Jennifer Bowen Photography » Engagement, Wedding, Portrait & Family Photographer // Scottsdale, Phoenix Arizona

My J-bird turns five next month, so I had to take some recent photos of her on this new green chair I just found and fell in love with. I bought it for my office but thought it would work beautifully for certain portrait sessions as well!

As for the child…well, I fall more in love with her with each passing year. If that’s even possible.

If you are interested in a “Green Chair Portrait Session” just drop me a note for more info. :-) Locations are more limited due the ability to carry this far from the car, but there are so many great places this chair can work.

First let me apologize to my clients and all the non-photographers who read my blog, because this post will likely bore you to death. It’s a technical (and long) one regarding equipment that other photographers might appreciate, but for the rest of you, feel free to skip this one.

I wanted to share my thoughts on the new Canon EOS 1D Mark IV. I recently purchased it, but almost feel it was out of necessity, rather than a purely desired purchase. Let me explain.

I have always been a Canon shooter. But as some of my photographer friends know, this past year I have contemplated moving to Nikon. I’m not one of those who has loved the 5D Mark II because I’ve had some issues with mine, specifically  the focus system. After many frustrations this past year shooting with the Mark II (and the focus system already being replaced once by Canon) I’ve put my faith in them that this new 1D Mark IV, with its brand-spanking-new 45-point focusing system, will respond consistently well and be a suitable replacement for my Mark II.

Let me give you a little background as to the equipment I’ve used and my progression through different bodies so it has some context. When I first started in photography about 10 years ago, purely as a hobby then, I learned with film. I bought a Canon Rebel film body, an entry level lens or two, and basically shot it on automatic until I started to learn a little more about shooting manually. Digital SLR cameras really starting taking off about a year later, and being one who was never intimated by technology, I made that jump pretty early on. I bought the newest “entry level” digital SLR body at the time (Canon Rebel), a better lens, and my relationship with Canon digital SLR’s began…

That first Rebel camera worked well for me until I started shooting weddings and quickly realized I needed something that responded much faster and was more ergonomically laid out control-wise. I bought the newly released Canon 20D and found it worked great for the next year, and when the Canon 30D came out, I bought that one and sold the old Rebel. I shot with those two cameras for about a year until I could afford to buy the lovely full-frame Canon EOS 5D. And I fell in love instantly. Moving from a cropped sensor, like all the previous models were, into a full frame quite frankly took my photography to another level. The colors popped more, and the images out of the camera were just seemed to have more depth and dimension.  Not to mention my lenses, by this time mostly pro “L” series lenses worked as they should, meaning I had the full focal distance out of them. I knew that since I had gone to a full-frame sensor, I could never go back. I sold the old 20D and used the 30D as my primary backup, but mostly shot with that 5D for the next 2 1/2 years.

But like all things do, that camera aged with time and the technology had by then outpaced the current features. Like many other photographers out there, I was itching for Canon for release its successor since it had been 3 years since they rolled out a replacement full frame. I followed many of the technical blogs out there, checked in with Canon and other technology sites and forums, and waited impatiently for the replacement. Finally they announced it – the 5D Mark II! – and I quickly added my name to the waiting list at Samy’s, B&H and Crutchfield for the thing. It finally arrived right before Christmas 2008, and I felt like I did the year I got the Cabbage Patch Kid doll from Santa. I was so excited to get my new toy and play with the features and functions, see how high I could push the ISO, and use the movie function to record home videos of Jordan on Christmas morning and of her seeing her new baby brother for the first time a month later.  (Ironically — and quite sadly for me — I accidentally reformatted the CF card of Jordan seeing Alex for the first time in the hospital before I pulled off the video. I pulled all the images but forgot to move the video over since those files were newer to me. Big, big bummer.)

So since that time, I’ve been shooting weddings with the Mark II and the original 5D. There are many things that I do like/love about the 5D Mark II, namely the high ISO and the ability to shoot rather cleanly in very dark scenes with no flash, the larger LCD screen, some of the new functions and  generally the feel of it my hands. I also obviously love the HD video capability for personal use and ergonomically, I find it’s a little ’sturdier’ than the old 5D. And while the huge jump in megapixles was nice (if they are needed, say for shooting the cover of a magazine) I found I usually shot in SRAW 1 so that the files were 10-11 megapixels and not 21. Mainly because a 10 mpx RAW file produces a beautiful image, and working with those massive 21 mpx files requires an inordinate amount of space, both on CF cards and on the computer hard drive and virtual memory.

