No travel costs for Wisconsin weddings--it's official!

There's a new "policy" I wanted to update y'all on. I've made an official decision at Vantage (hear ye hear ye) that I won't charge travel costs for any couples that book with me in Southern Wisconsin. I benefit greatly from shooting in Wisconsin (I get to see family, eat at my favorite restaurants--The Old Fashioned! The Great Dane!--and get coffee dates with old friends--Fair Trade Coffee! Espresso Royale!) and I want to provide an incentive to future clients to keep me coming out there. And no, my mom didn't put me up to this, although I'm sure she's doing a victory dance at the thought of me flying back to Wisconsin regularly. (Hi mom!)

So pass it on to any of those new engaged couples you were thinking about referring to me--I'm up to it! :)

Self-portrait, puppy-portrait

So as some of you know already, Vantage Photography's website is getting a facelift. Nothing crazy...just updated homepage images, new "about VP" text and pricing information. Which brings me to the title of this post: I also uploaded new "this is who I am" pics. Just thought I'd share with y'all my new self-portrait(s)!

Yes, these really are self-portaits. And, yes, this is me being a goofball and then laughing hysterically at myself. It's not a bad thing to be amused by the stupidest things--you're always laughing!

As I was about to pack up my gear, I noticed Chloe sleeping on the couch. Hmmmm, I thought. This calls for a puppy-portrait! So I picked her up and put her on the chair. Luckily she was a sleepy puppy, so she pretty much sat still for me the whole time. Who knows? Maybe I'll take up pet portraits as my next photography foray!

Kathleen and Mike

I love Kathleen and Mike! You may remember this duo from the e-session I did with them back in the Spring (check it out here). Well, they're baaaaack, and they're married this time! They're such a beautiful couple, clearly in love, and SO much fun, which is pretty obvious from the pics. And admittedly, I haven't teared up at a wedding since the first one I shot and, well, this one got the water works flowing--seriously, I was like "Jena, you CAN'T cry! You're the photographer!". Thanks to the two of you for a fab day and I'm definitely taking you up on that offer for dinner when I'm back in the Madison area!! :)

Ok, so it's not spidey vision...

So I'm a member of the Digital Wedding Forum, a great online resource for professional wedding photographers all over the world. And as all good DWFers do, I procrastinate by surfing the site and learning lots of new photography tips, readings posts, etc. :) I just came across a link for the FM 100 Hue Test, an online test that allows you to test your color vision. Ok, so it's totally dorky, but I actually had FUN doing it! I know, I said it was dorky. And, it turns out, I have 100% PERFECT COLOR VISION! All that really means is that I'm good at color correcting to make sure that photos come out the right colors and you don't look purple-ish (or green-ish or red-ish or whatever-ish) in all the pictures. So hooray for my eyes!!! In my head, as I read the test results, I actually said "Good job, guys, keep up the good work!". Somehow my eyes are male in my female body. Go figure. Lol.

We're New Kids On The Block!!

No, we haven't quit our jobs to become the newest members of my favorite boy band. We're New Kids On The Block because WE MOVED! Michael accepted a marketing position with Intuit (Turbo Tax, Quickbooks, Quicken, etc) in San Diego, California this summer so we picked up our lives and moved clear across the country, puppy and all. We're absolutely thrilled about our new digs and the adventures that await us. The weather is fabulous, the people we've met so far are friendly and we can't wait to explore the surrounding area. Chloe is thrilled, too, because we've shacked up across the street from Balboa Park, the Central Park of San Diego. That means she gets lots of walks with her mom every morning (that's me) and there are plenty of other dogs to sniff and play with.

I'm especially excited about this move because it's allowed me a great excuse to dive in feet first and take the business FULL TIME! That's right, I'm doing this photography gig 24/7. Ok, maybe not that much...but at least 40 hours a week! :) I'm so excited about being able to pursue my passion full time, a chance that a lot of people don't get and/or take. It's been great for me and for my photography, too, since I don't have any other pesky jobs to distract me. I've already scoped out cool places for engagement sessions and have lots of ideas. I also still have a handful of weddings in Wisconsin that I'll be flying back for, so some of you will still see me from time to time. :)

I'm especially excited to be able to take one day a week to dedicate to personal projects, such as documenting, through photography, how life and the concept of family changes when someone makes the decision to go into a nursing home. I even bought my own website (www.jenaolson.com) to show off my work. But don't go there yet...all you'll see are ads from GoDaddy.com, since I've gotten about as far as buying the domain name and that's it. All good things come to those who wait though, right? :)

So a little business plug from me, in light of this big news: we're giving 10% off any package to anyone who books a wedding with us in Southern California during the months of September and October. That's right, 10% off. Tell your friends!

