Identifying "Baby Grace"

AP called me to cover a press conference in Mentor announcing the identity of "Baby Grace" was discovered. The girl is Riley Ann Sawyers from Mentor. It was a hard press conference to shoot.

The first photo is of Riley's father, Robert, talking about her life and the things he remembered the most about her. The second photo is of Sheryl Sawyers, grandmother to Riley, and Ray, uncle to Riley. Sheryl is holding a picture of Riley and an Elmo doll she bought her for Christmas.

My son Luca is 7 months old now, and I can't imagine what this family is going through. My condolences go out to the Sawyers family. This press conference was very emotional, and I hope my photos helped tell this unfortunate story.

Photos © Associated Press.

Bramley portraits, 10-27-07

Sometimes a wedding shoot is nothing like any other wedding shoot. Dawn and Kevin's wedding photos were a perfect example. Dawn called me to discuss wedding photography a few months ago. She and Kevin were already married out on the west coast, and what she needed was some reception coverage. But in addition to the reception photos, she wanted some interesting portraits of the two of them in a different setting. So what she wanted was some images shot at Lakeview Cemetery. We had a fantastic time and the portraits are way cool. These are some of my favorites. The setting was screaming black and white.

Luca turns 6 months.

Usually any photos I shoot of my son Luca end up on his own special blog site - www.kenblaze.com/luca - and people other than family don't see how cute this kid is. He turned 6 months old this last weekend, and my wife Kristen and I set up a studio in the house to capture some portraits of him. This is one of my favorites from the day.

Tis the season ...

Yes it is the engagement time of year. I went out to Willoughby Hills to photograph Mike and Laura, a couple whose wedding I will be shooting in November. We had fun walking the streets of Waite Hill while getting the evil eye from all the cars passing by. Did you know that it's safer to walk against traffic when in Waite Hill? We had a fire captain stop and tell us. Here's some of the shoot.

Busy weekend

I had a productive weekend. It was the busiest for me in a while. Shot Tara and Steve's wedding on Saturday, Meghan and Drew's enagagement photos on Sunday and Nick and Nate Bonvissuto's kid portraits on Monday morning. Tara and Steve will have a gallery up on my website in the next couple weeks. But here's some of my favorite stuff from the other two sessions.

Sarah and Wille (9-28-07)

Sometimes I shoot weddings that are not full days. Those weddings don't end up in my galleries on the weddings part of my website because I don't shoot the "story of the day" for those weddings. I often still have great photos from these weddings that you don't see. Here's my favorites from Sarah and Willie's wedding.

Indians/Yankees ALDS Game 1

So I shot game one of the Divisional series between the Indians and the Yankees last Friday night. I shot the game for AP. It has been about 5 months since I left my job at the News-Herald, and this was my first trip back to Jacobs Field. You may have seen some of my photos on SI.com or CNN.com or ESPN.com or Yahoo sports or wherever else they run AP photos. It was a good night for the Indians and for me. I haven't had the chance to get out and shoot too much baseball this year, and I was happy to come up with some nice images. The shot of C.C. Sabathia was my favorite from the night. He had a good game but it was a tough battle in the end to get the win. The shot of Victor Martinez hitting the home run was a favorite on SI.com and seemed to sum up the Indians night.

Ken Blaze Photography Blog Begins!

I have decided to start a blog to chronicle some of what is going with me in my world of photography. I will devote this blog to some of the interesting things I am shooting and to keep clients up to date on recent assignments. Enjoy!