But what I did not like is that I noticed pretty quickly that this camera’s focusing system was extremely inconsistent. It had a difficult time locking in on a subject in low light conditions, such as receptions or darker ceremony spots, and would often “hunt” for too long, even with very fast prime lenses and all “L” series professional ones. What good is that high ISO for low lighting if the camera can’t focus on anything when you need it to? Many images came out very soft or slightly off focus. My Mark II also had a hard time locking focus in conditions that it should not have – such as high contrast or perfect outdoor light. On several occasions it would hunt between the groom’s tux and the bride’s dress and never focus lock on anything – as if it didn’t know if it should lock on black or white. Many times at weddings this past year, I had to flip my lens to manual focus and just override the whole system so I didn’t miss moments. And for someone who does not have 20/20 vision, that can be a little risky at times. But I usually did better than the AF system did! (Side note: I have used the “back-focus” button approach for a few years now; where you can lock in on your subject with the center focal point and then reposition the camera as needed by switching the functions between your exposure lock button on the back with the shutter button. This always worked brilliantly with the first 5D, but my Mark II would lose its focus on the recomposition half the time. It’s like the thing was on crack and so happy to keep bouncing around every second.  So, I sent it back to Canon and they replaced the entire AF system, saying it did have some malfunction issues. It came back better, but still did not focus as consistently well as my older 5D focuses.)

This past year, I had to increase the number of shots I take at any given portrait session or wedding just so that *something* came out in tack-sharp focus. I could take 3 shots of the same scene where I have changed absolutely nothing focus-lock wise and 2 would be SO soft and blurry and one tack-sharp. As a wedding photographer paid to capture moments, I cannot afford to miss any moments due to a poor internal focus system that is so inconsistent. After a little googling of “focus issues with the 5D Mark II”, I found LOTS of people were having the same issue I was. Turns out there are several blogs and forums burning up with less-than-kind-words for Canon, and specifically this camera and the focus system they should have updated when they released this camera. I wont share those links here only because my intention with this post is certainly not to bash Canon, and you can easily google the issues. As I said earlier, I have always been a Canon shooter, and my goal is to stick with them, because I think by and large they do make great products.

Which brings me back to hinging my relationship on this new 1D Mark IV. When Canon announced it, and the completely redesigned new 45-point focus system, I took a very hard look. I read as many things as I could about the camera, but I was afraid to spend that kind of money on a relatively untested body since I’d had so many problems the last time. And Canon definitely keeps things under wraps as far as all their selected-photographer-testers go; meaning those testers are not allowed to even look at their images on a computer or post them online; they can only view what’s on the LCD, which as we all know can sometimes look perfect there but when you open it up in the computer, sharpness can be off. (Which begs the question: why so much secrecy Canon? From what I understand, Nikon does not have this same approach with their testers.)

But what sealed the deal for me on deciding to move forward with this camera was this review by England-based photographer Jeff Ascough.  It wasn’t so much the {great} images that he did post from the wedding taken with this camera, it was that like me, his big hesitation was the fact that this was not a full-frame camera and therefore, its hard to imagine the files could be as pretty as the files that come out of the full frame Mark II. But as he put it after looking at them – the Mark IV blew the Mark II out of the water quality wise and he loved the focus system. Okay, done.

I will say, so far I am loving this camera. The focus system is much better, hands down. It doesn’t not have a problem locking in really low light, low contrast light or even nearly dark rooms. The files straight out of the camera are beautiful. It is a new body and system for me, since the 1 series cameras are a little different button wise than the 5D’s, and that is taking a little getting used to, but it has a ton of custom functions that the Mark II does not have. I also love that it has a dual card slot. It takes a CF card and a SD card. Battery life remains to be seen as far as shooting a wedding and if it will last all day.

