Jud Dagnall Photography Blog

After the sun set, there were a few minutes of gorgeous color. This image was also taken near Castle Tufa at the Mono Lake South Tufa Reserve.

Sand tufa is smaller, more delicate tufa. This “grove” is located on the way to Castle Tufa at Navy Beach (part of the South Tufa Preserve) at Mono Lake.

My second image from Mono Lake. This was taken near the South Tufa just after daybreak:

Magda and I returned to Mono Lake for another Christmas trip. It was a mellow trip, with varied weather. However, I did get some exciting images that I’ll be posting over the next few days. Here’s the first of the set:

Magda and I did the “Great Bridal Expo” wedding fair at the Fairmont Hotel in San Jose today. Our booth was a new design, and we had a very busy and enjoyable time. Thanks to all the great couples who stopped by.

Kami and Kit had a great wedding on September 30th at the San Juan Oaks Golf Club. I was there again with Craig Smith, and we had a ton of fun. Kit’s a golfer, and we spent a little time on the driving range. They were definitely enjoying the day, and Kit even managed to get in a round of golf before the ceremony! Kami’s father gave an incredibly touching speech, and had the whole place in tears.

And now, the images:

Wow. So many weddings to post, but here’s a start. Golshan (what a cool name) and Manuel are such a great couple, and thanks to Craig Smith for this gig. It was quite a party, with outstanding food, relaxed and really fun family, a full mariachi band, and quite a bit of flair!

And now, the images:

Jodie and Mike had an beautiful, fun and low-key wedding at the incredible Kohl Mansion in Burlingame. They are such a cool couple, relaxed, fun and very classy. I was with Craig Smith and we had a great time.

Jodie looking radiant:

Kohl Mansion:

Mike met Jodie moments before the ceremony to give her the bouquet. It was a very emotional moment.

The guys:

Just before the ceremony began:

The families waiting expectantly for everything to get started:

Jodie with her father:

The first kiss:

The decor was top-notch:

Full of special details:

And the light was just right:

And what a cake:

Their first dance:

Jodie and her father:

Some traditional Greek dancing:

Did I say what a cake ?!

Kohl mansion after dark:

Last Sunday was a scorcher, but I got to spend it with a fun couple Rose and Jeremiah + Leonard Norwitz from lensphoto.

The ceremony was held at the Santa Clara mission:

.

Rose looking radiant with a beautiful bouquet from www.flower-flour.com:

Lighting the unity candle:

What a great-looking couple!

Jeremiah with the girls!

The head table:

Their dance:

They had a spectacular cake:

And to finish off, Jeremiah successfully retrieved the garter using only his teeth, and Rose was laughing all the way through!

I’m sure they’ll have a great honeymoon in Hawaii!

Last weekend I photographed a fun wedding with a great couple, Vicky and Chris. The wedding was held outdoors at Ardenwood historic park in Fremont. I wish them the best and hope that they enjoy their Jamacian honeymoon! Here are some images:

Vicky getting ready:

The beautiful bride:

Chris looking sharp:

The bride waits…

Vicky arrived at the ceremony in a horse drawn carriage!

The ceremony

They had a horse-drawn carriage. I love the expression on the driver’s face!

Chris with all the ladies

During the dancing:

The first dance

Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes were at Yahoo! yesterday. I got a chance to play paparazzi, and get a few pictures.

Tom armwrestling with Yahoo! CEO Terry Semel:

Tom waves to the crowd:

Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes in a sea of Yahoos:

A friend of mine has started a new online referral site called “Mutual Win” – where referrals are golden!

It’s a simple, cool idea– a place where you can take post and/or take advantage of various referral bonuses. If your gym or appartment offers a bonus when you refer someone, you can list it on the site. If you’re looking to join a gym, or find a new appartment, search for it on mutualwin.net. Contact the other party, and arrange to split the bonus. It’s not just limited to gyms and apartments: there are a variety of categories for posting, and you can also create “golden opportunities”, items that don’t fit into the existing breakdown or from which you may not directly benefit.

It’s well worth checking out, and I think there’s a lot of potential here!

The Palo Alto Camera Club has a monthly digital “slides” competition. As part of an ongoing project to automate image submission, I’m creating several scripts to resize/frame and “mat” the images using ImageMagick, a command line utility for windows and linux. It could be also be done via photoshop actions and/or scripting, but since this will eventually be running on a server, I wanted to do outside of photoshop.

The basic requirement is that the final image should be 1024×768 pixels (the resolution of our digital project). If the image is smaller than this, then it should be placed on a black background ‘mat’. The club guidelines require an image that is max1000x750 pixels, and then note that a simple border will be added. So my image magick script does the following:

1. Read an image named input_image.jpg
2. Resize the image to a max of 1000×750 pixels (length x width).
3. Place a 1px white border around the image
4. Place a 1px black border around the image
5. Center the final image on a black background that is 1024×768 pixels.
6. Sharpen the image
7. Save as a quality 85% jpeg with the name “output_image.jpg”

And now, the script:

convert -size 1000x750 input_image.jpg -resize 1000x750 \
-bordercolor black -border 1 \
-bordercolor white -border 1 - \
|\
composite -gravity center - \
-size 1024x768 xc:black \
-sharpen 0x1.0 -quality 85 \
output_image.jpg


I just returned from an incredible five day workshop with Cliff Mautner. It was exactly what I needed! His use of light is outstanding, and he was able to share with us many of his techniques and approaches. I went away feeling like I had a much better understanding of how to use light as the primary tool of photography, both indoors with flash, and outside using available light. His approach to making striking images with backlighting, silhouttes and minimalist is already having an impact on my photography! He kept us laughing and engaged all the way through, and I also had the opportunity to work side by side with some very talented and inspiring photographers from all over the country. I would definitely recommend his workshop to any photographer who wants a better understanding of light. Thanks Cliff!

Magda and I had a booth for Jud Dagnall Photography at the Brocade wedding fair last weekend in Fremont. It went very well: it was fun to speak with all the great couples and and we are looking forward to our meetings. We were happy with our gallery-style booth design.

Here’s a quick shot that we took (+ a little photoshop doctoring for mood ;)