Look Who I Found When I Came Home!

It was Ben and Charlene, hanging out in in the front yard.

Just kidding. This is actually my vacation home in Norway.

Nope, this is an engagement session we did in San Francisco in March.

Here are a few more images.

Jewelry Photographs

I recently photographed the amazing jewelry of Keren Barukh of Oakland, California.

The similarity to portrait photography is that the subject (in this case jewelry) must be lit to bring up its distinctive features. And, distracting elements (in this case clothing, face and hair) must be lit so that they add to the photo, rather than distract or detract from the jewelry.

In this case, Jillian is not just the model, but also a client of mine.







Another model was Courtney

Hiking With Dad - Retrospective

My father, Felix Khuner(1906-1991)


I took this photo in, I am guessing, 1968. I took this with my first real camera, a Canonet QL-17, that my father had brought back from Japan in 1968.

We were hiking in a National Park - I think it was Mt. Lassen - and my father stepped in a creek with his right foot. He stopped to dry his shoe, and I got this shot.

I was a photojournalist forty years ago!

What Will You Be Doing on Your 95th Birthday?

Will you be teaching a dance class?



My mom was teaching her regular Thursday class as the Senior Center (not at the Senior Edge, I guess?). Because her class was celebrating her 95th birthday, she asked me to come by and take a group photo.

They had a cake for her



Happy 95, Mom! - Like she'll ever read my blog.

My Mom at Eighteen

My Mom's High School Graduation Photo


I did not take this photo. I am guessing that the person who took this photo isn't around anymore. But look at the gift the photographer gave us.

Photographs are our gift - the photographer's and the subject's - to people in the future.

You may think you are just hiring a wedding photographer or some photographer to do your family portrait. In the best of all worlds, you choose a person who will create images that will tell your children and grandchildren who you were way back then. How did you feel? Who was close to you?

"Thankyou Mr./Miss photographer of 1931 who took this photo."

I want to be Nadia Boulanger

I don't even know who Nadia Boulanger is, but I LOVE the name.

Sandals

My mom is a name dropper. She used to tell this story about my older brother's footwear, and how we were so ahead of the times:


"Remember when Jonathan wore sandals, and that was before everyone else was wearing sandals. He was the first. He did it before everyone else wore sandals."


An impressionable youth, six years younger than Jonathan, hearing my mom tell that story many times, I really believed what she was saying. And I felt pride. I would see a guy wearing sandals and I would think, "Oh, but my brother, my family, was the first." [I am not sure if I really think with commas, but using commas makes me feel important.]


This year my wife and I are working on this problem. I want to have conversations without my mentioning that I was the first to do something or that I or my family has a connection to a famous person.


We have come up with a technique: Whenever I mention some connection I have with a famous person, she or I say, "Sandals."


Don't we all know that Pride is a sin? Don't we all know that murder and Pride are not good? It ain't the latest self-help fad, buddy.


It's not that it's a sin, but that it is alienating, it breaks the connection that conversations are, ideally, supposed to create and strengthen. And, it alienates me from myself. When I mention my connection that elevates me, I am not as present. I am less my authentic self, and just a jerk compensating (failing to compensate) for my inadequacies.


Connecting with others feels good. It's the opposite of alienation. When I don't feel connected, name dropping makes it worse, not better.