FalconRose Photography

4x6 Photo Contact Card

2011-12-31T19:11:00.000-08:00

A much better layout for this business. I think this will work while keeping the costs of printing down.

FalconRose Photography Image Brochure January 2012

2011-12-31T18:12:00.000-08:00

Here is the first initial design of the January 2012 1 page image brochure for FalconRose Photography. Not very creative, but hopefully some more inspiration hits, before I have to take this around to the art stores.

Business Card

2011-12-31T16:53:00.000-08:00

As you have seen in my previous post, the past 5 years I have not even had a business card to hand out. This will be my new business card.

I am looking very forward to getting these printed and hopefully ready to hand out by late January 2012 at the very latest. I will also have some flyers ready to hand out hopefully by February that I will be taking around to some of the art dealers in the Lower Mainland. After 5 years of trying to get this business launched, it's time to git'r done. Thanks to all of you for joining me on this journey of discovery.

My New Year's Resolutions

2011-12-31T16:44:00.000-08:00

As my business is still in what I would consider the fledgeling stage even after 5 years (I'm accruing no debt because I buy my equipment outright in cash, rather than on credit: that way the equipment is 100% mine and not on loan to me by a credit card company). I still have "true" wildlife lenses that I need to acquire and thus am in a quandary in terms of not having the range to get the shots that would really be profitable. However that is on the table. And hopefully, I should have in the next two years five acquisitions that will bring a lot more to the table.

A 300mm f/4 lens

A 105mm f/2.8 VR Macro

The set of teleconverters to go with the 70-200mm f/2.8 VRII and the 300mm f/4 lens to bring me a decent range

A tripod (the Gitzo SGT GT5561) and the Jobu BWG-Pro2 gimbal head

A set of Lee 0.3, 0.6 & 0.9 Graduated Neutral Density filters.

This will allow me to expand my ability to create saleable landscape photos and saleable wildlife shots.

My long term goal is to replace the 300mm f/4 with the 300mm f/2.8 VRII or the 200-400mm f/4 and get an incredibly long super-telephoto with the 600mm f/4.

So my business resolutions are as follows:

I will do my utmost to increase 100-fold the number of images in my saleable inventory, which means getting out to do as much shooting as I can possibly manage to do so given the restrictions with my being a family man.

I will take my camera everywhere...

I will train my eye to see more opportunities in everything (wildlife or landscape) that I shoot.

I resolve that I will start sending out my photos to the magazines this year and try to nail down a few sales (5 sales to start would be the impetus) this year.

I resolve to get out to the Fraser Valley Bald Eagle Festival each and every year from now on. This is going to be an annual event with me every year.

5 resolutions that I hope to uphold and take into this 2012 with me. Looking forward to new photographic opportunity and success this year. Happy New Year and May the best come to each and every one of you.

Wildlife Photography - Prints For Sale

2011-12-31T14:17:00.000-08:00

Call or email me for pricing.

Variety of wildlife subject matter will increase and/or change as I gain equipment.

Landscape Photography - Prints for Sale

2011-12-31T14:04:00.000-08:00

Call me for pricing.

Follow my Facebook Page

2011-12-29T21:59:00.000-08:00

I have put up a new Facebook page for my Wildlife, Nature and Landscape Photography: FalconRose Photography - Wildlife, Nature & Landscapes

Landscape Photography

2011-08-20T14:20:00.000-07:00

Landscape Photography Album

More of my Landscape Photography will be going up in this album as I get around to doing more with Landscape Photography.

500px - My site.

2011-07-16T12:51:00.000-07:00

FalconRose Photography 500px site

I now put all my photography that I sell on 500px. I have a total of 13 photos on 500px.

Lateral Switch into Wildlife/Nature/Landscape Photography

2011-05-30T19:24:00.000-07:00

I am finding that I lean more towards the Wildlife/Nature/Landscape genres of photography. With the acquisition of the 70-200mm f/2.8, the eventual acquisition of a 105mm f/2.8 Macro lens and the possibility of more work by shooting stock photography, I've decided to leave behind the potential money in wedding photography and switch to something that feeds my creative muse. I will still do portrait and event photography, however that will be more of a sideline. It will be done on a "at request" basis though mostly for friends and family.

Here are some of the nature shots that are going up for sale.

The rest of the "for sale" images can be found at my link on 500px at FalconRose Photography - Retail Images at 500px. Thanks for looking.

Amabilis 30th Anniversary Concert

2011-02-06T12:44:00.000-08:00

Finally, the pics of Diane conducting...

Amabilis Singers 30th Anniv. Concert Gala Photos Part II

2011-01-01T11:27:00.000-08:00

My choirmate from Amabilis (from the days where Amabilis was directed under Diane Loomer and who is still singing with the current choir) Gillian Bartholomew being recognized for her wonderful contributions to the choir.

Carrie Taylor, one of Amabilis's choral conductors

Another former Amabilis Singers choral director and conductor, Anne Unger.

The beloved choir director and conductor that I sang in Amabilis with; Diane Loomer. I was a bass-baritone in Diane's Amabilis Singers. And yes, I do have pictures of Diane conducting. Watch for them in the next few days. Still lots of editing to do.