I did a comparison shoot the other day, where I set the two cameras on the exact same settings and took the same image to compare the output. In all cases, the Mark IV focused faster and quieter. I too thought I would notice the fact that it was a cropped sensor more than I am. When you compare the files with the Mark II, you do certainly see the crop, but when its up to your eye, Im not noticing it too much. Im a fairly “intimate” wedding shooter anyway, meaning I like to get up close to capture emotion, so I think this balanced with the full frame Mark II, will work beautifully for 2010 weddings. I can’t wait to put it to use starting March 6 with my first wedding back.

These images are of nothing special; I just wanted to show the color fidelity and quality of RAW images straight out of the camera for comparison sake. Nothing has been done to these except for converting them to JPEG via Adobe Lightroom. All images were taken with the exact same settings: same lens, aperture, and ISO. The shutter speed did vary a little since the sensors are different size. I’ve noted the settings below.

(I would have taken face & eyes shots of Jordan if I could have convinced to her sit still for more than 5 minutes for this, but alas, my almost 5-year-old had more important things to do, like climb the tree. And my client sessions of late have been little kids so its impossible to do a ‘test shoot” on toddlers – so instead you get kids toys! ;-)

This is the Canon 5D Mark II image (ISO 400, 24-70mm f/2.8L lens, shot at f/2.8, 1/2500 second). Used center focal point on the mouse and recomposed. Partially cloudy day; overcast at time of shot.

And the Canon 1D Mark IV image. (ISO 400, 24-70mm f/2.8L lens, shot at f/2.8, 1/4000 second). Same lighting conditions as above. Same focus approach; appears more in focus to me overall.

Canon 5D Mark II image (ISO 400, 24-70mm f/2.8L lens, shot at f/2.8, 1/6400 second)

Canon 1D Mark IV image. (ISO 400, 24-70mm f/2.8L lens, shot at f/2.8, 1/6400 second). This image would be brighter like above if I had backed up a bit, but I wanted to show the crop factor by staying in same place.

Canon 5D Mark II image (ISO 100, 50mm f/1.2 L lens, shot at f/2.0 @ 1/200 second)

Canon 1D Mark IV image (ISO 100, 50mm f/1.2 L lens, shot at f/2.0 @ 1/250 second). Again, appears to capture more detail.

Finally, here are the cameras side by side. My 5DMKII has the battery grip on it, which is nice at weddings because I never need to change the battery. The battery in the IDMKIV is bigger and different, so the “battery grip” is already part of the camera. I’m interested to know if it will last the entire day. Between the two cameras I’ll never run out of juice (and I always carry backup batteries even if I did), but it will be interesting to see how they perform side by side at the weddings this year.

5DMKII on the left. I will say I do like all the main buttons (menu, trash, review) to the left of the LCD like on the 5D, but I am getting used to the other body. Camera/live view function makes much more sense on the 5D also. Not sure why they named it “fel” on the 1D and put it on the front, right by the shutter button.

If you are one of those photographers who has had issues with your 5DMarkII, I’d love to know — or even if you haven’t and want to share your experience with it, please do! I have read some “rumors” that suggest Canon will issue a replacement for the 5D Mark II at some point in the next year or so – with the new focus system – and ideally I would have like to have waited, but in case it takes another year to come out, I didn’t want to wait that long. I also debated buying another original model 5D since I know a few places are still selling them, but after getting so used to the high ISO and bigger LCD, I didn’t know if I could go back to the other model ;-).

Anyway, hope this post helps if anyone else is on the fence about buying this new camera.

Does anyone remember 2009? Everyone I’ve talked to said they felt it just flew by like no other, and I’m certainly no exception to that.

I’m not sure how my baby boy Alex has already grown into a one-year-old so fast, but he has, as of about 2 weeks ago. And boy is he BUSY. Wow. I’m finding out how physically active and into everything boys really are. It’s so different than with my daughter. We didn’t even have to childproof our home (for the most part) with Jordan, but Alex has already figured out how to push the baby gate across my entire office so that he can find a way into the computer equipment. And then there is the lure of the doggie door, so he’s figured out rather quickly how to open the laundry room door so he can climb through that (or try.) And we marvel because Jordan never MOVED FURNITURE AROUND THE HOUSE, while Alex will push whatever chairs or other pieces he can across the floor. Constantly.