So consider us official Californians--we're here to stay. Yay!!

Marita and Eric are engaged!

Two weeks ago I had the privilege of spending three hours doing an engagement session with Marita and Eric, two very fun, energetic and in-love people. We hit practically all of Madison, from the Olbrich Gardens to the Overture Center to State Street, and I for one had a blast. I'm also psyched because they want me to use their images to create a custom guest book, my first "real" one (as in, not just a sample book). I love these books and think they're one of the greatest ways to customize your wedding and have an amazing keepsake all at the same time. Yay for Marita and Eric! :)

I can't wait to shoot their wedding in October and share with you even more gorgeous photos from that day...

Click here to view their slideshow (oh so fun!!) and scroll down to view images:

Teresa and Eric

Teresa and Eric celebrated their wedding on August 22nd at the Marcus Center for the Performing Arts in Milwaukee, WI. Everything went smoothly (not a cloud in the sky, even!) and everyone spent the day laughing and enjoying themselves. A highlight of the day was watching one of Eric's groomsmen get everyone (literally everyone) at the wedding onto the dance floor to sing along to Neil Diamond's "Sweet Caroline". There was clearly a lot of love in these two newly-joined families and Kate (my second shooter) and I were glad to be a part of it. Thanks for choosing Vantage to shoot your wedding! Enjoy the peek at the pictures, you two!

We're home (and we've banned Alitalia from our lives for good).

Ok, so we've been home since last Wednesday but life's been a little crazy since then and I haven't had a chance to sit and write. :)

We had a little snafu (is that how you spell that?) with our flight on the way back, which has led us to declare an official boycott on Alitalia. I highly recommend you do the same thing, to avoid the stuff we had to deal with! Now, this isn't to knock Italy--of course we LOVE it there, but we experienced a seemingly typical Italian travel scenario that hopefully you can avoid. So...we show up at the airport 2 hours before our scheduled flight but, hmmmm, our flight isn't on the departures board. That's odd. After flagging down an Alitalia person, and having that person then ask 2 or 3 more people what the heck was going on, we come to discover that our 2:10pm flight doesn't exist. Yes, there was a 10:10am flight but no 2:10pm flight. And, of course, even if it did exist, we apparently didn't have tickets for it. What?? Well, remember way back to one of our first blog posts when our flight got cancelled due to weather and we had that huge debacle between Alitalia, Delta and STA travel trying to schedule another flight? Eventually we got an Alitalia official to deal with it--by cancelling our entire trip and then rescheduling it. But, as we found out when we were in the airport on our way back, she never scheduled a return flight!! Luckily, they didn't put up a fight and paid for a hotel room and meals for the night as well as a ticket for the first flight out of Rome direct to Chicago the next morning. Well, at least we got another story out of it, right? :)

So that's it for our travel stories (for now). Hopefully you had a good read and enjoyed the images that came with it. Not sure when we'll be able to take a trip like this again (Japan and Southeast Asia are high on the list) but we certainly have enough memories to sustain us until the next trip... :) Ciao!!

Santorini, Pompeii and Rome

It's our last day today. I'm sitting in the kitchen of our Rome hostel, waiting for Michael to finish packing. Our bags are heavier (lots of sovieners!), our skin is tanner (hooray for laying out by the cruise ship pool!) and our portable harddrive is full of photos. We leave Rome and fly to Chicago in a few hours. It feels crazy to be going home after travelling for so long and I imagine it's going to feel crazy to be home for a while afterwards. But, before I get too introspective, I still have three cities to write about.

Santorini:

Unfortunately, Michael wasn't feeling well the day we were in port, so I stole out while he was sleeping and had my own adventure.Santorini is really beautiful and it makes sense why it would be such a huge tourist attraction. There were a TOOOOOOON of tourists--in fact, there were, at one point, seven cruise ships docked that day. This made it pretty hard to see the "real" Santorini, but I made a point of getting lost down little alleyways and trying to get away from the main tourist areas.

Santorini is the Greece we all see in the pictures: whitewashed houses, brightly colored doors and windows, bright blue domes on the churches. The city is located high on a cliff and people need to take either a cable car or a donkey up to the top. The line for the cable car was over 2 hours so I opted for a donkey. So I paid the guy my 5 euro, hopped up on a donkey and expected the donkey owner to walk with me to the top like in Petra (Jordan). But instead, he just gave it a big slap on the butt, yelled something in Greek and the donkey walked away without him. This only worked so well, however, since as soon as we turned a corner and were out of his line of sight, the donkey stopped. Just stopped. I slapped it on its butt, gave it a nudge with my heels, said "let's go" in all the languages I knew, but this donkey was not gonna budge. After 5 minutes of this, I got off and tried pulling him by his harness. As much as I pulled and yanked, this donkey was not going to move for me. Until I went to get back on him, of course, and he walked away from me. Oh, I see how it is, Mr. Donkey. This game of "donkey walks away when Jena tries to get back on" continued for another 5 minutes until the donkey gave up and let me on him. But he still just stood there. More heel nudges, more butt slapping, more yelling (does anyone know how to say "let's go" in Greek?), no moving. Until a pack of about 20 donkeys turned the corner on the way up the hill and Mr. Donkey decided to show his solidarity and walk up with the others. Geesh. I opted not to chance a donkey ride on the way down, needless to say.

