Kristine Paulsen Photography – Lifestyle Portraits, Editorial and Wedding Photography in Missoula Montana

I hope you all got a chance to step outside last evening and witness the gigantic moon hanging low over the hilltops and reflecting into the Clark Fork – seriously beautiful. I was hoping to see some northern lights, which didn’t happen, but my…the moon sure was a good substitute. This photo isn’t from last night, but I was reminded that I still had it hanging out, waiting to be shared, and today seemed like a good day for that.

Enjoy! This was taken this past June after George and Emily’s super fun engagement session. This image is way more gigantic than I’d normally post, but I figured the moon kind of merits that treatment.

On the docket: portraits and engagement sessions galore – stay posted!

Cheers,

-Kristine

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This past spring I had the wonderful opportunity to help produce a documentary about the Paxson Art Project taking place in Paxson Elementary School in Missoula, a program that was developed by the Zootown Arts Community Center (ZACC). Visiting artists came into the school and taught kids from kindergarten through fifth grade new art concepts. Currently these kids only receive 6 hours of art per year. Yes, you heard that right – per YEAR.

I stopped by these visiting artists’ classes and put together an informative video about the project which will be shown to folks around the area to hopefully help educate them about the need for art for kids.

Please take a moment to view this video, and if you find this as important as I do, please feel free to share with others. Thank you!

The video is about 10 minutes long (but so worth the watch), so you may want to get the video started by pressing the play button. Once it begins loading, I’d suggest pressing pause until the video is fully loaded, then begin watching. Don’t forget to have your volume turned on! Also, if you’d like to watch the video in HD (high definition, please click the link below the video to be taken to the Vimeo site to watch in HD.)

On the docket: portraits and weddings!

Cheers!

-Kristine

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Getting back to my photojournalism roots a bit, last week I was hired by Cork Tree Creative to photograph a press conference with Governor Brian Schweitzer and Ray Stillwell at the old Smurfit-Stone mill site to announce Green Investment Group, Inc.’s (GIGI) acquisition of the site. This is the seventh Smurfit-Stone paper mill acquired since 2006 by GIGI, an Alton, Illinois-based company that acquires and redevelops Brownfield sites throughout North America. (A Brownfield site is an abandoned or underutilized industrial or commercial site that is well-positioned for redevelopment.)

Plans for the future use of the Missoula site are currently being formulated and will continue during the course of the coming months.  As plans are finalized, work will focus on clean-up and reconfiguration of the site to analyze the potential use of the existing facilities and land.

Ray Stillwell, principal of Green Investment Group, Inc., stated, “The Missoula property offers many opportunities for continued progress in the region. As with all of our projects, our main goal is to work with the community and local officials to develop a site that complements the other industries in the area and meets the economic needs and interests of its people by creating jobs in sustainable growth industries.”

Gov. Brian Schweitzer commented, “Green Investment Group has a proven track record of investing the necessary funds to save the industrial infrastructure and create good-paying jobs.  We welcome them to Montana.”

Thanks again to Cork Tree Creative and Ray Stillwell for contracting me for the shoot. It was nice to hang with the press folks again and make some images for you of this event. I look forward to working with you again in the future!

On the docket: engagement and portrait sessions!

Cheers,

-Kristine

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As some of you know, I zipped across the country for a few days to my parents’ home for Christmas. We were lucky enough to all be together again for the holiday and had ourselves a lovely Christmas together.

My brother and I stayed up late Christmas day, talking about anything and everything into the wee hours, munching on cookies in my parents’ kitchen. We were startled when we heard pounding on our front door. Who could that be at midnight on Christmas Day? So odd… my brother answered and it was a policeman come to tell us that our neighbor’s house was on fire.

My brother and I asked the police man if everyone was ok, if they’d gotten out safely, and ran outside to see the house engulfed in unbelievably tall flames. My brother ran inside to wake my parents, and we ran outside again to stare disbelieving as the house smoked, windows shattered and as the roof spewed flames while firefighters worked tirelessly to put out the blaze.

Luckily, as I mentioned, everyone in the house escaped safely, except for their little puppy who perished in the fire.

