Change is in the air AGAIN….This time it’s Liv in College playing soccer, Jane and Tristan back to school, Ian working many jobs and finishing his degree, the leaves are turning, gardens getting spindly, weddings winding down, senior portrait sessions picking up. It’s always moving. I want to settle in and find that my tendency toward attachment and comfort is so much my habit. Just when I seem to find a groove, change comes. I know it’s good and I have to learn to roll with it better. I have to change too. A confession. I have to learn to love the feeling of the burn in my muscles and lungs from a work out. I have to learn to love the sound of my breath and the senseless chatter that permeates throughout my mind as I focus on the breath. I am comfortable with the nutty busy. Sitting alone in quit meditation, with no distractions is like throwing water on a witch, nevertheless I must learn to love it. I must learn to love the feeling of a growling stomach 3 hours before bed. I must learn to love  the taste and texture of tofu and fish (you can’t duos it with enough garlic and butter for me), flax and raw raw raw everything. I change slowly and my habits are what form me. I must learn to love green tea and vitamins and protein drinks. I love the freedom I feel from a lean, flexible energized body which I am beginning to see go. I know what to do and I know I can not sit around waiting to want to change.  It’s is my experience that in the doing the wanting comes after. All I have to do is a make a decision to to begin. That I have not done yet. Soon I hope.

I love shooting Senior Portraits. I love the creativity, doing the make-up,  styling, coming up  with ideas, playing with the light, but the best part is getting to know my subjects. I really enjoyed my time with Abbey. She is a stunning girl and a darn good soccer player.

in the cosmos

Ab

The Meadow

Lovely

White Shirt

I have captured 12000 images in the last  4 weeks. Many jobs, many personal. This set is from a Sonoma Chic Wine Tasting and Dinner gathering at the Imagery Estate Winery in Sonoma owned and operated by the Benziger Family who also have the  Benziger Family Winery. The Gathering was the first of three events that I covered for Alison and Paul’s  wedding, which ended a week later in Manhatten.

The Imagery Estate Winery has a wonderful Art Gallery and exceptional wine shop. It was visually stunning. The lighting was interesting and challenging dusk, ceiling canister lights, gallery lighting ARG…trying not to use on camera flash too much to wash people out. I shot with a 50mm 1.2:8 with my aperture wide open. 

The most memorable part of the evening for me were the speeches. It was obvious to me that Paul and Alison were equally loved and adored by friends and family. I love the speeches because I get to hear about the people I am photographing from the people that have known them and loved them the most and the longest. It is another way for me to get to know them and it is an intimate opportunity to tune into their emotions and relationship connections. When the speeches start my ears listen intently and my eyes open wide. I am looking for the  reactions to words and if I look deeply enough I see them.

I covered this wedding useing my photojournalism skills and style.

For a glimps of more of this event www.kimjamesphoto.com under Images under Paul and Alison at  I M A G E R Y.

The Drink

While I was at City Model Management in San Francisco, I had a team of test photographers that would test my models. I picked them based on the quality of their work. Lisle Taaje, the owner, has an amazing eye and he taught me what to look for.

Michael Davies was one of those photographers. He was also a breath of fresh air. Tons of great energy, fun and super funny. He was also at my wedding and photographed it as well. Flash forward 16 years introduce Facebook and I find Michael Davis, except now he is a bad ass working photographer, check him out www.michaeldavisphoto.com.

Michael contacted me after seeing some of my Trinity River images and asked to put one on his web site for photogrpahers. It is www.fotoseen.com

About Fotoseen:

Fotoseen is a unique collaboration revealing the world of photography.

We are a creative mélange of commercial, editorial, journalistic and intimate imagery.

Fotoseen showcases photography in an effort to not only inspire but also educate.

As an online community, Fotoseen.com is updated daily to continually archive the work of the photographers and allow them to investigate their work publicly.

In the Fall of 2009, we are anticipating the launch of our first national series of traveling photography exhibitions. This group of shows will be showcased across a variety of U.S. cities. Some of the featured cities will include: New York, Carmel, Las Vegas, and Los Angeles. A percentage of the sales of artwork will go directly to our Artists Education Fund.

Our mission is to create an educational fund for disadvantaged children. This fund will allow them the opportunity to learn the art of photography and equip them with the tools to do so.

Thanks Michael!!

I love this time we get on the River.  For 33 years, most summers I have gone to this place, always with family or extended family. I threaten to write a Stand by Me ish novel about my youth here…I suppose not while we are all still breathing. It was so very wild as a child, but the years coming as an adult have been calm for the most part. This place I dream of and the waters actually make me feel renewed. My children love no other place better. I have only brought one love here and that is my husband Ian when we were dating back in 1988. We went in March when it snowed and the apple tree had blossoms on it.

This place is remote as remote gets and A L L provisions, including water, have to be  hauled in. It took 7 weeks to pack and 3 days to unpack. We brought home a scorpion. Liv got a super bad sting on her bum, just after I finished her make-up of the fairy shoot, and I think it was a scorpion as well. I have never seen a bee sting so big and painful and last so long. She was such a brave champ and let me finish the shoot. 7 images only, but we will remember them as the bad sting.

Ian and I ate like it was our job and we brought home extra weight to prove. Back home to protein drinks. BLEK. Jane, Tristan and my nephew Jake swam all day everyday. Most days the swimming holes were all ours. Lots of growers there now and cell service, first time ever, now if there is a rattlesnake bite we can call for our own helicopter with a hospital about an hour and half away by car.

My mom camped with us and it was really nice to have her. Micheal met us there and my sister and her family camped just down the road. Ryon didn’t come and he was missed.

I read the book THE HELP, first time I’ve read for sport in 2 years and I loved it. It was  brilliantly written and I only wish I could write like this women. Ian read The Shack, which he says has forever changed the way he looks at life, religion and God.

It was a real nice, slow, quiet, very healing and so green of a camping trip. I loved it. It was worth all the work. And now for the pictures.

Ians Blueberry pancakes...Thinking of John

A happy man

River Watching on the Trinity

Watching me watching him

Two of my favorite creatures

Lovin the River missing Ryon

I photographed my friend Trish last night. She is due any moment. It rained all day, cold and windy. I tried to cancel and then she let me know how close she really was.  So I opened myself up to the will of the Universe. They came over we walked out into a very wet and rainy meadow. My front yard. As I was setting my flash the sky opened up and gave us this. And once again I am humbled. Looking at her gorgeous belly and the sky  I reminded I am not the Boss. The Boss has way more imagination, creativity and beauty than my little limited mind can come up with. I am only an observer and documentor. Man, God is so Good!

Trish and Jack

Trishy in her element

The outside studio

walking on the meadow

Soon

And her mother wanted her in a white shirt in a chair. Not Trisha