See how much fun the current choir is having? Makes me wish I could sing still.

Some more choir shots. Why do I get the feeling that Cindy is going to want to kill me?

A shot of the audience members singing one of the numbers that they were allowed to join in on.

Amabilis Singers 30th Anniversary Concert Gala

2010-12-17T11:47:00.000-08:00

Amabilis Singers 30th Anniversary Dress Rehearsal

2010-12-11T08:29:00.000-08:00

Here are some shots from last night's shoot of the Amabilis Singers Dress Rehearsal for the 30th Anniversary Gala Concert.

The entire massed alumni/current member choir

A shot of the tenors and basses of the current choir

Looking forward to being there at the concert and getting some more shots as well as reuniting with old friends afterwards.

Christmas Season

2010-12-07T17:15:00.000-08:00

Just some shots for Christmas this year.

May you all have a wonderful holiday season and may you all have the best in 2011.

School Portraits 2010-2011

2010-10-06T08:47:00.000-07:00

© 2010 FalconRose Photography

© 2010 FalconRose Photography

I take my own kids' school photography. I prefer the American Style of outdoor photography as opposed to the stiffly posed school portraits preferred by Canadian schools.

My two latest pics of Storm and Jamie

2010-10-02T09:52:00.001-07:00

The two latest of my pics of Storm and Jamie.

Plus a character portrait of Jamie (he just loves his "Austin" from the "Backyardigans"

Outdoor Portraiture - My Sons

2010-07-27T12:32:00.000-07:00

Galen with his ever-present soccerball.

Cameron on the jungle-gym.

I find outdoor portraits very satisfying both creatively and economically. For the simple fact that it costs a lot of money in terms of strobe-flashes, backdrops and other assorted things that a studio would require and outdoor portraiture requires NONE of that expenditure. Eventually, I'd like to get myself a studio setup, but at this point in my career, it's not a financially feasible decision.

Baby Photography

2010-07-25T13:55:00.000-07:00

Baby Photography by FalconRose Photography. The shots you don't get to take if you're not a family member. This is actually a shot of my daughter, Storm Arianna Rose Mariko Chikamori at just 3 minutes old.

Art Photography - Flowers

2010-05-01T09:50:00.000-07:00

Every so often, I do flower photography as a change of pace.

Our Temporary Wix Flash Website

2010-04-26T07:28:00.000-07:00

Wix.Com FalconRose Photo Website

Unfortunately, it's not as unique as I'd like it to be. I intend to put some work into a functional website in the near future and upload it to my Shaw account in which I hope to have a proper URL for it.

New Equipment on the Way.

2010-04-24T09:17:00.000-07:00

FalconRose Photography has just acquired two new critical pieces of camera equipment. We (my wife and I) should be taking delivery of the Nikon D300s camera body and Nikon AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8 G ED lens as of the first week of May.

This Nikon D300s has the capacity to ramp up the frames-per-second rate from 6fps to 8 fps when coupled with the MB-D10/EN-EL4a combo

The Nikon D300s with the MB-D10 battery grip looks like this:

The lens and the camera will increase our flexibility to be able to shoot in low-light conditions (such as the interior of a church). The ability to rack-up the ISO if necessary and retain quality of image is crucial especially in both wedding and event photography. This will be a turning point for FalconRose Photography and a good step towards the other equipment that we need to make this business viable in the competitive market of wedding and event photography.

Update: Equipment received and being used.

Galen's and Cameron's School Portraits

2010-04-13T22:05:00.000-07:00

I decided to go the American School style for school portraits. I was tired of the one or two sitting postures that are chosen for school portraits and I've found that the highlights were blown out. I decided to do the portraits myself and follow the individual style of outdoor photography. And then threw a throw-blanket over the bookshelf and used that as a backdrop for the indoor photos.

Galen's indoor portrait

Galen with his skateboard

The ones of Cameron were taken indoors after the school photographer came and took his classmates' shots. I refused to let the school photographer do theirs.

Maybe we'll try another photoshoot with the both of the kids at school, either on the playground or on the basketball court outside.

All photos © 2009-2010 FalconRose Photography, (Hugo Chikamori, photographer), all rights reserved.

James Michael Takeo Chikamori

2010-02-16T13:40:00.000-08:00

Our 11 month old. A natural shot of him, with rather tousled hair.

©2010 FalconRose Photography

Warm toned photo.

An Architectural Photo from 2009

2009-11-18T10:49:00.000-08:00

Architectural Photography is one of my interests. I enjoy the play of the light on buildings and strive to utilize it in my photography.

This is a photo of the Concord Pacific construction site of a condo that is going up in downtown Vancouver.

