Jordyn and Lexi

Lexi loves Jordyn. Always wants to be right next to her, or smelling her, or licking her, or doing whatever she is doing. So when Jordyn is on the ground in her room playing with toys, Lexi wants to lay down right next to her and play with the same exact toys. Damn cute if you ask me.

One of the funniest things I have ever seen at a wedding

So there I was on Saturday night, shooting a candid photo of the Bride as she leans down to talk to her little 3 year old ring bearer, when what does he do? Grabs and pinches her boob in front of about 50 people. I about crapped my pants from laughing so hard. The best part is the look on his face in the last photo....he looks very proud of himself.

Cool Slide Show

Tom Boyd has a really cool slide show on his blog. He has spent tons of time with this band from Eugene and made a show of photos he has shot and set it to a song by them, which is really, really good. Go check it out!

Jordyn thinks I'm the coolest

And I feel the same way about her!

Ok...So to surprise Jenn, I went to Babies-R-Us and had them shoot a photo of myself and Jordyn. cheap and fast and easy.....Pretty cute huh? Jenn loved it.

Jordyn is so freaking cute when she laughs too. And she laughs the hardest when I try to get her to say "Daddy". Check out this video.

Sometimes things just work out

Sometimes in order to make a good picture you need a little luck. Today I got lucky. I was assigned by a magazine called "Dig" to shoot a portrait of the owner of a tulip farm in Woodburn. On the way out I noticed that the sunset was going to look decent and thinking that hopefully there would be some flowers around. Well I arrived and there was nothing..no flowers, just mud. She took me to a greenhouse where there were some plants, but no colorful flowers like I was hoping. We talked for a while and she mentioned a windmill that was popular with visitors when they come out to see the tulips....so we drove out on the property and found this windmill in the middle of a field......Windmill, plus sunset, equals cool photo......I love the versatility of the Canon Speedlites too. A couple of these bad boys on full power and you can light up the world.

There is NO Snow!

There is no snow on Mt. Hood. Only Timberline is open....barely. It's very sad. I love to be up on the mountain and snowboarding, but there is just NO SNOW! Today I went up to do a story for Getty about the lack of snow and the ski resorts losing money because they are closed or nobody is going, etc. I went to Timberline first and shot this. I looked like summer time up there. Very sad.

Serious Head Wound

So, you think your having a bad day? This wrestler has 26 stitches in his head! Tonight I was sent to a wrestling match and when I got there the editor tells me this kids story and asks me to try and get a shot of him on the bench or something. He is Clackamas' 275lb wrestler and a pretty good one too. Good shot at winning the league title....anyway, last weekend during the ice storm, he decides to sled down a hill, loses control and smashes his face into a fence post, nearly loses an eye and boom, 26 stitches in your face. During the match he was walking around so I asked him to pose for me real quick. I had 2 Canon speedlights pointed toward the mat for the action so I grabbed one real quick, flipped it around and shot a close up of his injury with the action in the background. I think it turned out pretty cool.

Portrait's are fun

I like to do "Sportraits". They are fun to do. It's fun to get creative with lighting and it's fun to make people look tough. Here are a few portraits I shot yesterday for the Tacoma News-Tribune. This kid is not small by any means. 6' 7" 300lbs. Rock Solid. He made even me look very tiny. He is a DL at Grant High and will go to either Miami, Auburn, Nebraska, Cal or Oregon State.

Update LONG overdue

My brother always want me to update all my websites. If I forget to update my Sports Shooter page for a week or two he's all over me, telling me to update, etc. He gets even more pissed when he visits my website. Well Kev, this is for you. Today I spent nearly all day updating www.craigmitchelldyer.com. I added new photos to each and every section and added new rates page and changed the thumbnails on the main page. I left a lot of the old photos up, but added a bunch of new ones as well. Check out all the new images and let me know what you think.

Wedding DVD's

Last year a couple whose wedding I shot liked the photos so much, they flew me to Florida to shoot the reception. While I was there I was talking to the Bride's brother and he showed me some software that made it so you can set photos to pan and fade in and out and set the show to music. It was very cool. Anyway, so now this new found knowledge is being used to give my wedding clients something extra. I've done 4 of these DVD's now and I think they are pretty cool. They are also a blast to put together. I have been just using the couples first dance song as the music. They really like that, gives it an even more personal touch, I just have to remember to write the name of the song down when they dance.

This one is from last weekend in Bend.

This one is from Friday.

You need Windows Media Viewer to view them. If you don't have it, download it, there are Mac and Windows versions on the download page and let me know what you think.

Craig

An oldie but a goodie

This is a video I made of Lexi when I first got my little Powershot digital camera that takes videos. My buddy Mike has a Boston Terrier that Lexi thinks is her boyfriend. Check out the Video.

Lexi doesn't like Jenn's singing

Jenn was doing a funny little song and dance for Jordyn today, but Lexi did not like it too much....

Here is the video.

