Here’s a picture of Donovan Ricketts on the Timbers program cover from the last home game.

Green & White magazine featured one of our images of Timbers player Diego Valeri on the cover.

Alaska Airlines featured a double truck we shot previewing the MLS season and featuring Darlington Nagbe.

Other than Sports and Weddings we shoot a lot of portraits for various sports teams, athletic clubs, law firms, financial companies, construction firms, newspapers and magazines. Another area that is hard to choose my favorites, but here they are – Our 12 Favorite Portraits of 2012.

This photo is a fav more because of the story behind it. Danny Mwanga had just been traded to the Timbers and this was his first day with the team. After training and media interviews and what not at the training facility, we brought him to the stadium to do a photo shoot for the program cover and inside pages. He is a Portland native show we wanted to shoot him with the skyline in the background. The best place to do that at Jeld-Wen Field is on the roof. So, the first time I talked to him was to say “Hi Danny, I’m Craig, nice to meet you…you’re not afraid of heights are you?” Then we climbed up on the roof and shot this image.

This photo is of my 4 year old son Carter. Ok ok, its not a client photo, but man I love this kid. He cracks me up. This is him standing in for a test photo when I was setting up at the studio. It’s now on the wall at my house.

One of my clients is the Washington Dental Association. They put out a glossy magazine once a quarter or so and brought me up to Seattle to shoot the Dean of Dentistry at the University of Washington. I needed 4-5 different images of him so I found a location near Red Square with a lot of different options for shooting a lot of different looks without having to move too much equipment. This image was one of my favorite from the shoot.

This is an image I shot for the Milwaukie High School Wrestling team. I wanted a dingy, dirty, gritty look to the portrait and shot in the practice room.

These images are both of lawyers, but shot for different uses. The one on the left was shot for the law office in Seattle for use on the website and the image on the right was shot for Super Lawyers magazine. I shot this image with the cover in mind, but the ended up using a different photo.

These images were portrait sessions for website usage, I like them for the simplicity of the lighting and the look of the subject.

The image on the left is another one shot for the Timbers. I shot Hanyer Mosquera in the locker room and we wanted him to look sweaty. He speaks very little english and I speak even less spanish so it was a little funny when I was trying to tell him I was going to spray him down with water. The image on the right was shot for Oregon Athletic Clubs. We spent 3 days shooting in all 3 clubs in the area for their new brochures and website.

This image was shot for the USA Today. A money section story about a local company that builds ships for export to China.

I shot this image of a local realtor for OutFront Magazine in a cool penthouse condo near downtown Portland.

BONUS IMAGE:

Ok, so I know this blog is called 12 of 2012, but I wanted to include one last image that didn’t really fit into the other categories. In the fall, I was given what may have been my favorite assignment of the year. I was sent to a windmill farm in Eastern Washington to shoot a bunch of photos of windmills. Now, this is not something I ever do, but it was very fun. The only thing I had to do was drive around by myself for 2 days waiting for good light and making pretty pictures. I was a great change of pace and I shot some images I like and learned a lot of wind power.

Well, that’s it for my 12 of 2012. It was a great year for me personally and professionally. We traveled all over the place, made some nice pictures and met a lot of great people and new clients along the way. I can’t wait to see what 2013 has in store.

It’s already 2013, but we are continuing on of “12 of 2012″ theme today with our 12 favorite sports action images of 2012. I shoot a lot of sports. Sports action is probably my favorite thing to shoot. I mean, getting paid to go to sporting events? What is not to love about that?! That said, I usually shoot between 1500-2500 image per game. Take 30 soccer matches, 8-10 football games and 20-30 NBA games in a year and that’s a lot of photos. It’s tough to narrow it down to my 12 favorites but here they are. These may or may not be my “best” photos, but they are my favorites for one reason or another.

We’ll start off with my very favorite sports image of the season. And it’s not even from the field. The Timbers Army is the best. I love them for the atmosphere they create at the games and for the photo opportunities they create. For this image, I wanted to show the intensity of the crowd during a match with the Vancouver Whitecaps. I used a monopod fully extended over my head fired with a remote trigger while stading in the front row. Love this photo.

Sticking with the Timbers theme, this image is of Timber Joey after cutting a log slab after a goal against FC Dallas. I loved the lens flare from the sun and smoke and there is just a lot of energy in this image.

In rains in Portland. A lot. I spend a lot of time shooting photos in the pouring down rain. The opening night of the MLS season in 2012 was one of those nights. Timbers rookie Andrew Jean-Baptiste scored a goal and this was his reaction.

Luis Scola from the Rockets and Raymond Felton from the Blazers collide during a game in February.

More from the Timbers Army. Green smoke after scoring a goal is a good thing! To see more of my favorite Timbers photos, check out my appearance on the Timbers in 30 TV show.

I only shot the Seahawks once this year, but they are a fun team to watch. I was very impressed with Rookie Bobby Wagner who seemed to be all over the place during the win over the Patriots.

On October 6th I was crazy enough to shoot both Oregon and Oregon St. games on the same day. There was great light at the Beavers game and after leaving with about a minute left to beat traffic I arrived at Autzen Stadium just as the teams were coming out for warm-ups before beating the Huskies. Long day, but fun.

This reaction by David Horst after scoring against Seattle was as genuine as you can get. I love the reaction photos even more than the action images most of the time and Horst did not disappoint in this match.

I like to try to shoot from unconventional angles sometimes and it paid off while shooting from the stands with a 300mm lens at the Rose Garden during a game with Denver in December.

Last but not least, I covered the Stanford vs. Oregon game in November for Stanford. The Ducks were undefeated and ranked #1 in the country and just needed this one little win to clinch a trip to the Pac-12 title game and eventual National Championship showdown. The Cardinal however had a different plan and they beat the Ducks on a last minute field goal. I followed the players into the locker room after the game. The scene in there was hot, smelly and crowded, but they were very happy, climbing on lockers, yelling screaming. It was a cool scene. My cameras kept fogging up, but I knew this was a unique photo from an important moment in Cardinal Football history.