Lourcey Photography

In our never-ending quest to keep the boys occupied this summer, we decided to try somthing different this weekend- a polo match.  It was quite the experience!

I got several shots which should translate well into paintings for the fine art site - so stay tuned for those.  In the mean time, here are a couple of images from the day:

The highlight for the kids was halftime, when they let everyone onto the field to mash down all the divots.  There was champagne for the adults and  polo gear for the kids to try out. 

All in all, not a bad summer outing!

June was a very exciting month for the Lourcey family.   We were convinced that Beau would leave for college without losing a tooth, then right before his 8th birthday, the first front tooth finally fell out (or was knocked out by his brother, depending on which theory you buy into).  The other front tooth held on for dear life until it was finally knocked out in a McDonalds playground incident a week later.

I photograph a ton of children and the missing tooth issue comes up all the time.  People don’t want their child smiling because they are missing teeth.  Sometimes they want to hurry and get the session done before they lose any teeth.  My theory is, when both front teeth are missing, it is the PERFECT time to photograph them.  I mean, this is (hopefully) the only time in their life they will look this way, so why not document it?  After all, you can’t tell the whole story of childhood without touching on the issue of teeth!

To celebrate Beau’s grand toothlessness, I dragged him into the studio for a quick session.  Now his toothless look will be forever captured:

Enjoy!!!

This week, I was in charge of creating a slideshow for the graduating 8th graders at Westwood.  I had all nine students in my photography class this year, so I wanted to make sure to end the show with a strong image.

I came up with this shot while photographing the dress rehearsal of their play, “Shakespeare’s Bedtime Stories.” 

I thought an image of them taking their final bow would be the perfect ending to the slideshow.  I setup behind them and we adjusted the spotlights to make sure we had the right ones one and the right ones off.  I was thrilled with the final results.

Last week, I was invited to speak to the Heart of Texas Professional Photographers Guild.  This group is based out of Waco, Texas, and includes photographers from Waco - as well as the surrounding area.   It was great to spend time with other photographers and see how we all approach the job differently.

One of their members was kind enough to snap  a few shots of me…

Slideshow presentation

Not sure what I was explaining here - but I’m sure it was interesting!

Having served as the president of the Dallas Photographers Guild, it was interesting to see how similar groups ran their meetings.  I also had the opportunity to critique some of the competition entries, which is always fun to do.

I will be doing some more speaking engagments later this year, as well as judging at some state photography competitions - so be sure to check back often!

We had a great time this weekend at our second Scavenger Hunt.  Couples donated $200 to Westwood to get invited to this party - so we had to make sure it was an evening they wouldn’t forget!

Here are a few of the highlights from the evening:

Team Red

Team Orange

Team Blue

Team Pink

and the eventual champions….

Team Camo

Many, many thanks to the Smiths for hosting the party at their home.  Everyone had a great time and -best of all- we have plenty of incriminating photos of everyone involved!

Every year, we photograph the cast of the Westwood play for their promotional poster.  This year, we ended up with an idea that was a little more complicated than past ideas!

The concept was to photograph the entire group (60+ kids) from above.  The people in the Brookhaven theater department were kind enough to let us use their theater for the shot and we arranged the kids on top of each other, near the front of the stage.  Meanwhile, I was shooting from a catwalk way overhead.  I’m not a big fan of heights, so it was a little weird at first.

You’ll have to wait to see the final image for the poster, but I thought you might like to see the view from the catwalk.

(Look how tiny those seats look!!!)

In the end, we got the exact shot we were hoping for.  This year’s poster is going to be one of the best ones yet!

This weekend, we hosted a scavenger hunt for some of the students from Westwood.   The kids were given a list of things they had to be photographed with - and they tried to complete as many as possible during the time allowed.

I thought you might enjoy a couple of the images:

(some of the members of Team Holly in front of a fire truck)

(Some members of Team Dayton posing in front of a house)

Although Team Holly managed to pull off a 10 point victory, both teams had a lot of fun.  Here is a shot of all the participants proudly showing off their fabulous prizes!!!

This was actually the first of two scavenger hunt parties that we are hosting this month.  The second one is coming up this weekend and this time - all the participants are grown-ups.  If you think these pictures were funny, be sure to check back next week!!!

Last week I had the pleasure of photographing Daniela for her senior portraits.  She is a fabulous golfer, so we wanted to include golf in some of the portraits.  Of course, we started out with a very traditional shot -

While I was pleased with the image, I thought we could take it a step further.  I wanted to downplay the golf club and focus on Daniela’s face.   We cropped in a little closer and switched to a more dramatic, directional light.  The resulting image was stunning.

Her mom went crazy over the image - which is always one of the highlights of my day!  We printed a large gallery-wrapped canvas, which now hangs in their home.  It is always a blast to work with seniors - and Daniela was no exception!

I’ve been working on creating more images for my upcoming painting exhibit this summer.  One of my latest creations is “Three Toes”

The image was an exercise in composition and color.  I liked the repetition of the pose.  I have no idea how they are able to stand like that - truly amazing.  I took a very pastel subject and added tons of color - I felt like that gave the piece more impact.  The original is pigment and acrylic on canvas, but I will also offer it as a limited edition giclee print on watercolor paper.  

This weekend, my wife and I attended the yearly auction for the Westwood School.  The theme was “We’re All In This Together” so it was very High School Musical.  I decided to go with the traditional tux, but you should have seen some of the crazy outfits people had on.

The shocking event of the night was when I was crowned Homecoming King.  Check out the excellent crown and sash! 

Overall, it was a great night and they raised a bunch of money for the school.   One of the items that sold at the event was a Photo Scavenger Hunt with Lourcey Photography.  Rest assured we will come away from that with lots of great pictures - and I will make sure some of them make their way to the blog!