For the last few weeks, my oldest son, Jacques-Charles, has been capturing images of Winnetka in preparation for the Winnetka Sidewalk Sale on Friday, July 16th and Saturday July 17th. He will be selling his 11"x14", 8"x10", 8"x8", 6"x8", 5"x7", and 4"x6" images mounted in 10"x10", 11"x14", and 16"x20" Archival Museum Quality Mats ready to put in a frame.

Below are some of the images available for purchase at the Sidewalk Sale. If you are interested in viewing Jacques-Charles' work or purchasing a print (or two), please come early as quantities are limited.

Corey + Mike engagement photo session was shot on location downtown Chicago.

Giant replicas of Grant Wood's farmers in his 1930's American Gothic painting (Art Institute of Chicago) have been erected in front of the Wrigley Building. Corey + Mike adopted a contemporary version of the farmers' poses with modern bag and mobile phone. For the final images, the colors of Corey's jeans match the farmer's wife dress and Mike's jacket and jeans match the farmer's.

Rather than the traditional under the dirty L shot, I used a slow shutter speed with a little flash to give it a more busy and urban feel.

Whoo Hooo!

Lips on lips on lips

JR has added the stunning new Zeiss 21mm f/2.8 Distagon T* ZE to his prime collection.

The lens is laser sharp wide open and exhibit very low distortion (1.7%).

Here is one of my favorite image from Corey + Mike engagement session photographed with the Zeiss 21mm last week.

Reviews of the exceptional Zeiss 21mm can be found at photozone.de and at Diglloyd.com.

JR's complete prime collection includes the 15mm f/2.8 fisheye, Zeiss 21mm f/2.8 Distagon T* ZE, 35mm f/1.4L, 50mm f/1.2L, 85mm f/1.2L, 100mm f/2.8L MACRO IS, 200mm f/2L IS, and 300mm f/2.8L IS.

I said a lot of things were brewing for 2010... Well... Our fourth little one as been brewing for a while and will join us at the beginning of March (or sooner...).

We know he's a little boy and are looking for a name so feel free to help us out with suggestions. We have three criteria:

1) the name has to be comprised of "two names" separated by a hyphen (just like mine, Jean-Rene, and that of my three other little ones: Jacques-Charles, Natalie-Soleil, and Pierre-Andre);
2) the name obviously has to have a French ring to it;
3) the name should not easily be "butcherable" (a new word I just made up) in most Latin-based and Germanic-based languages;

Thanks to all my family, friends, clients, client who became friends -- past, present, and future -- for making the last year, and the last decade, spectacular.

My wonderful image of Val + Nick's wedding (also featured in my web site gallery) is featured on the cover of a DxO retail box.

On November 3rd, DxO launched version 6 of its DxO Optics Pro Raw Converter. My favorite new feature is the expanded range of many corrections (sliders), allowing for artistic interpretation rather than just accuracy. My favorite previous feature was definitely the DxO Geometry corrections linked to the lens modules, allowing for quasi-tilt-shift lens controls over the image.

You can download a free 30-day trial version here (Windows only at the moment - Mac version to come).

In October and November, I donated over 40 hours of photography, processing, and retouching to revamp the Sacred Heart School brochure to highlight and convey the Academic, Faculty, Curriculum, Extracurricular, Spirituality, and Parents aspects of the school. The photography make the brochure stand apart from any other.

Download the full 11-page Sacred Heart Brochure containing my images here.

JR is adding the superb new Canon 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS.

Reviews of the lens can be found on dpreview.com and photozone.de.

Further to Crystal + Joseph's wedding celebration we had some more fun with a Day After Photo Session...

I've been outdoing myself this year. There isn't a single wedding where I haven't created unique images - different from any wedding I've shot before.

I'm particularly proud of the the image of Christina + James with the wind blowing the veil layered in front of the city's skyscrapers. To shoot it, I sat in the front passenger seat and lowered the camera as low as I could between the front seats and lit the scene with a dash of flash while dragging the shutter to give the backdrop a tiny bit of motion.

Ceremony:Fourth Presbyterian

Reception: Prairie Production