Always reach for the stars because the sky is not the limit!

Assmaa Elayyat, the younger of two children born to Egyptian immigrants, was born in June of 1984.

Suma, as her friends call her, graduated from Moreno Valley High School in 2002. Suma chose to continue her education at the University of California Riverside. After graduating from UCR in 2006 with a B.S. in Business Administration, she continued on to Cal State San Bernardino. In December 2010 she graduated with a Masters in Public Administration.

During her collegiate years Suma was employed by the County of Riverside, Department of Social Services office in Perris CA. In 2009 Suma's outgoing personality, strong work ethic, and pursuit of a higher education earned her a promotion to Supervisor and move to downtown Riverside where she currently works.

During Suma's off time she can be found at the gym, shopping the latest sales at her favorite stores or just "blowin O's" with her friends at the hookah lounge.

In conjunction with her recent graduation, she retained the services of Hackworth Photography to create her graduation portrait. Here are a few of the images from her photo session at the studio of Hackworth Photography. Enjoy!
 

To see more of my work with Seniors, Brides and Families be sure to visit my website:

www.HackworthPhotography.com

Nick and Ashli's Wedding

Flashback to October 2010.....My cousin's son is getting married in December and their photographer, due to a disagreement, won't be shooting their wedding. Well, to make a long story short, I agreed to shoot their wedding, a small affair to be held at the home of my Aunt Stacha and Uncle Dan in Henderson (Las Vegas) Nevada.

The day finally arrived and after a dozen or so emails and phone calls between the bride and myself, I am now shooting the wedding of Nick and Ashli. Nick, a motorcycle riding and skateboard enthusiast is marrying his beautiful girlfriend of 7 years.

First, we headed to the clubhouse for some private photos away from the family and friends who have gathered to witness this wonderful event. Once we got away from all the peering eyes and the chaos of wedding preparations a completely different side of these two came out. The love and passion they share is beyond words and that is what I sought to capture with these images I am going to share with you now. Enjoy!

To view more of my wedding portraiture please visit my website at: 

http://www.hackworthphotography.com/galleries/weddings/

Wedding Albums

So the big day has come and gone, months of preparation and your special day went off without a hitch.  Everyone will talk about your wedding for weeks and maybe months to come, and the memories of the wonderful event will slowly fade away.  I'm sorry to burst your bubble but it is the truth.  So how can you hang on to the memories for a lifetime?  Photographs, and what fine way to display those photographs but in a professionally designed album.

Today I want to share with you some of my favorite wedding album pages I have created.  Now, due to space I am only going to post a few pages here, be sure to head on over to my website to see even more.  And by the way, who says albums have to be just for weddings anyway?  Ever consider an album of a first birthday party, or fiftieth? An engagement party? A Quinceañera? Albums are not just for weddings!

Well, enjoy the photographs and be sure to take a look at the rest of the Wedding Album pages over at http://www.hackworthphotography.com/galleries/wedding-albums/

LA County Fair 2010

The LA County Fair, and probably any county fair, is just an endless gold mine of photo opportunities. So, with my camera bag strategically packed and my very pregnant wife in tow, we set out on our yearly pilgrimage to the LA County Fair.

So what should I shoot? What would you shoot? I actually went in without a plan, though I did recall watching the wood workers last year carve their miniature sculptures and thought that maybe a cool photo op, or maybe the model train sets, who knows.

So as we exited one of the exhibit halls we ran in to the carousel, spinning seemingly nonstop at a nauseating pace, (at least for those of us who suffer from motion sickness). This could be the pic I was looking for, but how do I make it different from every other photo of the carousel every other patron has taken? Maybe with a long shutter speed I can show the motion of the fair's most traditional ride.

So I took my camera, set it on the ground, propped up by my wallet, set the camera on Shutter priority (to control the amount of time the shutter is open, a full second in this case) and snapped this shot;

And who can resist the deep fried treats at the fair, especially funnel cake! So we sat down to have our dessert and my eye kept scanning the landscape for another shot. This scene of the patrons lined up at the ticket counter  with the rides in the background just reminded me of a traditional scene at a county fair;

Finally, just as we were heading for the front gate to leave for the night I caught a glimpse of this contraption they call a "ride", it rises to the top of the tower and then drops back to earth leaving the rider's stomach hanging somewhere in the stratosphere;

So this was our trip to the LA County Fair and the images I came home with. I hope you enjoyed these images and the stories behind them.  For more of my work be sure to stop by my website and take a look see!


Kevin


www.HackworthPhotography.com

An Evening in Havana

Earlier this month I was asked to photograph the “release party” for Bask magazine, a magazine I have been assisting Tony Florez with recently. Tony was already booked at Pelican Hill so he asked me to cover the event.  I arrived at the location of the party, the Balboa Beach Club in Newport Beach, and to make a long story short, no one there had any idea what party I was talking about.  Well, after a few phone calls we figured out that the event was actually the Beckstrand Cancer Foundation annual fundraiser, “The Diamond and Pearl Ball 2010”, and this year’s theme was “An Evening in Havana”. I was there to cover the fundraiser for Bask Magazine!

Topping the guest list this year was the new national spokesperson for the foundation, Eva La Rue. Currently, Eva portrays Natalia Boa Vista on CSI Miami and previously she portrayed Dr. Maria Santos Grey on the daytime soap opera All My Children.