Pompeii/Sorrento:

We were excited to visit Pompeii again since we had had so much fun the last time. We did a walking tour with Erin and Josh (our cruise dinner mates) and then wandered the eery streets. If you ever get a chance to visit Pompeii, do it. It's an amazingly preserved city and really gives you a sense of what it must have been like to live so long ago. We also got a chance to hang out in Sorrento, a town about 20 minutes from Pompeii, and the site of the cruise port. Sorrento is a cute Italian town and we were excited to happen upon a famous gelateria while we were there--the owner is in the Guiness Book of World Records for creating the largest ice cream cone ever (based on the pics we saw, it was huge) and the store has been visited by a ton of famous people including the Pope. And the ice cream was pretty good. :)

Rome:

Our last stop of our tour and we weren't disappointed. I enjoy Rome a little more every time I come back and this time was definitely not an exception. We did the normal touristy things (the Forum, Colloseum, Vatican, etc) but then also got to see some things we hadn't seen before such as the Jewish Ghetto and Campo dei Fiori, a colorful piazza where a lot of the young Italians hang out in the evening. We also stopped at a cafe that reportedly has the best espresso in Rome...and we concur. And, of course, we threw a coin into the Trevi fountain guaranteeing that we would return. :)

So now it's time to go. Michael has finished packing, we need to check out of the hostel and catch our train to the airport. Hopefully you've enjoyed reading about our adventures and seeing some of the images we created. Next time I write, I'll be back in the good ol' US of A eating peanut butter and watching reality tv. :) It's been an amazing adventure, an incredible journey. Ma adesso e' il tempo per ritornare alla realita'. Ciao ciao!!

Pictures as promised (Yalta, Odessa, Volos).

Today we said goodbye to our cruise ship. Sniff sniff. We had an absolutely wonderful time and would definitely do something like it again. We're now in Rome, just arrived about an hour ago. Before we left the shipe, I did have enough foresight to edit some images and put them on my flashdrive in case we stopped at an internet cafe along the way to the hostel.

This first image is from Yalta, a beach resort in the Ukraine.

The second and third are from Odessa, a city with a lot of charm and a lot of history. Unfortunately, much of the city is under construction in order to give the city a facelift but we were still able to get a good sense of the place. We were lucky enough to find a restaurant that served pelmeni (russian dumplings that were oh so yummy) and the Ukrainian specialty of vodka "spiked" with hot peppers. Michael said he could feel the vodka moving down his esophogus into his stomach. It definitely had a kick to it, that's for sure. We also happened to see a TON of weddings going on, being that it was Saturday. Outside of the Opera House, we saw four different bride and groom couples getting their pictures taken. A block away, we saw two more couples. Lots of weddings for a small city

This last image I took at the Archeological Museum in Volos, a small town on the eastern mainland of Greece. Attractions in Volos are few and far between (which makes me question why we stopped there as a part of the cruise, but that's not the point), so before going to the beach we opted to see the museum. Neither of us expected much, since we've been to at least five archeological museums already on this trip and have seen our fair share of old Roman and Greek ceramic pots, ancient jewelry and tombs. But we were in for a pleasant change in archeological museum scenery, as this museum was dedicated mainly to the old (and I mean old, as in ooooooold) settlements that had been discovered around Volos not too long ago. The figurine in this image is thought to have been created between 6500 and 5300 bc. That's between 8500 and 7300 years ago. I told you, oooooold. And there were dozens of these figurines in the museum, plus dozens of cooking items and weapons. Amazing.

We also stopped in Santorini, a famous Greek island, and Sorrento, on the west coast of Italy north of Naples. Unfortunately, Michael came down with the stomach flu the night before Santorini and was quarantined (seriously) to our room for the next 24 hours. I wasn't feeling sick, so I stole out to see the island while Michael was sleeping. Sorrento was cute, exactly what you'd expect from a touristy coastal Italian town. I'll add more narrative once I edit and upload images (hopefully tomorrow).

Michael and I will stay in Rome for three more days before heading back to the States on the 22nd. It's so hard to believe that it's coming to an end! But I won't think about that right now. I've got sightseeing to do. :)