Kate Huntington and I got together for a quick shoot at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, California.
It had rained the night before our shoot so the air was extra clear, which created beautiful light for our early morning shoot.
You can follow Kate on IG here @K8Huntington
-Oliver Endahl
Zahna Simon is a deaf dancer located in the San Francisco Bay Area. She is the company and festival assistant director at the Urban Jazz Dance Company and is extremely talented.
We used a variety of locations in SF, including the Sutro Bath Ruins, Ocean Beach, the Hidden Staircase, and Sutro Heights Park.
You can follow Zahna on Instagram here @DeafEnPointe
-Oliver Endahl
Jane Woodford and June Freeman are the 2024 Pointe Shop Models.
For this session with them, we shot in the Orange County area in Southern California.
Both June and Jane are extremely talented and this shoot was absolutely epic.
You can follow them on their IG’s below, along with the Pointe Shop.
Till next time,
-Oliver Endahl
Briana Baldovinos
Colorful studio photoshoot in Los Angeles
This was the first photoshoot Briana and I did together. I had seen this colorful photostudio available for rent in LA and thought it would be a great location for us to utilize.
I loved the vibrant colors of this space. I think bright colors are underutilized in art and pop culture. Probably because colors are the “standard” of photos, so people equate less color (black and white) to be more “meaningful” in their expression. (But both black and white and color, are equally valid in their artistic expression.)
Briana brought a great charisma and achieved excellent ballet lines that played well with the lines of the furnishings.
For the lighting, there was one large window located on one end of the studio that we used as our main source. It was an overcast day, so the light came in soft and diffused.
I’ve been photographing for around 14 years so I can shoot quickly when I need to. Briana had done many photoshoots before and is a pro, so we were able to create all these images + more in just a 2 hour time period.
You can follow Briana on IG at @Briana.Ballerina and you can keep up with my work right here on the Zine.
-Oliver Endahl
Peyton Szuberla
At the Noguchi Gardens and in studio
Peyton Szuberla and I shot at a public sculpture display called “Noguchi Gardens” located in California.
The garden sits between some business buildings and a parking garage. It’s less of a traditional garden and more like walking through an outdoor museum filled with huge pieces of art. It’s kept insanely clean and is often used for various photoshoots. (I had never shot there, but the location had been on my radar for years) While we were there, there was two wedding parties and some locals snapping photos and enjoying the sights.
There’s several very large pieces of art that each individually stand on their own, and together they all combine to form one grand piece which is the garden itself.
It wasn’t until after our shoot that I researched to find out more about the location. It turns out it was designed by renowned artist Isamu Noguchi.
Here is the Wikipedia headline info about Isamu Noguchi;
“Noguchi Isamu (November 17, 1904 – December 30, 1988) was an American artist and landscape architect whose artistic career spanned six decades, from the 1920s onward. Known for his sculpture and public artworks, Noguchi also designed stage sets for various Martha Graham productions, and several mass-produced lamps and furniture pieces, some of which are still manufactured and sold.”
How wild that he designed sets for Martha Graham? You can see in his work that it absolutely lends itself to dance with all the curves and aesthetically pleasing shapes.
Here is more information on the garden’s from the official website;
“Commissioned by the Segerstrom family in 1979 and completed in 1982, Isamu Noguchi’s California Scenario is recognized as one of the country’s preeminent sculpture gardens and the most vital publicly accessible outdoor sculpture oasis in Southern California. One of the artist’s most important public sculpture gardens, its design symbolizes various geographical characteristics of California, incorporating indigenous plants and materials.”
( https://www.southcoastplaza.com/stories/2016/12/noguchi-garden/ )
Everything looks so beautiful and intentional at this place that at one point I thought an outdoor garbage can was an art piece. (Which I thought was especially funny since in the movie “Wonder Woman 1984” they make this exact joke as they stroll thru an outdoor sculpture garden.)
After we finished at Noguchi, we headed to a photo studio that we had reserved for 2 hours. The studio had skylights above a cyc-wall, so we used all natural light for the set up.
Peyton’s Mother, Jessica, was the stylist for the shoot. I told Jessica for colors and outfit inspiration that we wanted anything neutral for the gardens, and for the studio we wanted anything “Barbie” centric. (That movie has amazing fashion and both Jessica and myself were inspired by it)
Jessica knocked it out of the park on both themes.
Love these gloves and the lines they created with Peyton’s port de bras
This converse look was especially fun to shoot. Peyton’s movements maximized the flow of the blue top and really brought an electric energy to the look.
Towards the end of our time we started losing light, (we shot at the studio from 6-8 PM) So Peyton wore this unique white fluffy top that we paired with a maroon leotard. The white top picked up the remaining soft light and Peyton’s body was nearly silhouetted.
This was a phenomenal shoot. I was feeling extremely inspired by the Noguchi Gardens, Peyton’s movements and Jessica’s passion/great taste for styling.
Keep an eye on the Zine fore more shoots with Peyton and Jessica Szuberla.
-Oliver Endahl