Thank goodness he is so much fun and keeps us laughing all day!

Here are a few images from yesterday…

And last week… getting these two together in a shot is nearly impossible!

Boy did it fly by. 2009 can go down on record as the fastest year I’ve lived yet.

But Jennifer, it’s now OVER, you say. I know it’s officially 2010, but the fact that I’m just now able to do my yearly review kind of sums up my life in a nutshell this past year: playing catch up! 2009 was both wonderful and interesting, and busy. Busy with the kids and our family, busy in business, and with me personally.

In ‘09, the biggest blessing of course was the birth of our second child, Alex in January. I cannot believe he is almost one! Holy moly. I wasn’t sure what to expect with two children and was honestly a tad nervous to have a boy (since I come from all girls and its all I’ve known), but I can look back on it now, almost a year later and say it has truly been one of the greatest blessings of my life. Two children has certainly been busier, of course, but also so FUN! I guess the biggest thing I was not prepared for was what having two would do to my heart. Before Alex, I wasn’t sure if I would be able to love the second child the same as I loved my first. How could my heart love another human as much as it loved Jordan? Now I understand why people desire to have 3, 4 or 5 kids. Your heart literally doubles with each new addition, and it’s just as amazing and powerful and passionate as it is with the first. And the added bonus for us is that the whole experience has been so much more relaxed and calm. I think we have been able to enjoy all the stages more the second time around because we know all to well how fast they go by and we just don’t stress about as much. While we won’t be having any more children (2 works great for us!), I can understand why others would want more for those heart/love/added person and soul reasons.

This REALLY feels like it was yesterday. It was, right?

Aside from that big deal for us, some other exciting things happened for my business as well:

In February ‘09, I announced a new partnership with The Royal Palms by serving as their official photographer for the Babymoon Bliss Package. I was so incredibly honored to be approached by Erin Stremcha, marketing coordinator in late 2008 about this exciting opportunity and have had a lot of fun photographing beautiful pregnant mamas and dads-to-be at The Royal Palms this year. Erin just had her own first baby (Baby Parker) recently, so it was so fun to photograph his complete adorableness as well. Since I haven’t shared too many of these on the blog this year, here are a few of the sessions we did in ‘09, and I have another full post coming soon featuring another super cute recent Babymoon couple.

It was also a very humbling, and exciting year of publishings and industry recognitions for me. First Ginny & Dave’s wedding was featured in Ceremony Magazine, a popular Southern California annual bridal magazine, then Arizona Bride Magazine featured some more of my images and included several of them in their Annual Resource Guide given free to all newly engaged couples registering at area department stores, and then the special 10th Anniversary issue of Phoenix Bride & Groom Magazine featured two of my weddings! Aimee & Matt’s and Christy & Josh’s fall weddings were included and each had a nice page feature.  The Wedding Chronicle featured Laura & AJ’s wedding in their Best of Weddings 2009 issue and earlier in the year Allison and Chris’s wedding was featured.

Much to my surprise, I was selected as a Winner of the Brides Choice Awards on www.weddingwire.com, Nominated for Best Photographer 2009through Arizona Bride Magazine readers, and most recently was selected as a Winner of Best of Weddings 2010 from the readers of The Knot. These last 3 are especially meaningful to me since I had no part in soliciting any votes for those – the readers nominated me and all 3 have been a big surprise. Thank you, thank you!!

I was also so thrilled to be featured on some popular wedding blogs in 2009: Southern Weddings Magazine Blog featured Aimee and Matt’s wedding, as well as Sheryl and Dane’s wedding, and The Bride’s Cafe featured some bridal party images of cute gowns that can be found at Twirl Boutique.

I had the chance to really get to know and work closely with some amazing vendors in town this past year, which has been especially wonderful. We are really lucky in Phoenix to have so many fantastic people to choose from, and I feel like I’ve had the chance to form some new friendships, which was been so great. I really want to thank the Sanctuary Resort & Spa for choosing one of my images for their wedding ad (wow – honored!), the Emmy award winning Serendipty Videography chose one of my images for their front page of their website (again, very honored!), and Twirl Boutique for hanging some of my work inside their two awesome stores (in Scottsdale and Chandler – thank you Keri and Jeni!), and finally to FlyJetbird, a corporate aviation company out of Ireland, who found me online and purchased one of my personal family images for their website.

