August 2008 – Otis & James Photography

Allison & Mark

Gather ’round, my dear Children of Blog, because I’m about to tell you a story. Â It’s a story about when the Otis & James Caravan of Love pulled out of the Minot station, and headed South to a land called Bismarck! Â Now, I don’t want you to think we only did this to visit the State Capitol, or to even go to the Heritage Center…even though we did kind of do both of these things.

No, my good friends, the reason for our Southern sojourn was so we could be a part of the fabulous wedding of Allison & Mark! Â I suppose you might be wondering why I’m calling the the ‘fabulous’ wedding, and I’m here to tell you that the reason why is because I can not tell a lie. Â I know that someone famous said the same thing, and it may have involved cutting down a cherry tree or something like that, and it also seems to me that the story that I speak of is completely false and was proven to be nothing more than some sort of a morality fable, but people have just accepted it to be the truth because they’ve heard it so many times, but that only goes to show that just because you hear thing repeated doesn’t exactly mean that they’re true, but that doesn’t have anything to do with anything here, it’s just a statement of fact, and what this has to do with anything is that I can not tell a lie, and the wedding of Allison & Mark was truly, truly fabulous!

The reason for this, you may be wondering, is because they – along with everyone else that was involved with making the beautiful pictosnaps – made the day completely wonderful on all levels! Â They brought their A-Game [ed. Â You’ve never played a sport in your life, please stop trying to use sportingÂ analogiesÂ – it reeks of insincerity.] and judging by even these few sample snaps that lie just below these wind-baggy words, I most definitely am not telling a lie.

So, with all of these words swirling around your head, I think it best be time that we put them all to bed, give MuchLove & ManyThanks to Allison & Mark for letting us be a part of their day, and to all of my little cowboys & cowgirls out there in Land of Blog on a Summer night so wonderful – Enjoy!

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Kelly & Josh!

Oh yeah…hey…it’s me again. Â Just thought that I would throw a ray of beautiful pictoriffic sunshine your way via the information superhighway (the interweb), and more specifically through what we in the world of o&j call ‘the blog’, and I’m not gonna do it through putting up a bunch of pictures of me and my doggie, or even me eating a grilled cheese sandwich (even though pictures of me eating a grilled cheese sandwich are very interesting, and I think some form of performance art, but I’ll leave those for later.) Â Nope. Â Instead, I’m going to put the sunshine into your lives via the wonderful sample snaps of Kelly & Josh!

You see, there was this time, that wasn’t all that long ago, when this dynamic duo sauntered into our studio and informed us that they needed some sweet bippy e.pics taken. Â Well…it was something like that. Â I know they came into the studio, and I know we took their pics. Â But they may not have sauntered, and they may have actually scheduled an appointment in advance, but those things are just details, and I’m here more to weave a yarn than to provide an actual historical document of the time Kelly & Josh came to visit us.

Oh yes, back to Kelly & Josh! Â Did I forget to mention that they were totally awesome, and the short time that we spent together was filled to the brim with excitement and pictoriffic goodness of all sorts?! Â Well, I just told you, so now you know!

But who am I to just sit here and ramble on about how good they are, when you could just look at the sample pics and see for yourself. Â So I will stop, and I will give MuchLove & ManyThanks to Kelly & Josh for beins so awesome, and to all of my good peeps of blog that are always so awesome – Enjoy!

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Kaela & Josh!

Do you know what I dig about my job? Â I mean, besides the fact that I get to make all the rules, follow only the ones that I choose to, I get to boss around employees, I can be late and nobody will write me up for it, there is no human resources department, I don’t have to be a part of any ‘performance reviews’, there are no mandatory in-services that I need to attend, I don’t have someone that is younger, less-educated and just straight up dumber than me bossing me around…well…you get the drift. Â In case you haven’t already figured this out, I’ve pretty much been fired or asked to quit just about every job I’ve ever had before. Â I’m not the kind of person that likes to be put ‘in a box’…I get cagey. Â Or boxey. Â Something like that. Â But do you know what I dig more than all of those awesome things? Â Getting to work with beautiful people like Kaela & Josh!