Strange Remedy

Ok, so Jordyn was up all night coughing, running nose, etc, etc, etc Jenn and I did not sleep a wink. I feel so bad for her, it really must suck to be 4 months old and sick. We took her to Dr. Campbell (Jenn's boss) this morning and he said she has some kind of illness that starts with a "c" that I can't remember the name of.....anyway he said taking her out in the cold would make her better! HUH? Just when you thought it was best to bundle up and stay inside, the Doc says letting her breathe cold air will help her get better. So I'm putting her outside with the dog right now (Just Kididng). We'll see how this works. Hopefully she gets better in a hurry. Poor little thing.

Jordyn's not feeling so hot :(

Today my little munchin came down with her first cold. I feel so bad for her, she can't breath, her nose is running and she keeps grabbing and pulling on her ear....we think she might have an ear infection or something. It breaks my heart to see her all sick and sad.....We'll take her into Jenn's work to see the doctor tomorrow. Hopefully there is some high quality baby narcotics that will take care of her.

When it rains it pours

No, not the so-cal floods....but business. It is strange how the freelance photography business works. 1 week you have nothing, you sit in the office all day, you get caught up on work...then BAM! you wake up on a Monday and your phone rings off the hook and you have jobs booked for everyday that week. Wierd. Oh well, its a good thing, a very good thing. Today I shot features for the Spokesman Review at the US Figure Skating Championships, tomorrow I am shooting the WA governor's swearing in for a wire service, Friday I have a wedding, Saturday its back to the Figure Skating, then Monday or Tuesday I have a shoot for the Tacoma paper.....how's that for variety? When it rains it pours. But I like it!

Mt. Bachelor Fun

Here is a photo of Jenn and I at the mid-mountain lodge on Bachelor yesterday. We had a great weekend, even though we froze our asses off......Thanks for snapping this photo Rob!

Guard goes Dit!

The Register-Guard in Eugene has always been my favorite newspaper. Growing up in Eugene I wanted to work for the Guard. It always has been and is still to this day, one of the best "photo" newspapers in the country. I feel it is a dream come true when I do jobs for them.....they also have some of the greatest shooters I have the pleasure of knowing working for them. Each one of those guys ROCK! Anyway, they were also probably the LAST people on planet earth to go digital.....yes that's right, they still shot film until this week! Imagine having 3 people shoot a Duck Football game then having to soup, edit and scan all that film. Crazy. Well, now they are in the 21st century. This photo that Pietsch took is cool. Those guys got handed a shit load of sweet gear. Lucky Bastards. The Guard just got even better.

Work Weekend, but FUN too!

I have to shoot a wedding in Bend on Saturday, but on Friday Jenn and I are going to go to Mt. Bachelor to snowboard and then stay at the Inn at the Seventh Mountain before shooting the wedding on Saturday AM. It will be the first time we have left the baby alone overnight.....Jenn is worried, but I'm sure she will be fine......I am looking forward to a great weekend of snow and spending time with my hot wife! Oh yeah and get paid too. Sweet!

Editorial POY

Put up 10 photos from 2004 that I think are good. Check them out and let me know what you think. They are on my SportsShooter page.

Baylee and Jordyn side by side

My little niece LOVES photos. She loves to have her photo taken and loves to look at photos of all kinds of things and people. Good thing since when she was young I shot her photo almost daily....anyway, she has this thing were she comes into my office and says "Ceg (that what she calls me), Ceg can I look at pictures on U puter (your computer)" Of course I say yes, open up Photo Mechanic and she has a hey day. Then she picks out photos for me to print for her. Usually 1 or 2, sometimes more, last week she had me print 10 from Christmas....anyway she likes to take them home and hang them on her closet door. Apparently it is a huge shrine of fun things she has done or people she likes a lot. She is very possesive of the shrine and if anyone come near it she freaks out. Pretty cute. She has about 10 photos of Lexi, her and Lexi, Jordyn ad Lexi, photos of my mom, her with my mom, my sister, me and Jenn etc, etc, etc and LOTS of photos of her and Jordyn. Anyway, we went over to my sisters house the other day to drop off a BoohBah toy Baylee had been wanting and she showed us her shrine. While looking at some of the older photos of her as a baby we were all shocked at how much alike Bay and Jordyn look at the 3 month age. So I dug into the archives. The closest I could find was Baylee at 5 months and Jordyn a couple of weeks ago, but still the look very close. Good thing because Baylee is adorable.

2005!

Well good bye to 2004. The best year of my life both personally and professionally. Personally, Jordyn was born and continues to grow and amaze me. We are so lucky to have her. I have a great wife, and a great family and live in a great house. It could not get any better. Professionally, my client list has grown 10 fold and my photos have been published in more places than ever before. My images were seen in Sports Illustrated, USA Today, Newsweek, Golf World MSNBC.com and many other national and international publications. One of my Mt. St. Helens photos was picked to go with encyclopedia's top 10 news stories of 2004. Cool!

I'm looking forward to 2005 being even better! Happy New Year!