The Irish Lass

/ BillMcNamee.com/

Look into those eyes… Look at that sweet and innocent face… How can you not?

This is Tegan, an adorable little Irish lass I had the pleasure of photographing in the spring of 2006. Tegan’s mother contacted me after seeing some portrait work I had posted on one of my older web sites. She was impressed with my casual and candid style. She wanted to do an informal photo session with Tegan in traditional Irish dress inside their home. 

The images I captured, though, were more than just a photo session commissioned from a proud mother. They were to be a loving reminder presented to Tegan’s father as a lasting memory of a moment in time. Tegan’s mother was suffering from brain cancer and was not expected to live. My images were her gift to both her husband and, in time, to Tegan. 

Knowing this, I arrived at Tegan’s house determined and focused on capturing the best images I could. I love working with and photographing kids. Anything and everything can happen. The moment I met Tegan, though, I knew our session would be delightful. 

Tegan was friendly and relaxed. She watched and played with her doll as I setup remote strobes around the family room. She was a natural subject and never gave a thought to the man with the camera. She was playing only to her mother. Her world was all smiles and joy for the woman next to me. 

The session lasted about two hours. Tegan’s mother was thrilled with the color proofs I displayed on my laptop after the session. The images posted here are a few of the final images I delivered to Tegan’s mother. She loved them all. I loved that I was able to truly capture Tegan and bring her mother some happiness.

A few weeks later, Tegan’s mother told me her husband loved the images and was very thankful and appreciative. I corresponded with Tegan’s mother for a few months before we lost touch. I can only assume her condition got worse and she passed. I often wonder about Tegan and the girl grew into. She would be 12 or 13 now, a young woman beginning to make her own way in the world. 

All the images presented here were captured with a Canon DSLR and a Canon EF24-105mm f4L IS lens. The remote strobes used were Canon Speedlites with their light bounced off a white ceiling. A custom white balanced was established for the photo session and applied to all images. Originally processed in Photoshop as monotones back in 2006, all images have been tweaked in Lightroom for clarity and sharpness. 

Enjoy!!

Havre De Grace With An iPhone

/ BillMcNamee.com/

Creativity finds you where and when it does. For me, it is usually behind the lens of my camera. You see... Photography is my passion. It is the fire in which my creativity burns. So it was this past weekend (January 12, 2019) as I found myself traveling through Harford County, Maryland.

I was not there with the intention of doing photography. I did not have my camera bag or any of my gear with me. It was an unplanned and impromptu adventure. I knew I had made a mistake ten minutes into the trip.

Driving through BelAir and Aberdeen on my way to Havre de Grace, I sorely wished I had my camera gear. The weather was perfect. It was an overcast winter’s day, mild but with a biting chill in the air.

I was headed for the Chesapeake Bay and The Promenade. A scenic 3/4 mile boardwalk on the south side of Havre de Grace, The Promenade, offers vistas of both the Chesapeake Bay and the Susquehanna River.

This destination was not the reason I travelled to Harford County, but it was location that called to me. Years had pasted since my last visit. So many years, in fact, I could not remember how long it had actually been since I last strolled the boardwalk.

Arriving at my destination, I parked next to the Havre de Grace Maritime Museum. Looking out from my car, there was the Concord Point Lighthouse with the Chesapeake Bay beyond. Now, I truly regretted not having my camera bag.

Instinctively, though, I reached over to the passenger’s seat and picked up my iPhone. Not the camera I wanted, but the camera I had with me. A trusted camera. A camera that has been with me, from one iPhone to the next, for many years.

I left the car behind, iPhone in hand, and made my way to the northern end of The Promenade. The surroundings were still and quiet. There were few people. The only sounds came from the waters and the birds of the Chesapeake Bay.

I love this silence, the silence of nature. I love to capture this silence in my images. And so... I walked. I walked and took in the natural silence while capturing the images you see here.

The images presented here were captured with an older iPhone, an iPhone 6. All the images were processed in Adobe’s Lightroom and converted to black-and-white with Mastin Labs Presets. Detail and depth enhanced by increasing clarity, sharpness, and contrast. Frame ratios are 6:7 and 16:9.

Enjoy!!

___

Originally Published: January 15, 2019

Cruising The California Coast

/ BillMcNamee.com/

The year was 1992. The season was late winter. The place was the central California coast, around Monterey Bay.

I had ventured there on business for the software development firm I was working for at the time. This was my first trip to California and I was looking forward to exploring the coast.