You see, that is really the best part of the job! Â Every day, beautiful people come into our lives, just like this very wondrous couple, and we get to take wonderful pictosnaps of them. Â And that, my dear friends, is the best part of the job…and that’s the truth! Â You know what, I’m going to put these words to bed. Â Before we get to the awesome samplesnaps, I gotta give MuchLove & ManyThanks to this wonderful couple for giving us some of their valuable time, and to all my good people out there in the Land of Blog, keeping a watchful eye over the town that is currently sleeping – Enjoy!

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And One More Time…The Family Brintnell!

Welcome back to the Otis & James All Star Client Tour 2008, up next in the game is none other than the totally and completely awesome Family Brintnell! Â I will tell you something, my dear friends of blog. Â In fact, I will often tell you many things, and all of them are unsolicited from you, the faithful viewer of the blog, and I do this with no remorse, because this is my party and I will drone on and on and on if I so choose to. Â Umm…yeah. Â So, now that we got that out of the way, I think I was saying something about…what was it again…hmmmm…I remember! Â It was The Family Brintnell!

As is usual with this awesome group, we had a great time working with them. Â And this time, we took the Otis & James Caravan of Love on location to the beautiful Home of Brintnell! Â It was a perfect night for it, and everyone in this lovely group was completely up to the task of making beautiful pictosnaps! Â But, since we’ve had the goodly pleasure of working with this fine fam before, we knew this was going to be the case, so really no surprises there.

What is surprising is that I am going to stop with all of these silly words now, give MuchLove & ManyThanks to The Family Brintnell for being so awesome, and to all my children of the blog – Enjoy!

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The Family Busch!

On a day that wasn’t all that long ago, the automated super doors of the FunCenter (we just had them installed, they have handles now) opened on up, and into our photographic existence appeared none other than The Family Busch! Â And guess what, my dear friends, they didn’t just come here to gaze lovingly at my pretty face. Â Oh no, they came here to have some totally awesome family pics taken before they up and left this town that is known as Minot!

You see, we are acquainted with this awesome family through the mother of our one and only James, the always lovely Bonnie, who worked with the Dad (he has a name, but he’s just Dad here) of this group at Our Savior Lutheran Church here in Minot. Â So it only seemed natural that for some sweetly going away family snaps, they would stop by the world of o&j (I mean, we would have probably been sad had Bonnie helped them schedule something with another photographer.)

So, it was with great joy that we worked with them (if you want to call it work), and we would like to offer them a big ol’ plate of MuchLove & ManyThanks for stopping by before they moved on in their journey of life (I know, that sounds cheesy, but I gotta wrap this thing up somehow!) Â Oh, and to all my good peeps out there in Land of Blog reading this, remember to – Enjoy!

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Once Again…The Family Dufner!

Hello there, my good friends of blog, it’s me again. Â Did you really think I was going to leave you alone? Â I think not. Â Because if I were to do such a crazy thing, then you would never get to hear about how we had the superawesome great pleasure of once again working with The Family Dufner!

It seems that they’ve been coming to us for years now, and I think that it seems that way because they’ve actually been coming to us for years now. Â So that makes sense. Â As I was saying, if I were to leave you alone, I wouldn’t be able to tell you that – as usual – they came to FunCenter for Fun and What Not (FCFFAWN) and did the magic. Â They turned it on, they tore it up, the did the deal, they rocked it, and they rocked it hard.

For those of you that have difficulties understanding my Ã¼ber-hip lingo, what I’m saying is that they were awesome, and really – would it be any other way with this lovely family?! Â That was a rhetorical question, because there would be no other way. Â Awesome is the only way they know how to do it. Â So I’m going to leave it with that, and get rid of these words so we can look at the lovely samplesnaps that are just waiting for you to feast your eyes upon. Â MuchLove to The Family Dufner for again giving us some of their sweet & precious time, and to all me good peeps out there on this fine night in Blogville – Enjoy!

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It’s James, Yo.

Step back in time with me for just a second, to a time and place that will forever be known as the time that James stepped into the FunCenter (well, technically, we made the outside world our FunCenter, but he did have to step in for a couple of minutes, just to fill out the paperwork, you know, so, it’s not like I’m lying to you or anything, I’m just…ahh forget it, let’s get back to the real words) for some sweetlysweet senior snaps.

