Anna Mayerphoto journalism | Anna Mayer

More babies & more tats. San Jose newborn photography.

Anna — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 18:20:00 +0000

Remember my newborn with the beautiful parents with awesome ink? They’ve had their second baby! Lucky me I get to photograph them again and lucky you, you get to see.

Here is the latest edition with his lovely parents:

And here’s a flashback to baby no. 1 . . . And the latest again. He’s so precious . . .

Look at those lips!

Another flashback. She was so much chunkier! Love the cheeks.

And maybe my favorite Before & After . . . no. 1 on mommy’s shoulder in 2008 . . .

And here she is now, so big! (oh, and look at mommy’s expanding ink . . . )

Beautiful gallery of a beautiful boy.

Anna — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 16:00:00 +0000

When clients commission us for portraits they are not just hiring a photographer to capture some images of their kids and family, they are taking the first step toward beautiful art for their home. This lovely wall gallery was exactly what she was looking for when we began the process. Isn’t it sweet?

Pretty little ladies. Bay Area kid’s photography.

Anna — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 15:46:00 +0000

These sweet sisters sure made me smile. There was plenty of joy to capture! I think I have a photo somewhere of my sister and I playing piano; so classic. When I travel from Milwaukee to San Jose for photo sessions, I never know what kind of joy I am going to find, but I am often so delighted when I discover it. This session was no exception. Love love love what we captured.

My bubbly-Bug. Underwater photography in Milwaukee.

Anna — Sat, 02 Oct 2010 15:30:00 +0000

One of my favorite “professional photographer perks” are the fun “tools” we get to own because, well, we NEED them. And the best of them all was my Ikelite underwater housing. I was lucky enough to buy one from another photographer, so it wasn’t TOO expensive, but it is quite the deal. Because I bought it for my classic 5D and I didn’t plan to use it a whole lot for client shoots, I decided not to upgrade to the lens housing I needed for my 24-70 or my 85 mm (not to mention I would be beyond nervous submerging those lenses along with my camera body. $$$$). The end result is a nifty black ring around all of my images, which I personally think looks cool, kind of like a portal in a boat. Sometimes I edit it out, but in this one I loved it. Isn’t she the cutest? I shot this in the outdoor pool at my sister’s campground in N. Minnesota (if you live in Minnesota, you have to check out that campground. You can BUY a campsite, really, and keep it forever. Pretty cool, right?)

Sweet sisters in their favorite tree. Family photography in Los Gatos, CA.

Anna — Thu, 30 Sep 2010 14:27:00 +0000

I really loved this session. The girls were just sweet and fun and they had no problem showing me all the cool things they could do in their spectacular backyard. In the hour I was with them we managed to capture a whole lotta’ “childhood” for their mama; an especially wonderful gift when you children are older and have one foot in the more grown-up (and sometimes less sweet) world of a teenager.

Oh, for heaven’s sake! Too stinking cute!! San Jose Children’s photographer.

Anna — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 15:33:00 +0000

Imagine my delight when these two little cuties walked up to me at our Short and Sweet at McClellan Ranch. Not only were they cute, but they were sweet little monkeys, too. I just loved them and their beautiful and lovely mama (who, unfortunately, wasn’t being photographed that day. Next time, right?).

Project Imperfect post #5 Faster Mommy !

Anna — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 15:30:00 +0000

A familiar view for me, as we shuffle down the road on some of our walks, on nights when she’s already PJ’d up and too tired to keep up. I actually don’t take her on runs in this; too annoying not to have my arms but she still likes going “super fast”. I love that I have this photo now, to help me remember this time in our lives and what we did so many evenings.

Project imperfection, post #4. Bay Area family photographer.

Anna — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 13:19:32 +0000

I have a long list of wishes when it comes to being a mommy. I wish I was a better planner, I wish I was better at following through, I wish I had more time with my kids. But one thing I do get right is reading with my children. I love snuggling up with a good stack of storybooks. Every one of my children is a reader, yay! Doing a least one thing right.

A little announcement! Images by Anna is now Anna Mayer

Anna — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 17:04:20 +0000

No, there wasn’t a wedding, and I’m not running from the FBI.

When we moved our family to Milwaukee a little over a year ago, we thought a lot about how we wanted to approach running a high-end custom photography business here as we have in the Bay Area. Should we extend our California-based business, Images by Anna? Should we start anew? After a brief attempt as a single business, we decided to go the “separate” route. We took many of the things we had learned over the years, came up with some awesome branding with the little red balloon, and launched Anna Grace. We had visions of an established local brand that would define a market. We thought we were on to something really fun and cool. And we still do.

However, there are many facets to running a small business and reality was that trying to mange two distinct identities, especially on the ubiquitous internet, proved to be a much more daunting task than we had anticipated. I ended up feeling like a schizophrenic, with so many identities and “voices” that I almost stopped communicating at all. After much consideration of our personal well-being and the best interests of our clients in both locations, we have decided to merge our two companies, Anna Grace (thelittleredballoon.com) and Images by Anna (annamayer.com), into Anna Mayer (annamayer.com). We are taking the best of our ideas for Milwaukee and bringing them to our clients in California (you are gonna’ love the new tweaks); we are bringing the best of our methods and systems from California to our clients in Milwaukee and Chicago (lucky ducks); and we are bringing together a vast group of fans from around the country (we love you, too).

Now, if we were a big company, we would get all of the various elements in place, stage a big event, and “flip the switch”. However, that’s not really our style (or our reality). We’re laid back people trying to be the best for our clients and our family. Instead, you’ll see changes happen in bits and pieces, but other than the obvious name and logo change, nothing will change as far as the great service and awesome products you know and love.

A few things to note: due to Facebooks’s limitations, our page there will remain facebook.com/imagesbyanna , which works, anyway, since the ARE “images” by “Anna”. You’ll see our new logo showing up (just look for the balloon ) around town & around the internet. You’ll see some changes on twitter (@imagesbyanna will be retired in favor of @annamayerphoto). What you won’t see? Two crazy chickens trying to juggle two companies, 5 email addresses, 3 twitters, and 5 facebooks; not to mention 4 kids, a house and a new puppy named Oscar. Yes that’s right; we have a dog named Oscar Mayer and no, he’s not a wiener dog. (No promises that we won’t still be two crazy headless chickens, though, cuz those kids, that house and that puppy are not getting a rebrand; at least not this time around.)

-Anna & Brian Mayer

Life. Captured. A fabulous opportunity.

Anna — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 18:39:08 +0000