In ‘09, I also expanded the business by bringing on an associate photographer. In May we announced that Jenny Bishop came on board to help shoot portrait sessions. I’ll be doing a feature shortly on some of the great work she has done for me this past year and we’ll actually be expanding her role in 2010 to include wedding coverage as well, and will be adding one more associate photographer to also shoot weddings — details to be announced soon. I’m so excited to expand this part of the business!

Speaking of growing, I also hired Kelly Gill to come on as a studio coordinator and she has been fantastic. I’m soooo happy to have her on the team and love working with her. (Jenny is on the left and Kelly is on the right.)

In September, I launched a new logo and blog design (by the very talented and kind Ryan Brannen of One Red Key) as well as updated my current website with the new look. I also updated my packaging, ordered new business cards that I love, redid some of my branding materials (more are on the way) and implemented a new backend proofing site for clients (PickPic for you photographers.) I received so much positive feedback on the new blog and look, and for that I am thankful. It was a long time coming! While the new gallery website is still in the works because it’s proven to be SUCH a huge undertaking and I keep pushing the project back due to client driven projects that take a higher priority, I can say it will definitely happen in 2010! :-)

After coming back to my shooting schedule in March (post maternity leave) I shot 15 amazing weddings in ‘09. Between my associate Jenny and I, we shot close to 70 portrait sessions this year and met so many new families this year – as well as saw many familiar and favorite faces.

My workshop partner Kim Jarman and I held another round of Create Better Images beginner and intermediate workshops in June and they sold out in record time for us – we were truly amazed! We plan to do these at least twice a year, if not 3 times a year, from here on out because we have just been getting great feedback from you guys who attend them and each have so many clients who ask us about when we plan to do more. So they are coming :-) Also very exciting, in June, Jeff Bills of Serendipity Videography came out and filmed our Intermediate Class and put together this fantastic video for us. Thank you again Serendipity for making us look so good!

The next two classes are scheduled for next week and while they are sold out, we are announcing the dates for the next set here very shortly. Hint: Mother’s Day Gift for all those Mom’s who want to take better pictures of their kids. Stay tuned!

Finally, it wasn’t all happiness – I did have a few sad family moments this year as well. In early May, my grandfather passed away after a long and happy life. I think one of the harder aspects to losing a grandparent is watching your parents deal with the profound loss of their own parent. Both of my paternal grandparents passed on years ago. In fact, my Dad’s dad died when I was just 4, and I vividly remember it being the first time I ever saw him cry. One of the few times later when we lost my grandma, his Mom, 10 years ago this March. Sadly, my Uncle Bob in Vermont also passed away this past summer. He too lived a long and full life, which was celebrated by much of my extended family at a family reunion of sorts shortly thereafter. Sadly I couldn’t go due to my schedule, but felt like I was there with all the pictures my family sent along.

As for 2010, I am SO excited and ready to go! Last year was a bit transformative for me as I had to find my footing again after adjusting to 2 kids. It has not always been easy, but we have settled into a groove again and the kids are doing great, I have found a good balance (on most days) and plan to kick things up a notch this year. I have some really fun products coming for more clients, a few surprises in store, some amazing weddings on the books and so much more. Stay tuned! It’s going to be a great year, isn’t it?

I just wanted to take a moment to wish you all a very safe and happy new year!

2009 has been a very good year — a great year in many respects — but I’m also very excited about 2010 and all that is in store. I’ll share more on Monday (looking back/looking forward) when life gets back into a routine, but for now, both kids are wanting to crawl all over me and we are heading out soon to ring in the new year with some good friends. Two kids home over Christmas break = abbreviated and limited blog posting :-)

Just a handful more photos that I took while in New York City last month. Of course, when traveling with young children, you don’t have all day to roam the streets and take photos to your hearts content, but I did manage to capture a few more along the way…these are in no particular order, just ones I liked for whatever reason while editing them.