My dear friends. Â We have known one another for many a long year now (again, all of the years are the same amount of time, except the one where we have the leap year thing, but that’s just some sort of a plot against the people that are born on that date to keep them young, but I’ll save that discussion for another day), and you know I’m gonna straight shoot this thing. Â It’s like I need to have a leather bomber jacket, and it needs to have ‘The Straightshooter’ embroidered on it, that’s how much of a straight shooter I am. Â So I’m gonna straight shoot this thing.

James came in, he knew what the dilly-yo was, he did the deed, and rocked it up. Â Straight shooting. Â That’s what I do.

MuchLove to James for giving us a little bit of his time, and to all my good peeps out there in Land of Blog – Enjoy!

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Charity & Andy

Hello my dear dear friends of Blogville! Â I come to you today, on this fine late Summer Saturday afternoon with a wonderful story, and some even better pics for you to gaze upon! Â We’ll start with the story first. Â You see, if we were to hop into the Otis & James Wayback Machine (and I’ll spare you having to actually get in it and push the empty McDonald’s bags out of the way so you can squeeze in), we could go back to a time and a place when the Otis and the James were just getting started out in this crazy crazy world that now occupy.

The reason that we would go back is because we would be able to see that one of our original clients, and an original supporter of what we do here is none other than this wonderful couple that we like to call Charity & Andy! Â In this time and this land oh so long ago, all we had was a one foot by two foot sign with our name on it, a back room in our office, a computer and a camera. Â We believed in big things for ourselves, but it was hard to find others that felt this same way (we kept thinking, ‘if you build it, they will come’, but we hadn’t really built anything.)

Through some sort of a magical twist of fate, Charity came into our lives first, as at that time Andy was serving our country in Iraq. Â Eventually, Charity came to work with us offering hair and makeup to our Seniors. Â Not only that, but we soon came to call Charity an honest to goodness good friend! Â Not long after this, Andy completed his tour and we had the double-good pleasure of meeting him, and working with them as a couple. Â We soon became friends with Andy too, and this friendship has lasted all the way until today!

Soon our little o&j world became something bigger, and time marched on. Â Also, Charity & Andy found themselves leaving our little neck of the woods behind for bigger cities. Â But we still remained friends, and when it came time for them to go from just being a couple to being a husband & wife, we were honored that they chose us to be a part of their big day! Â Well, I guess we would have been pretty sad if they had chosen an other area photographer, but we would have respected their choice. Â But we’re happy that they chose us, because being able to shoot the wedding was like putting the final chapter in this book (there will be other books – sequels to this book. Â Look for them soon.)

Well, I’ve rambled on here long enough. Â I just want to say how much we’ve appreciated everything Charity & Andy have done for us over the past years, and they are a part of how we got to where we are! Â We wish them all the happiness in the world, and know that we will see them and work with them soon! Â Also, a big MuchLove & ManyThanks to everyone that helped make this day go so well, and to all me good peeps out there in Land of Blog – Enjoy!

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BMWNROR v.26 :: The Families Schmidt & Peterson!

The only way I can think of to say how awesome working with these this family is through Van the Man. It’s serious when I’m bringing out tracks from Astral Weeks.

MuchLove!
MuchLove!

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BMWNROR v.25 :: The Jody & Brent Edition!

Dig, if you will, my good friends of blog. Â For I’m about to lay on you some totally awesome sample pictosnaps. Â So what I’m asking you to do is to strap yourselves in, sit back, and get ready to let the good times roll. Â Because you’re about to have your visual world rocked.

And what, exactly, is it that will be rocking your world? Â Well, none other than the righteous e.pics (and If I have to explain to you one more time that the ‘e’ stands for ‘engagement’ I’m going to explode) of the wonderful and lovely Jody & Brent! Â You see, they strolled on in to the FunCenter in need of some e.pics, we just happened to be their with our camera’s, and the rest…is history.

There shall be no more words. Â Just MuchLove to this wonderful couple for giving us some of their time, and to all my good children of Blog sitting around your computers on a day when you should be outside – Enjoy!

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