Not only am I available for portrait photography, but I will also do architectural photography as well

Portraiture Work

2009-10-03T14:31:00.000-07:00

Over the past few weeks, I have had several portraiture sessions with old friends from both high-school and college. As the business’ primary focus is portraiture, we have had to tailor our photography portfolio to reflect that rather than stock photography. The next move from there is to assess exactly what equipment we need in order to facilitate artistic results and acquire them. Right now, I’m hoping that our business will be able to acquire a Gary Fong Lightsphere and an Interfit 5 in 1 32” reflector. That should be enough to accommodate the outdoor/environmental photography that we will need to pursue for the time being until such time that we have the resources to acquire a set of studio lights and some backdrops. Then we will have the opportunity to experiment with lighting.

My deepest thanks go out to my two friends who consented to this photo shoot: Phil Burrows and Daeyong Ra.

Also finally my wife and my youngest son modelled for the family portrait (mother/son)

New Facebook Profile for FalconRose Photography

2009-08-27T09:22:00.000-07:00

FalconRose Photography Facebook Profile

We have decided to attach a Business Profile to our Facebook account. All paid assignment gallery updates will be to our Facebook Account as well to show our clientele what we can do.

As this weblog and our business develops, we will be developing a permanent URL (http://www.falconrosephotography.com or .ca) and hopefully that will eventually create traffic and subsequently more paid assignments. Please keep in mind that falconrosephotography.com is not an active URL at this point in time. When it does become active; we will post a notice saying so on both the Facebook Profile and on our Blogspot weblog.

New things on FalconRose Photography's Blog

2008-12-30T11:56:00.001-08:00

As you can tell, we've added a few things to this blog which is a Flickr Photostream Gallery of all the photos that we're currently taking. This enables us to show you what we're currently doing just by uploading our images to Flickr. As a matter of fact we intend to closely tie the Flickr photostream gallery in with this particular blog so that we can allow you to know exactly what our output is. And as our photography output increases, the more images will show on that photostream.

I'm currently looking forward to the acquisition in January of that 50mm f/1.8 lens which will form the base of our portrait/headshot business and the acquisition within the year of the Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8.

Three models have been lined up to assist in the increase of the portrait portfolio which will be going up on the Flickr account. So during the holidays I've been rather busy with the organization part of the business.

Happy Holidays and all the best in the New Year to all our readers.

Falconrose Photography has a new contact e-mail address.

2008-12-26T17:56:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. FalconRose Photography has a new e-mail address. You can contact us at falconrosephoto(at)gmail.com (just use the @ symbol in place of the (at)) We will be working "headshots" and portraits for the first little while building up finances for acquiring some heavy duty lenses (f/2s and f/2.8s), so we'll be getting 2009 rolling. We hope to have a good year next year and looking forward to seeing some more business come in.

Prints for Sale

2008-11-05T23:25:00.000-08:00

These make good wall prints for those who are interested in such items.

Sunset over False Creek

Tranquil Pond (B&W still)

Walking Down Burrard Street

Cherry Blossoms at Dusk

Butterfly on Daisy

Sunset at Lost Lagoon

White Sided Dolphin Leaping

Red Tulip

Previous Blog - no longer updated.

2008-11-05T23:06:00.001-08:00

Our previous blog was at Livejournal.com

http://falconrosephoto.livejournal.com/1010.html

http://falconrosephoto.livejournal.com/1089.html

Here are the two previous posts that are visible on the blog. The dates are prior to the implementation of the Blogger blog.

I am still in the process of obtaining release forms for the NAGS shoot.

Welcome to FalconRose Photography's Blog

2008-11-05T23:00:00.000-08:00

Falcon Graphics was born in 1995 when Hugo Chikamori, then a realtor with Landpower Realty thought about assisting fellow realtors with the design and creation of open-house brochures. Back then graphics technology based on Windows operating systems was in its infancy, printers taking often 4-5 minutes to assimilate a print job and thus he usually ended up waiting half an hour for a brochure to print. This was NOT the way to encourage repeat customers. After meeting and marrying the love of his life in 2000, he ventured to addict her to model-building and photography, his two other passions. Since both he and his wife were both born in June within two days of each other, 6 years apart, they decided to add the rose (the June birth month flower) to the name to create FalconRose and switched ventures from "printing" to "photography".

With the objective firmly in place, they embarked upon a vision to create a photography business, first by creating stock photography, then ultimately going freelance and opening up a photo-studio. The road towards freelance photography has been long and tiring, however we've managed to get our first few breaks doing some work for Newton Advocacy Society's Annual General Meeting booklets as well as taking some photos for their awards ceremonies. The first steps are usually the hardest and as such are absolutely necessary in marketing and crucial to the overall success of the business

With the creation of this blog we are trying to show you what we're trying to do in the creation of this business, what services we offer and above all show you the results of our labours. After all it isn't just fancy equipment that forms the basis of a photography business, it's the people behind the equipment. FalconRose Photography was originally founded on the basis of architectural photography as Hugo's specialty is and has always been Landscape and Architectural and his background has been in the real estate community. However with the economics of the photographic market, we have had to branch out into other forms of photography such as wedding, portraits and commercial photography. FalconRose Photography is not averse to other forms of photography such as aviation photography and aerial photography, however those are niche markets and the equipment to do those types of photography such as hiring the aircraft to take us up is costly, but we will do those if asked.