When They Were Cute...

Every ten days is a lousy schedule for updating this blog, but the school year has dropped upon me hard and fast this fall; already I've done about nine senior groups (two forming '09) and at least a dozen undergrad groups. Three hundred or so informal portraits, a homecoming and numerous sports, all in the last two weeks.

I haven't had so much as a moment to do any shooting for myself, and I really should be cleaning the sensor of the 30D right now (it is filthy; I can't shoot over f11 without the sky looking mottled), but for some reason I starting thinking about these pictures the other day...

Clark and Betsy were about seven weeks old when these were taken in April of 1999. We had closed off the doorways in the dining room of the house in Long Beach with gates, and they had the run of the room. Without a table in it the only furniture were the antique chairs lining the walls, some blankets and a seat cushion.

Molly was sleeping while these two were making a ruckus. It's funny how often one of them would be asleep while the others were playing. This was also the period when Betsy was more socially adjusted with the other two; as time went on she became more of a loner. It is rare that I see her sitting this close to Clark anymore.

These were shot on Ilford XP2 film with a Pentax ZX-5. Probably used a 35-70 or a 28-105, I really don't remember what lenses I owned back then, I had a mix of manual and autofocus, since the ZX was my first AF camera. What I do remember is how nice the light was in that room in the late afternoon: The sun would bounce off the side of my house onto the house next-door, which would then reflect through a giant 6 x 6 foot window, completely filling the room with beautiful, soft light.