We hope this year will be a great year for you and your family.  Perservere in your efforts and great rewards will be reaped.  Shoot for the moon and even if you miss you will land among the stars!  We look forward to looking after all your photographic needs in 2010.

The team at Louise Diesel Photography

As we are celebrating the end of this year and the beginning of the next take some time to reflect upon everything you have learnt this year.  How much you’ve grown and all the friendships you are able to share   We wish you and your family a prosperous new year filled with love and challenges to help you grow and become who you are supposed to be!

Riani

MERRY CHRISTMAS from the Team at Louise Diesel Photography!!  We wish you and your family a happy festive season and a prosperous new year!

How many times have you looked for one of your treasured photographs?
You think to yourself it must be somewhere in this shoebox or on that CD - SOMEWHERE being the operative word.
Louise Diesel Photography has the perfect SOLUTION for you!
Throw the shabby old shoe boxes and old cd’s away, you don’t have to start the computer up and crowd around the screen.
Create the ultimate coffee table storybook with all your memories and comments. Your imagination is the limit…..

We now also specialise in designing, printing and binding of storybook albums.  Each and every album is custom designed(you can do it yourself or we can do it) and hand crafted to guarantee that your memories will come to life in your personal one of a kind coffee table storybook.

We offer a unique value added service in printing two different types of storybook albums.  The first coffee table storybook that we offer is used locally as a personalised gift for mother’s day, holiday photos or just a family photo abum.  This album comes with magazine style pages and a personalised cover.

Our second album is used nationwide as a wedding album.  This album comes with 2mm thick pages an a bonded leather cover(cream or black)  It has metal corners in gold.

Both of these coffee table storybooks make unique gifts or table decorations.  It’s a quick nd easy method of making sure your photos will be around for your children and grandchildren.  Contact us for more info…

I got commissioned to do a professional photoshoot of a new Indie Rock Band a few months ago.  We considered doing the shots in studio but I then decided that we needed a more
‘worn down’ location for me to create the right feel in the images.

So off we went to this old warehouse premises.  The warehouse is quite run down but parts of it is still in
use by panelbeaters, bakkie canopy builders and so forth.

The aim of the photos was to come up with an idea for their new cd cover(Front and inside of the booklet)  When you photograph a group of people like a band we want to portray the mutual friendship and comaraderie they share. I had them take their instruments(guitars/mike’s whatever they do in the band) with, to make our shoot more interesting.

Despite being able to sing in front of large groups of people they’re all quite shy and it took a lot of hard work to get them all used to being in front of the camera.

I just snapped away and eventually they got so used to having me moving around them, climbing on top of things and sitting on the ground they just seemed to relax and forget about the camera. Perfect, I got a few natural shots of them playing on their Fender electric- and Ibanez acoustic guitars, even playfully attacking each other with the microphone.

The secret is to keep them moving around, so that in the end you will have a wide variety of backgrounds and poses to choose from.  Sometimes it is necessary to ask them to
pose in a certain way, other times just put them in front of a rugged background and have them playing guitar or chatting about upcoming or past performances.

Interactive posing is something I have found to work very well when photographing groups of people like a new band.  Think of interesting things for them to do like jumping from a step, throwing their jackets/caps in the air or acting like a heavy metal rock band for instance.  And don’t forget, subtle flattery will get you everywhere…   Keep encouraging your subjects, tell them you like the pose, their jacket is awesome and just laugh  with them and enjoy the shoot.

Don’t be afraid of trying a funky new idea or photographic technique.  People like musicians are also artists who want to express themselves.

At the beginning of the shoot it’s a good idea to sit down with your clients and chat to them so that you can form a good idea of who they are, what they like to do and how you should portray them.  50% of your
shoot should be planning, where, how, lighting etc.

With outdoor photoshoots the weather plays an extremely important role.  Always be prepared for the unexpected. Even though your only going to shoot with your hotshoe mounted
flash, take one of your studio lights and an extension just in case.

Consider the angle and height of the sun.  Maybe you want the

harsh sunlight at 12 in the afternoon but watch out for squinty eyes.  You can even get some funky sunglasses and issue everyone with a pair to try something different.

Groups of people always look good when you pose them on different levels.  Try not having everybody standing on the ground, have someone sitting in their haunches, or kneeling down.

Maybe have the next person stand on a crate or on a rock.  Otherwise your shot might be a bit static.

This shoot ended up being a lot of fun and these guys don’t sing too badly either

Just go with it!

Riani

As professional wedding photographers we get the chance to meet people from overseas and photograph their weddings in South-Africa.

Take a couple like Buford and
Tersia who are from Dubai, they got married last week just outside Alberton at a venue called Thornebirds wedding and conference centre.  I’ve only ever heard about
Thornebirds wedding and conference centre but this was my first wedding that I photographed there.  The place is quite small which just makes for a very intimate

setting in which to celebrate such a joyous ocassion.  Thornebirds has amazing well established gardens, green grass everywhere, very tall trees and even a small
riverlike water feature.

So naturally the bride and groom opted for a picnic setting for the wedding reception.  It had been raining since Saturday and the weather bureau predicted rain
throughout the day.

When I met with the couple on the Monday(2 days before the wedding) Tersia kept telling me that it wasn’t going to rain.

I remember waking up on Wednesday
(the day of the wedding) and looking outside my window just to see what the weather looked like, and believe it or not there wasn’t a drop of rain that fell that day. It wasn’t
too hot or too cold, all in all a bright summers day.

Tersia(the bride) being an unconventional

girl, went for a Marilyn

Monroe hairstyle with a piece of net covering half of her face and a hairpiece with white
feathers.

The wedding was peacock themed, so there was quite a lot of coloured feathers and the colours of a peacock involved.  It

was so totally different and really
showed you a lot of the Bride’s personality.

The bride and groom was totally comfortable with me as the bride’s mom does scrapbooking at my mom’s scrapbooking shop so I have talked to Tersia a few times, and
she’s seen a lot of my work there.

Creative freedom is one of the greatest things a bride and groom can ever give their photographer. Youre photos will be even more
striking because photography really is an art form where you the photographer gets to express how you see the world.
Someone who knows both Tersia and Buford really well told me that even though Tersia hasn’t always been dating Buford, that her heart has always belonged to him.

Throughout
the course of the day I could see that what I’ve heard couldn’t have been more true.
They really had a blast and I wish you guys all of the best!!

Riani

Photos on DVD!!

One of the things that I love doing is creating personalised animated dvd’s of your photographs – click on the link above to view a sample dvd.

I think that the photographs just come alive with the music and special effects and is a wonderful way to view your photographs and friends and family. They come in high-resolution dvd format and can also be posted to youtube for overseas friends and family to view. They also make lovely gifts.