Lukas VanDyke – International Wedding Photographer

While I’m doing photo tours, I thought I would post a couple of photos of my home office as well. If you know anything about me, you know I am extremely cognizant and sensitive to the spaces I am in. I would rather eat in a restaurant with a cool atmosphere and average food, then one with amazing food and an atmosphere I don’t like. In fact, there’re a lot of places I won’t eat because I don’t like the tiles on the floor, the color of the paint, or the kind of light bulbs they use (I HATE fluorescent lights). All to say I just wanted to give you all a little look into why I made the choices I did in regard to our living and working environment.

When people step into the home office the first thing they always ask about is all the photos on the wall. Well, they are a collection of pages from magazines that represent lighting arrangements, color, or poses we like. It’s kind of a compilation of the feel that defines our style of portraiture. As far as the rest of the room I’m big into ambient light, I love window light during the day, and a lot of soft low wattage bulbs reflecting off the walls at night. I can’t handle overhead lights. Seriously, I can’t. When I used to work in an office, I took all the fluorescent ceiling light bulbs out of the ceiling, hid them, and purchased my own floor lamps. Suzy and I are also really into vintage items. I think one of our favorite past times together is antique stores, thrift stores, and just driving around the area looking for cool items. I also love dark wood and brightly-colored paint. You’ll see a lot of that in our office, house, and studio.

When you spend many of your waking hours sitting at a desk, you want it to be a space of peace and tranquility that always brings a smile to your face. It should be a place with no loose ends, no clutter, and a clean slate of inspirational surroundings. That’s our goal with the spaces we occupy and that’s part of what helps keep us creative.

After a few years of marriage, Suzy and I discovered we were more productive if we worked in separate rooms. Maybe it was all the love in the air distracting us. So, maybe if you’re lucky, she’ll post some photos of her office space on the other end of the house.

When we decided to move our office and gallery space to the center of downtown Los Angeles we really had no idea what was available. We drove into the city, parked, and started wandering into buildings, and following up on craigslist adds. After a couple very dirty buildings, uninspiring spaces, and people we would rather not have as landlords, we found the Spring Arts Tower and met Lulu and Peggy.

Just walking into the lobby we felt inspired. The spaces were everything we dreamed of, and even the people we met wandering the halls and in the elevator seemed to be just the artsy type we gravitate towards. In fact a majority of the people in the building are artists of one kind or another. Lulu was more than helpful taking us back and forth between all the floors to check out the different spaces available and Peggy answered all our questions with a smile. We signed up for a space right then and there. Nothing anywhere could have felt more right and we knew it.

Since then it’s just gotten better. There are some exquisite dessert and coffee shops right on our street (for you coffee snobs they even serve intelligentsia). There is a massive library/bookstore/coffee shop in the lobby. There are some incredible other artists in the building who’s pieces just blow me away. We haven’t checked out the night club in the basement yet, but I’ve heard it’s pretty happening. And for those of you who like movie stars, they film in our building all the time. There’s a parking lot with spaces right next to the front door, and the street is in the nice area only two blocks from Pershing square and right near all the new residential lofts. It took us a few weeks, but I think we are at least moved in enough to make it usable!

I can’t wait for you all to come by and visit!

When I first started shooting I used to do a lot more street photography. There’s something about doing portraiture with real-life people doing what they really do that is fascinating. I’ve been around the world a number of times, and I got in the habit of just wandering around for days at a time in major foreign cities. I met a lot of interesting people and even photographed a series of close-up shots of beggars in a number of different countries. I think it’s people’s eyes that get me. Some show hope; others show despair; many are suspicious, and a few sparkle with joy. For me all the people you meet and interact with is the fun of traveling alone. I also think all that early street photography, and real-life portraiture is what got me into loving the emotional aspect of wedding photography. Just like some of the real emotion you sometimes happen upon on the street, weddings are a day full of real emotion just ready to be captured.

Anyway, I finished a shoot down in Malibu a few weeks ago, and as I was leaving spotted this guy on the side of the road leaning against his car just smoking is cigarette and strumming his guitar. I pulled over and asked if I could take a couple of photos of him. He was hesitant, but let me. When I left I realized I had already forgotten his name. When traveling, I used to always write them down, but I guess I am out of practice. So here it is, another interesting life I will never know more about.

Hello All! It’s been one of those weeks where so much has been happening that the blog has gotten a little neglected. But to get back into it I thought I would type out some of things Suzy and I commonly pray for our photography business. These are all prayers that we have consistently prayed over the past couple years since we got married. It’s obviously not word for word, but you’ll get the idea. The cool thing is that God has given us instruction for everything we need to know in life and how to pray in the Bible. So at the bottom I put some of the scripture that has helped instruct Suzy and I in how to pray and what to pray. Hopefully it’s helpful for someone out there. Feel free to leave a comment or shoot me an email if you have any thoughts or questions!

Prayers:
Holy God, We praise you for giving us the ability to work and make enough money for clothing and shelter. Even that is more than we deserve. Above and beyond the food and shelter thank you for allowing us enjoy what we do. In the areas we don’t enjoy, give us continual joy in you.

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Lord Jesus, we praise you for giving us a business where we have the flexibility to serve our/your church in more ways than people with less flexible schedules. We pray that you keep this a focus in our lives and show us how to balance our time between work and serving the church.

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Holy Spirit, every wedding we book, and every check we receive we acknowledge is a gift from you. Each and every one is unexpected, and we thank you for each and every one as it comes. We ask that you keep us encouraged when we doubt and focus our hearts on you and not our business for joy. Keep us humble when we are feeling successful knowing our every ability is a gift from You. We ask that you keep us focused on the ultimate goal in life which is to fear God and keep your commandments. If our business or photography takes us away from that goal please take it away from us and re-direct our focus on You.

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Dear Jesus, I thank you for giving your life for us on the cross and covering our sins. You’ve given us a business where we get to meet and interact with A LOT of people and we ask that you help us to have the courage and joy to share the gift you’ve given us with others at the appropriate times.

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Lord, as we make these plans with our business we acknowledge you are in control. Give us wisdom in our decisions so that we can bring you the most glory through our time, money, and affections. If this decision is your will please bring us success, if it’s not show us another door.

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Dear Jesus, as we head out the door to shoot this wedding we pray that you give us skill, focus, energy and creativity throughout the day. We ask that you give us humility and love towards everyone we meet and interact with. We ask that you help us through our attitudes and actions to help make this the best day possible for the bride, groom and all their families and guests. Thank you for allowing us to shoot this wedding.

And just for some color here’s a quick shot of the meeting room an the new studio space in downtown. I’ll have some more photos up of everything later this week!

Scripture References:

1 Corinthians 10:31 “So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”

James 1:5 “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.”

James 3:17 “But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.”

James 4:13 “Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. 15 Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.”

Ecc 12:13 “The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.”

Matthew 6:9-17 “Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”