No stranger to flying, I remember my flight from Baltimore to Los Angeles being long and boring. The commuter flight from Los Angeles to Monterey could not have been more different. Hugging the coastline all the way to Monterey, the views of the coast in late afternoon light were thrilling.

Arriving at the Monterey airport, I rented a convertible, put the top down, and drove down into Monterey before checking into the hotel. What awaited me in Monterey completely captured me. I was greeted immediately by landscapes, seascapes, wildlife, and colorful historical cityscapes.

Of course, I packed a camera and some lenses. This was 1992, though, so 35mm film still ruled. The camera I brought… It was a Canon T90, Canon’s flagship SLR at the time. The lenses I paired with the Canon T90, on this trip, were Canon FD lenses, including the 50mm f1.4, the 35-70mm f4, and the 70-200mm f4.

The film I was shooting was Kodachrome 64 and Kodachrome 200, both slide films. Years later, the slides were scanned and, recently, processed in Adobe Lightroom. All the images were cropped and enhanced for white balance, exposure, and contrast. A couple of images were converted to monotone.

The images presented here are but a small selection of the images I captured from Monterey to Big Sur. This sampling, hopefully, gives you a sense of what the California coast held for me that winter in 1992. Images as feelings… Feelings in the moment… The California coast, truly, is a magical location that offers unique vistas and the most wonderful colors and light.

Enjoy!!

Food Coloring

/ BillMcNamee.com/

As much as I love black-and-white images, I’m always torn between black-and-white and color when it comes to food photography. As an example, this post contains two food images captured at Ocean City, Maryland in the fall of 2021. Each image has a black-and-white treatment and a color treatment. If I had to give the treatments a one word description, one would be Artful. The other would be… Yummy! Any guess as to which is which? :) lol

Enjoy!!

Ocean City, Maryland: Fall And Spring Jaunts

/ BillMcNamee.com/

Being a resident of Maryland, there are a plethora of seaside resorts in the Mid-Atlantic to venture off to for a weekend at the beach. One of the most popular is Ocean City, Maryland. Or… As it is affectionately referred by Marylanders, OC.

While the summer is the typical season for boardwalk beach towns in the East, my favorite time of year to visit is off season. Fall, winter, and spring… These beach towns have a relaxing, slower pace. Fewer people, at least for me, means a more enjoyable time.

The fall of 2021 and the spring of 2022, found me at OC for two much needed getaways with my lovely Sally. With the world still wrestling with COVID-19, but being fully vaccinated and boosted, we ventured out to relax and chill in a favorite little hotel with great views on the beach.

Neither of these trips were exclusively photography outings. Of course that didn’t stop me from bringing a camera. The first trip, in the fall, I packed my Fuji X-T1 with my Fuji XF 18-55mm f2.8-4.0. The second trip, in the spring, I packed my Canon M50 with my Canon EF-M 18-55mm f3.5-5.6. Both sets of gear are very small, yet very capable.

The images in this post are a mix of shots from both jaunts to OC. They are somewhat skewed towards documentary or street type images. As such, all but two have a black-and-white treatment. The two food images, though, look way more yummy in color :)

Enjoy!!

Roadmap: June 2022

/ BillMcNamee.com/

In the past, I have made the occasional roadmap blog post. With the soft site reboot, this is a blog post category that hold a lot of relevance. This is especially true when published a couple of times per year.

Change is one of the few constants in our lives. Two to three years ago saw me in a vastly different creative space than I’m in now. In a year or two, I’m sure my creative focus and interests will also be different.

Developing and updating a roadmap for one’s creative endeavors and outlets, makes a lot of sense. It’s a flexible center from which to gage accomplishments, learn, and grow. It’s can also a be a source of reflection to both see and understand the journey.

With the above in mind, here is the first in a series of roadmap posts that will hopefully be update twice a year in June and in January. Emphasis here on realistic and achievable goals.

  • Reboot BillMcNamee.com by removing blog content and starting fresh.

  • Add a News/Featured Post page to the website.

  • Tweak and update other sections of the website, including the folio images.

  • Photography, Photography, Photography, Write

  • Publish blog posts on a regular basis. Minimum goal is one to two posts per month. This will include tweaked works of older, but relevant, posts

  • Publish images to my social media feeds on a regular basis. Minimum goal is four posts per month.

  • Publish at least two photo books (digital, zine, or hardbound) between now and the end of the year.

  • Update my published book, Off Season, Cape May, New Jersey.

  • Create a store front on BillMcNamee.com to sell images and publications directly.

Please enjoy the site and stop back often. It is my deepest desire to keep the content fresh and to post and publish often.

Enjoy!!