Tutti Performs at Tork Bar & Grill

After a few lazy days of festivities filled with family, eating, relaxation, and (did I say eating?) generally being somewhat unproductive, it was nice getting back to work in a scene I am still very much a part of--live music. Having all the history that I do with live performance, shooting bands is still one of my favorite things to do. The day after Christmas proved to be one of the coolest live shows I've ever seen.

Tutti, a local indie band from El Paso, and longtime personal friends, had a rocking show on Friday night. It was great being so near my element again, albeit off the stage as opposed to on it, but having a camera in my hands made the whole thing that much sweeter. The band not only sounded great, playing an eclectic mix of '80s and '90s pop, Spanish rock, and some techno beats, but also gave me some excellent photo opportunities. The typical darkened stage with tungsten stage and mood lighting would have been a lighting and high ISO noise nightmare to anyone, but I'm quite impressed by my Canon DSLR and the new "Nifty Fifty," the Canon 50mm f/1.8. Low-light shots were amazing, the lens being as fast as it is, and the sharpness at even the widest aperture impressed me. This was the first time I've ever put the Fifty through its paces.

The photo gallery should be up pretty soon, for those of you who would like to see photos from the evening. Also, I'm pretty sure the band would appreciate some web traffic on their MySpace page. Just go to www.myspace.com/tuttis for more info on the band. Please check my website for photos of the band, and I'll post a link to the gallery as soon as it becomes public (waiting on permission from the band first).

As always, all of us would greatly appreciate any comments.

EDIT: The band's photo gallery is now public and available for viewing online, in the new "Music" section on Elysian-Productions.com.

Specialty Print Products from Elysian

First of all, let me take a moment to wish everyone a very Happy Christmas, and a wonderful holiday season. What better time than the holidays to get in touch with friends and family, and reconnect with our loved ones. There are not very many better ways to share those holiday greetings and wishes than with a thoughtful, unique, personalized gift. Elysian Productions is now offering greeting cards with personalized photos and messages. Perfect for sending your warmest wishes to your friends and family, wherever they may be.

Also, for the remainder of the holidays, we are offering our Christmas and holiday greeting card package to military families who are separated from loved ones by distance or deployment for half price. That's right, half price. What better way to send a special holiday gift to your soldier overseas. If you are a soldier, airman, sailor or Marine stationed on or near Fort Bliss or Holloman AFB, this is also the perfect way to keep in touch with your loved ones back home.

Since the holidays are quick to come and go, we are also pleased to announce that along with our greeting cards, we are debuting our line of personalized birth announcements.

All our specialty custom print product packages include the photo session, retouching, and photo CD with portraits from the session. For more information, please contact the studio.

We look forward to hearing from any and all of you out there, and may everyone have a wonderful Christmas season.

By the way, a very special thanks to Matt and Marie Shutt for their gracious permission to feature their Christmas card.

Attention all Bands and Musicians

Greetings all,

I was up late last night recovering from a day of work with my other job, a military training contractor, and had a marvelous epiphany. I realized I had no money, and our economy sucks. Then I realized, well, most of my clients don't either. SOOOOO. . . . .


For a limited time, I am offering photo sessions/packages to bands and musicians FOR FREE. Yes, you heard it, for free. The session can be a composed (set up) standard band portrait, at whatever location you choose, or it can be photos of a concert or performance doing what you do best. The photos are yours to do with what you will.


Please, don't feel excluded if you're not a band or in one. I am extending this offer to any musician, so if you are a classical performer doing recitals, chamber ensembles, or whatever, the same applies to you all. If you ARE a band, I'll take any genre or style, also. Praise & Worship bands, this means you, too.


So, if you or someone you know fits the category, please let me know when you'd like your free photo session. Spread the word, because even those of you that don't directly fit the bill, sure as heck know someone who does.


Any questions about anything, feel free to contact me here or at fern@elysian-productions.com

-Fern

Fine Art Posters and Prints Now Available

Fern Camacho/Elysian Photography is now offering fine art posters and prints of selected images. Prints are available via Elysian Photography's home page. New photos and poster layouts will be added continually in the future, so please check back frequently to view new available prints.

Also, as a bonus to you our clients, fine art poster prints are being offered of any image selected by you. Again, different styles and formats are available, so check back frequently for options and layouts.

Currently, the print you see above is being featured as part of the "Cityscapes" collection by Fern Camacho (me). The entire collection will be compiled in a photo essay entitled "Cityscapes of the Sun City" to be published (hopefully) early next year. The entire collection will be available for purchase as a bound set or as individual prints.

Prude Ranch/Davis Mountains Retreat

Back over Labor Day weekend, my wife and I had the privilege to attend a family retreat at Prude Ranch, in the heart of the Davis Mountains in Texas. It was a great weekend of family fun and relaxation, but also, a great opportunity to catch some great photos of the ranch, the mountains, and attendees of the retreat.

Family members and attendees of the retreat can now order prints and images through our online galleries, and can view all the photos of the set at their leisure on our Prude Ranch/Ft. Davis online gallery.

Hopefully, many more opportunities for travel will come, and as always, we hope to share photos of our travels with all of you.

Hello World!

Thank you all so much for visiting our website, and by extension, our humble little blog. It is here where we will keep everyone informed of all the news, goings-on, and updates to our studio, website, and any scheduled or special events which might be happening. Being a small operation, and having taken the duty of designing, administering, and updating our website myself, the decision was made to go the way of the upstart internet entrepreneur and DIY blogger/businessman and start this blog. The idea seemed harmless enough. Instead of hosting the entire bulk of our internet operations, like photo galleries, news and updates, and client/friend feedback and networking, we're keeping things much more dynamic. Having a smaller homepage linked to much more fluid and dynamic hosts for different applications like SmugMug and Flickr, MySpace, and Blogger will make updating individual items much quicker and more efficient. Being a part of each separate and respective community will also exponentially expand our exposure and networking capabilities.

For those of you new to our new website and networking layout, please note that all the different facets of our internet presence can be accessed through our home page. Our home page will have links to all relevant things--photo galleries, news and update blogs, our profiles (official Elysian and personal) on networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook, and any other link we feel is relevant to us or potentially any of you.

As it stands right now, this is the way we are "outsourcing" our hosting needs: For photo galleries, our primary host is SmugMug. This photo sharing website is one of the slickest we have seen with some good premium services for power or professional users. Secondary photo collections and personal snapshot collections will be hosted through Flickr, a service already popular and familiar to many of you. Flickr has the added benefit of being a networking site, as well. For news, updates, and regular goings-on, we are using (obviously) this Blogger account. This being the 21st century, and since everyone and their grandmother already has a blog and feels comfortable with one, we are harnessing the power of the blog to keep our friends and clients informed of daily life at Elysian. We have also linked our home page to our Elysian profile on both MySpace and Facebook, so that we can take advantage of the networking possibilities there. As we evolve, more links are sure to follow.

Please let us know you care! Don't alienate yourselves from us. It is so easy to get in touch with us, and we will be happy to just hear from you, and not just for business. If we recently had a photo shoot with you, please, tell us about the experience, how you like the photos, whatever. We just want to hear from all of you. If you are scheduled to shoot with us or would like to, please share with us your thoughts, ideas, likes and dislikes, and concerns. We will gladly listen to your input so that your photo session will be pleasant and memorable. We can be reached via the main web site or any of the external host sites. My direct e-mail is fern@elysian-productions.com

I really look forward to what the future holds. Let's make beautiful images together.

Fern Camacho
Photographer and Founder
Elysian Photography