The thing that rocked all of us was that this fire, this ruthless, oxygen-hungry, sky-scraping fire, could have happened to anybody. And does. Frequently. I’m not sure if the fire chief has determined the cause of the fire. I’ve heard everything from it being labeled as a chimney fire, to a Christmas tree fire (of the plastic sort) to faulty electrical wiring.

I’m sharing these photos today because it’s the one month anniversary of this night. The house has since been torn down. The family is doing ok…it’s incredibly tough on them of course, but they plan to rebuild on the old foundation. I didn’t want to post these photos immediately, because I wanted to give the family some privacy in the face of their tragedy. Their town is a small one, and word (and photos) travel quickly.

I’m also sharing these photos because seeing something like this…and feeling the fear that our own house would catch fire….really makes a person reevaluate what’s important in their lives. I’m so grateful to have family and friends who love me, a roof over my head, and food in my belly. Please, if these photos move you, tell your loved ones that you LOVE them. Today. Do it right now. And also please do you and your family a favor and check to make sure your smoke detector batteries are fresh and functioning.

Life is fragile. Don’t forget to soak it in and appreciate every day you’ve got.

-Kristine

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Can you believe that 2011 is a matter of hours away? I can’t really wrap my mind around it – 2010 flew by in a flurry of wonderful experiences, including so many memorable photo sessions and weddings. I wouldn’t be as happy with life and my work if it weren’t for all of my fantastic clients (seriously, you all are WONDERFUL), business friends and supporters of my work. I’m always so grateful and humbled that you choose me to document the moments in your lives – it means more to me than you may know.

To celebrate the awesomeness that is YOU, I put together a collage of some of my favorite images from 2010 – can you find yourself or friends?

Happy, happy New Year!

On the docket: engagements and senior sessions!

Cheers!

-Kristine

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To reminisce a bit, one of my favorite photo assignments has to be the one where I was asked to photograph Vester Marshall for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer (before its extremely unfortunate demise).  This was a fairly routine assignment for a routine feature (photograph a Seattle person once involved in sports, a feature the P-I called “Where Are They now?”). Here’s the photo – read on for the “behind the scenes” story:

So, I was sent out to Belltown (a section of downtown Seattle known for its artsy ways) to photograph Mr. Marshall.  Here’s an excerpt about my experience from a blog I kept while I was at the P-I:

“Turns out, Vester was a former Sonics player in ’74 and is now an ordained priest, yoga instructor, artist and herbalist…

And he’s AWESOME! He takes me up to his little L-shaped studio in Belltown and it’s amazing. I walk into a cloud of incense smoke and find the place totally packed to the gills with weird stuff on the walls…like saxophones for instance. His counters are jewelry display cases, though he displays a multitude of other things besides jewelry in them.  His bed is covered in a rich red comforter, and he’s got tasseled pillows all over it.  He’s such a chill dude and very happy to be photographed. So I’m immediately at ease, as is he.

I take some shots in his place, and then he asks if we can get a shot of him with the space needle in the background. Ohhh, sure, why not. I’ve got time – this is my last assignment and it’s only 1:30.

So we walk around Belltown looking for a good vantage point. On the way, we’re walking and talking (and people are staring…this guy is TALL – he must be close to 7 feet tall!…plus, he’s eccentric…wears a long velvet coat with shiny buttons, a 4-string pearl choker, a wide brimmed black hat, dark sunglasses and has a carved cane…yeah. It also helped that I was walking around with 2 huge cameras. We didn’t draw any attention or anything…nahhh..)

Anyway. So, we’re walking and talking when I see a bright yellow wall. Bing!!!! Yellow wall! He’s wearing all black! There’s a cool window thing! What great contrast!

So I have him stop and chill in front of the wall while I stand in the middle of the street to get the shot. (I ask him to kindly let me know if I’m going to be hit by a car.)

And it’s great! I LOVE IT!

We do the space needle shot, but it’s not nearly as interesting.

We head back to his place where I grab my bag and thank him for being such a great subject. He’s thrilled and asks for a hug, so he gives me a big hug and kisses me on the top of my head (because he’s so TALL) and says, “Ok, sweetie! Thank you so much! You’re a fantastic photographer! It was wonderful to meet you! Good luck!”

