Michael Tallman Photography Blog

Lauren and Greg are our next door neighbors and good friends. We couldn’t have picked better next door neighbors, and we got to know them quickly thanks to our dogs - Sage and their dog Chewey are best friends. Leah and I have had many impromptu dinners together with Lauren and Greg due to how close our 191Xs era bungalows are. If Greg has a tasty leg of lamb on the grill, I can smell it from my front porch. We’ve got each other’s keys in case either of us run out of toilet paper or eggs. I don’t think we would know them as well if we were living in the type of houses that are being built today.

Lauren and Greg needed an announcement picture so I offered to do one for them if they would be patient enough while I fiddled with some new lighting setups. I would much rather find good light than make it myself but I am always trying to add options. We took these pictures half way up Little Cottonwood Canyon at dusk. Lauren and Greg are getting married this September. I’m totally bummed that I won’t be around for their wedding, because I have another one to photograph!

The picture below is Lauren and Greg and another friend Rick skinning up the ridge to Silver Fork Bowl, in between Big and Little Cottonwood Canyons. This was taken on one of the rare sunny days during our winter long snowstorm. I think we left the house at about 10 AM that morning - life is tough in Salt Lake City!

Here are some more images from Maggie & Dan’s engagement session in Boulder, Colorado. I met Maggie & Dan at their house in downtown Boulder, and they took me up to the Red Rocks near Mount Sanitas, a popular hike in the foothills on the west end of downtown. I found out that Maggie’s engineering firm is working on the new visual arts facility at the University of Colorado. The university recently tore down the old fine art building where I developed my first rolls of black & white film back in college. We took pictures up on the red rocks as the sun went down behind the mountains and the moon came up. The twilight definitely stole the show. Maggie and Dan’s wedding will be in September in Boulder, with a reception at Chautauqua Park up against the Flatirons. See the rest of the photos by linking to the slideshow below.

Here are the rest of the images from the engagement session I did with Sam & Ian a couple weeks ago on the Pearl Street Mall in Boulder, Colorado. I had to put off editing these for a few days while I moved all of my computing over to a new Mac. That Windows Vista had to go, it was driving me nuts and I couldn’t handle the thought of editing another season worth of weddings on it. Much happier now - I’m starting to see why everyone loves their Mac so much.

I knew we would get along well when Sam suggested meeting at Lucile’s, the best breakfast spot in town. They start you out with Beignets (New Orleans style doughnuts), then serve a massive plate of breakfast and a delicious but totally unnecessary biscuit. We discussed Sam & Ian’s July wedding in Steamboat Springs, Colorado over a late breakfast and then walked around the Pearl Street Mall area to take some pictures. The tulips were out in full bloom on the pedestrian mall, you can see them framing the first picture up above in the foreground. See the rest of the photos by clicking the link to the slideshow below.

I started laughing immediately after I clicked the shutter on this one in Sugarhouse Park last night. That’s our dog Sage with the tennis ball, and the crazed looking brown blur is her friend Lady. I was taking pictures of Sage and Lady sitting together in the grass when Lady suddenly decided to launch after something. I love this kind of accident!

When you have a phone? I went to the Denver Art Museum on Saturday to refresh the visual data-bank with a little Cezanne and Degas. My back was a little tweaked from hauling all of my heavy professional lenses around on my shoulder all day Thursday and Friday, so I left the big camera behind. It was the first time I had seen the new Denver Art Museum expansion, a fantastic building designed by Daniel Libeskind. The way the faces and angles of this building play with light is amazing - notice how the surface of the wall in the second photo down looks like it is curved (it’s not). I had to take a few pictures and all I had was my phone, but I think the prescence of this structure still comes through in a megapixel.

I automated a process to make these cell phone pictures look decent in photoshop - you just need to blur out the ugly low quality digital texture and replace it with a more organic looking texture.

Maggie and Dan took me up to the Red Rocks in the foothills of Boulder, Colorado for my second engagement shoot of the weekend. It was fun for me to do these engagement shoots using two different sides of Boulder, where I spent seven years of my life. Maggie and Dan’s session was a good shoot that turned spectacular after the sun went down and the twilight started working its magic. The moon was a surprise bonus. Just wanted to post a couple favorites before I head back to Utah today - a full posting of these will come sometime in the next week or two.

I’m in Colorado this weekend visiting with family and meeting up with two of the couples I will be photographing in weddings later this summer. I met up with Sam and Ian (above) on Pearl Street in downtown Boulder for a fun engagement photo session. Sam & Ian’s wedding is in Steamboat Springs, Colorado in July. I’ve got another engagement session tonight with a different couple and then back to Utah tomorrow. Full post of Sam & Ian’s photos coming soon.

Last Friday I had the honor of second shooting for my good friend Erin of Erin Kate Photography. Erin was photographing Paul & Yoko’s gorgeous wedding at the Mill Creek Inn, a short drive west into the mountains from Salt Lake City. That’s right - Paul and Yoko got married. It’s been a while since I have been the second shooter at a wedding - it’s great to be able to play around with the camera and experiment when the pressure is not on as much. Erin was doing a fantastic job, so I focused in on some of the beautiful details that Paul and Yoko had arranged. There were also a lot of kids at this wedding who always make for great pictures. I picked out a few of my favorites for a slideshow, click below to see it.

I took this YESTERDAY up at Snowbird. That’s right, May 1st. Apologies for the low-fi quality but I took it with my cell phone (and some drastic photoshop efforts). Although I have a ton of projects that I want to finish before wedding season gets underway for me, I couldn’t pass up one more big powder day. I ran into my friend Kristi and we took a few runs - this is her ripping through the foot and a half of classic Utah powder that fell the night before. Salt Lake City is such a good place to be. Leah and I went up again today to get some of the leftovers and skied un-tracked powder all morning. We had to quit a little early because I was second shooting at a beautiful wedding for a friend of mine - I’ll post those here in the next few days.

And they give me great feedback.  One of my favorite things about being a wedding photographer is the feedback I get when the bride & groom see their pictures.  It’s so rewarding to touch people on a personal level like that.  My clients may even do a better job describing the purpose of my work than I do, so I highlighted this recently when I changed the opening page of my website to a slide show.  Check it out.  Thanks to all of the brides & grooms who sent me those kind words!