The event started out with a walk down the red carpet, also covered by ABC news out of Los Angeles for their new show “On The Red Carpet” which airs on Saturday nights. The guests then made their way to the ballroom, which was decorated to the hilt portraying a nightclub that would have made Ricky Ricardo proud! The whole event was produced and directed by Kimberly DuBois of G-Force Production Company, she really did a great job.  

During dinner service auctions were held to raise money for the foundation, later it was report that they raised more than 1.1 million dollars.

All in all it was an amazing night I will never forget!

Renetta Caya (Gala Chair) Oday Shakar (Dress Designer to the stars) Eva La Rue, George O'Connell (Connell Family Foundation, Presenting Sponsor)

Renetta Caya, Oday Shakar, and Eva La Rue

An evening in Havana,

Even the waiters where dressed in period attire,

And the entertainment was amazing!

Links to people and organizations referenced here in the blog;

www.TonyFlorez.com

http://www.beckstrand.org/

http://evalarue.com/eva_la_rue_ONLINE.html

http://www.odayshakar.com/flash/


www.gforetv.com

And you can see more of my work at;

www.HackworthPhotography.com

Baby Sophie

I am a little late in posting my weekly blog, and for those closest to
our family you know that we welcomed our first child in to the world
this past week. Sophie Yasmin Hackworth was born on Monday October 11,
2010 at 2:15am. She weighed 7lbs 2 oz and was 19" long.

Now, I don't want to be the father who is always showing pictures of
the baby and raving about every coo and giggle but I do want to share
some of the first photos I took of her during her first days.

As always, enjoy the photos and your always welcome to comment on
them. To see more of my work, please take a look at my website.  There
you will find a variety of categories of my work and links to my
Facebook page as well.

www.HackworthPhotography.com

This picture was taken just 8 minutes after Sophie was born, I love it so much because it was completely candid, pure emotion captured in the moment.

This is Sophie's Sitto (Arabic for Grandma), Suzy's mom.  This is her first grandchild.

This is Grandma Jeannie checking in on Sophie just after her first bath just hours after she was born.

Nothing more precious than a sleeping baby, here is Sophie at 2 days old.

Flashes of Hope and Camp Ronald McDonald for Good Times

A few months ago I had the opportunity, nay, the privilege to spend the day at Camp Ronald McDonald for Good Times located in the San Jacinto Mountains with Flashes of Hope.

“Camp Ronald McDonald for Good Times creates a positive long-lasting impact on children with cancer and their families by providing fun-filled, medically supervised, cost-free, year-round camp programs.” – from the website

and

“Flashes of Hope is a nonprofit organization that changes the way children with cancer and other life threatening illnesses see themselves through the gift of photography and raises money for pediatric cancer research” – from the website. Their goal is to photograph every child until every child is cured.

Though I would love to post the photos I took of these amazing kids, FOH has asked, understandably, that we do not. (for the privacy of the children and their families)

But I would like to invite you to visit both organizations’ websites and see what wonderful work they are doing. (and if you look real close, you may stumble on my name, along with 5 others, recognized as the contributing photographers at Camp Ronald McDonald for Good Times).

Enjoy!

http://www.campronaldmcdonald.org/

http://www.flashesofhope.org/

Engagement Photos

In 2007 I had the pleasure of meeting prominent Orange County photographer Tony Florez. (Be sure to check out his website at; www.TonyFlorez.com ) I started working with Tony earlier this year as an assistant carrying his bags, adjusting lights, changing camera lens, etc on magazine and fashion shoots. It quickly escalated to an engagement shoot at the Mission Inn Hotel in Riverside and then on to weddings in some of the most beautiful hotels in Orange County.

The photos I want to share today are from Heather and Wil’s engagement shoot at the Mission Inn Hotel. ( http://www.missioninn.com/ ) Between holding reflectors and swapping out lenses I was able to capture a few images. I provided the originals to Tony and I would like to think it was these photos that first caught Tony’s eye and led me to this photographic journey and as a mentee to Tony. 

Thanks for all your time and patience Tony!

Downtown Farmers Market in Riverside CA

Today I happen to stumble on the Downtown Farmers Market in Riverside CA.  Since I didn't have any specific plans for the next few hours, I decided I would take a gander.  Just as I arrived I met Cliff and Jeanette, a local band, setting up to play for the crowds.  Since they had just arrived I continued on down the street, I told Cliff I would be back later to listen to him play.

Toward the end of the Market I came across this fruit stand and was drawn to the cool colors of the fresh summer peaches on the table and intrigued with the vendor and customer haggling over prices in the background, snap!

Deciding to head to the next block, beyond the Farmers Market, I almost passed up this scene of a bicycle chained to the lamppost. Now, anyone who as ever tried to photograph a yellow object, in the middle of the day, in direct sunlight, knows it can be quite a challenge, but I just couldn't pass it up, snap! With a little post processing magic, here is a little "old town" magical moment in time.

So back to Cliff and Jeanette, they had finally got set up and I could hear Cliff and his guitar cranking out the hits from two blocks away, time to get back.  As I arrived, they were playing all our favorite hits from  yesteryear, a great mix of R&B, Jazz, Blues, and a little Gospel thrown in to round it out.  They really sounded good and I couldn't let this opportunity pass me by, snap!

I hope y'all enjoyed my adventures in Downtown Riverside today, I really enjoyed sharing it with you!  If you want to see more of my work, take a look at my website, http://www.hackworthphotography.com/ and be sure to add me as a friend over on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/kevin.j.hackworth