That was SUCH a great day.  He was so sweet and my editors at the P-I went crazy over my photos.  Turns out, they love yellow walls, too.  :)  Anyway, it’s fun to share the stories behind my favorite photos.  Be on the lookout for more to come!  Or, let me know if you’ve got a favorite photo and want to hear the story behind it.  Trust me – there always is one!

In the meantime, I’m looking forward to my portrait session with Valerie in a few weeks – should be great!

Cheers,

-Kristine

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Yesterday I had the pleasure of receiving notice that my photography work has been featured on All The Photographers blog. Very cool! They wanted to specifically feature my photojournalism. Here’s what they wrote about my work:

“I’ve particularly enjoyed looking through Kristine’s work. She’s a wonderful photographer and has a large portfolio with some unique work. I’ve chosen to highlight her Photojournalism work to mix things up here on the blog, but she does wedding work as well. Enjoy!”

I encourage you to click this link and check it out. There are also many additional blog postings that have featured a great variety of other talented photographers. It’s definitely a cool site.

And, here’s a little screenshot to tantalize….

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I recently blogged about an event that I photographed Wednesday, the Cops in Shops kickoff event for the state of Montana.  The Century Council blogged about it the other day and put up a few photos of the Attorney General Steve Bullock.  I’m going to include a few more that I thought were kinda fun.  One of the police officers posed with his motorcycle in the beer aisle of the Safeway on Broadway looking very stern (he was such a good sport!)…don’t try to fake your age, folks!  We also did a few shots with him acting as a cashier checking someone’s ID.  These may be used on some billboards, too – I don’t know if that’s a for sure thing or not yet, but I’ll let you know as soon as I hear!  In the meantime, here’s the screen grab from the Century Council’s blog…scroll down to the end of this post for the motorcycle photos:

Also – the Chronicle of Higher Education published their story about Susie, the woman whom I photographed in Pablo, Montana.  I took a screen grab – here it is!

And now, some police photos:

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I’m excited to share the blog’s new look with everyone!  I’ve been wanting to give it an update for a while, but finally had the time over the past few days.  I hope you all enjoy it, as it jives more with the look and feel of my main website.  Plus, I finally admitted to myself, that no matter what I did, or which colors I experimented with, I just totally love the color green – always have, always will.  So.  Green it is!  No more of this gray and red business.  It just wasn’t me! (Of course, no offense to the colors gray and red – I think they’re beautiful.)

I also updated my logo (a little while back) to reflect my personality a bit more – since that’s a big part of how I run my business.  As one woman I spoke with a few weeks back said, “You’re not hokey, you’re honest, and take good shots with your talent.”  And that’s just how I operate – I believe in honesty and being genuine, and that’s how I’m running my business.  I’m all about positive energy, and I feel that my business and my photography reflects that.

But enough of the deep thoughts – I want to talk a bit about my time up in Pablo photographing for the Chronicle of Higher Education based out of Washington D.C.

I headed out bright and early on Wednesday to meet with Susie and follow her around for a day as she attended class at Salish Kootenai College. It was great!  I was a little bummed that it was so foggy (pea soup thick – seriously!) and the Mission mountains were completely invisible (I love them so much!), BUT, Susie has a wonderful, bubbly personality and it was such a pleasure to have the honor of documenting a day in her life.  I met her dog, Chaos (LOVE his name!), who kindly shared some of his food with me by putting it all over my pants leg (oh dogs, what can you do – he was just trying to be social), took a ride with her to school in her truck that was on the verge of overheating, and met all sorts of great folks at the college while we both attended various classes.  Susie was a complete and total sweetie and hugged me as I was about to leave for the day at about 4 p.m.  She called me up the next day to ask me how the photos turned out and also to say, “This has been the greatest experience of my life!”  (Words that make me melt!  Awww!)

The Chronicle liked my work and it should be published within the next week or so.  I’ll keep you posted.

Anyway – it was a great day and so nice keep my photojournalism background fresh.

So, since I have to wait to post photos from Pablo, how about some business card pics?  I did a redesign of my business cards, too, so I thought I’d post a few images of these bright, happy little guys.

Cheers!

-Kristine

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