This is the view inside on of the converted barges. Don’t judge them by their looks, on the outside, they look like an old sailboat or barge, inside, they are custom designed and remodeled to be a dream home on the water. And they pay two times more rent than the average flat in town!

Parting Shot... I ran out of the car to get this on, across 7 lanes of road to get this picture. I just HAD to have it. next time i get my bike stolen, i am going to come here and feel better...

So Amsterdam, gets a high rating to visit, and from what i do hear, stay off certain parts at night. I guess those rumors are true, but i didn’t see it for myself.

Back from Germany, Belgium, Holland & the UK!

I am I blessed to come home to a beautiful wife greeting me at LAX
after being gone for 2 weeks!! We are heading now to a wedding
rehearsal at the amazing Firestone winery in the Santa Barbara wine
country!! Then I am looking forward to spending some time with my wife
and my friends at home. Thanks to everyone I met in Europe who is
reading this, all of you guys are some of the sweetest people I have
ever met.

Rigo & Lina

One of my buddies that i played soccer in Junior & High School with for a short time, reunited years later at Cal Poly in the last few years of College, we roomed together for a couple years and became great friends again. Rigo has always inspired me as a human who puts others first. I learned that there were people in this world we are all inspired by, and Rigo is one of those few people that i felt accountable to treat others the same, it was so great. Kind of like the best kind of peer you can have. So while i am SO bummed i will be booked to shoot his wedding, i was honored to take his e-session images, and later our studio will shoot his wedding on the 22nd. We had limited light and so I shot almost all of these at 1.2 wiith my 85mm, or at 2.8 with my 24-70. We got a lot of great images in 20 minutes.

I think it helped so much that i was familiar with them, we had a blast and then finished dinner at Giuseppe's in San Luis Obisipo, they had my wifes favorite meal, Butternut Squash. Heh, she always gets that, like its going out of style. Here is a shot of us before we left. What a great evening, congrats buddy!

Amsterdam Tour

Day 3, and I feel totally warmed up now. The people in the Netherlands are amazingly friendly. One of my favorite things is to hear the photographers talk about the industry in their country. I LOVE hearing the differences & similarities, and then comparing to figure out how they match up in America. The topic of the quantity of photographers increasing every month as competition came up. its pretty easy to get into photography came up a lot. As I was sharing with them, creating great images is one key to giving a client something original. The trend today for people to shy away from “traditional or cookie cutter images” or photos that do not really represent who the couple is. Images that years later will show more of their character, and less of traditional poses. I believe that what we as photographers should create art that makes our clients proud of themselves. Not only that, our character of who we are, separates us from other photographers more than the gear we use, or the products we buy. And our reputation and the consistency of the choices we make, makes us who we are. That is important not only in our business, but our personal lives. Thanks to everyone coming to the workshops, it’s a blessing to share with you guys...

Thanks to Peter Geller for shooting these Shots

Here we are demonstrating with two relfectors, how to overpower the sun with no flash. I am addicted to these reflectors, as they have changed the way I photograph, and enhanced my images with sweet warm light. Tech Details : ISO=100, Aperture=2.8 Lens=24-70, Shutter speed 1/1000 sec.

So many great questions were asked about all the possible problems of light and how to overcome them.

Day Two - Duesseldorf, Germany

Today was great during day 2 of the Calumet Photography sponsored we got to talk to 50-60 photographers from the area, one of them even drove the 7 hours from Munich! I am getting used to the translation and Peter (California Sunbounce) was a great help. Most of the photographers who came could speak English, so they would ask me questions in English.

I felt a bit more prepared today. I am learning a lot about the European wedding photography industry, and I think its a few years behind America. Which is exciting in a way, because I can see how these photographers today will be leading the edge in the future. They are so excited to be here and share back their experiences, which is my favorite part, listening to them after the session and during the breaks.
Today I promised them I would take a photo of all of us and post it. These are the few that were left hanging out after the workshop. Here you guys go!

I always like to sit in the back as long as I can during the start of the introductions, and see everything from the back row. Here is my opening slideshow. Thanks to everyone in Duesseldorf!

We are gearing up for our fall Intensive Step it up workshop in Germany later this fall, in Early November some time. More details will be coming soon! Congrats to Sevda Aydin for winning a discounted seat in the seminar!

Right after, Marc from Fototv.com interviewed me and are going to do a 15-20 minute segment about wedding photography and how to succed, have fun and run a good business. Check out their site, he is a great guy and their site is really educational. This site is in German, but they are about to release an English version soon.

Germany Sunbounce Tour starts!

Today kicks off the tour, and while I am stoked, i know little of what to expect, speaking with a translator. As i do start to share, and the room fills up, its kind of crazy, far, far away a group of photographers just like me are meeting to learn how to do their jobs better and serve their clients, and make a living. Here in Munich, there were about 40 people and it was so good to meet so many photogs. Everyone was SO nice and I had a blast.

Nere are are in Munich

Good morning London

They say the wings of a 747-400 lift 13 feet when the airplane is in
the air, and sometimes I stop and think about how crazy it is that I
just flew over the Atlantic in an aluminum can at 521 miles per hour.
Either way I am stoked to be here. Looking down I can see morning
rush hour for all those Brits, but I am still waking up from a good
nights sleep. Today is a beautiful day!

Sweet sunset

I could not help but post this one, I'll put up more later, but here is another one of the sunsets from last night!

Amazing tahoe wedding

After the coolest double header wedding weekend, one in paso robles at
Bianchi winery and the following day at Lake Tahoe. We shot a record
6714 images on Saturday as Janice Casacca did an amazing job with all
the details! Here at Edgewood golf course in Nevada. We had
lightning and thunder right after the ceremony. This shot is from the
sweet sunset!! This was a weekend with no rest, but every second of
shooting with my wife was the best second in the world. Can't believe
i leave for Germany in the morning for two weeks. I still have 30,000
images to edit from the last week or two. I'll be blogging that
adventure daily so check back and to my friends, see you in 2 weeks
and to my couples and clients, I'll be in touch soon! I hope your
weekend was as great as mine. Have an even better week...

Photo of the Week

I have been doing construction on our new office and been working from 7am to midnight trying to get everything done so we can move in october 10th! The blog has been on the back burner, but here is a favorite shot from recently. This is from Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. I am going to be doing these more in the future. Have a blessed day!