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Talk about busy people and (lucky) last-minute booking… One spring day in March I am getting a call from a young lady who was among the guests of Maya and Stan’s notable wedding in Jamaica and has become my fan since then. So, she proceeds with a curious story about her brother Boris who is getting married in about three weeks. As I understood, as a business owner, he hasn’t quite had time to arrange for a professional photographer, or rather, consider the merits of having some guy hanging around in a way, on a day for them to enjoy. Fortunately, I was available and his sister persuaded him, alluring with a perspective of stress-free selection process, confidently referring to just one candidate - ahem - Zorz Studios. Read more

Zorz Studios is pleased to announce that we will be part of the New York Couture Fashion Week at Grand Ballroom of Waldorf Astoria, New York City. We are proud to partner with Couture Fashion Week and Partners In Health in our relief efforts for Haiti earthquake victims. On Saturday, February 13th, I will be auctioning studio’s photography service, donating all proceeds. Luxury items from the donors will be offered at a silent auction. Read more

Confidence is the sexiest thing a woman can have. It’s much sexier than any body part.
- Aimee Mullins

Be his sexy Valentine! Just in time for upcoming Valentine’s Day, I am pleased to announce Zorz Studios’ first boudoir marathon - a full day of fun, luxury, excitement, sexiness, music, champagne, and art! This is an experience every woman should have! In the spirit of magazine quality cover stories, on Sunday, 01/24/10, a creative team of professionals will realize your dream of being the sexiest your lover has possibly ever seen! We are taking you to a boutique Manhattan hotel, taking care of your makeup and hair, setting up the studio lights, then styling and tastefully photographing you in the finest way produced by Zorz Studios! Check out the promo slideshow below.

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As we continue to raise the bar of top quality and untamed creativity, finesse our vision, and revamp our offerings, we build more and more value into our exquisite packages, inevitably reflecting on the prices.

While shooting high undoubtedly serves as the ultimate drive to excel and remain the industry flagship, it has a penitent potential of distancing the studio from a more value-sensitive clientele where many of our appreciative fans, devoted followers, and studio art lovers are. This did not feel right… Read more

May the New Year 2010 be a year of materialized dreams. May your wishes, wildest and warmest, deepest and oldest, unbelievable and daring, come true! From all of us at Zorz Studios, we sincerely wish you and your loved ones the best and exciting things in 2010! Read more

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An important day in the year has come. It is time when I take a moment to slow down, look around me, and think of all whom I am thankful for — from family to dear friends, from clients who become caring friends to friends who become trusting clients, from those who influence me to those whom I inspire, from random website visitors to superior powers, from nostalgic rainy days that cleanse my soul to euphoric sunshine when I touch the sky. Think of you.

As I will sit with my family and friends today, I will raise my glass to all of you, to all who appreciate beauty, even if by giving Zorz Studios’ art just a moment of their  life. I am astonished by how much trust and love I am given… and I pledge to return it  both individually and globally, as we work on new charity initiatives in 2010. Read more

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Calling for all adventurous minds!

This time has come again! After the smashing success of the free engagement session contest a year ago, I am über excited to announce Zorz Studios’ next contest, TrashEd, in which we give away complimentary trash-the-dress sessions, photo books, and even free wedding coverage to three lucky winners! Read more

I’ve been eying The Wedding Salon’s prestigious bridal show for some time now, attending the salon’s networking parties. (One of them, by the way, led to an acquaintance with a turnkey effect.) So, having milled a substantial amount of flour required by this show, I signed up for New York Fall 2009 expo. Read more

Following a recent approach by TLC station, which expressed interest in some of my weddings for a potential coverage on a national television as part of their new show Four Weddings, another media company, WS Publishing Group, invited me to provide content for their new book.

WS Publishing Group is the largest publishing company of wedding planning books in North America that have published over 30 of the best-selling wedding books, carried in 6,000 stores. Now, together with WedSpace.com, it is creating a new title in the line of top-selling wedding books, slated for release in all major bookstores in early 2010. OMG! Wedding Stories: Did That Really Happen? will be based on hilarious and shocking wedding stories and, boy, don’t I have them!

The publisher invited Zorz Studios to contribute and I am starting to draft a few crazy wedding-related adventures which we happened to create and capture… By all means, if you want to help me with your story, pitch in! Send me your own iterpretation up to 300 words and I will quote it. I think you know whom I mean… The deadline is October 25, 2009.

People heard I did it… A maternity session in Alaska. They hear the rumors of it being shot on top of an Alaskan mountain in unpredictable October, on her 9th month… They can’t wait to see… For now, I will only say it happened and the image above is real. The rest of this amazing story demands a proper visual and documentary support which will follow with time. Read more

My old friend and client Daria, whose wedding I shot past week-end, was enlightened few months ago by an idea of giving a gift of photography art to her maid of honor Julia. Julia is pregnant and lives in Chicago but contributed a tremendous amount of time and effort to helping Daria with her wedding day preparations, including researching, contacting, coordinating, etc. As Daria puts it, “she did everything”.

To show the love and appreciation to her maid of honor, Daria ordered a photo session from me, wanting nothing but a “fantastic experience”. Since Julia was visiting NYC for a week-end only, we had one night-after for the session which I promptly made available for them.

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This October, Zorz Studios will again participate with an elite group of photographers around the country in a very special family portrait promotion. Although my studio does not focus on family portrait market, throughout October I will celebrate “Family Portrait Month“, a wonderful opportunity for you to update your family portrait, and help support Operation Smile, which treats children who suffer with facial deformities. Read more

On the same day following a session for Daria, I shot another bridal session for Vanessa, a fine wedding photographer. Her wedding isn’t until December so I have to keep her bridal gown profile as low as possible for now.

I met this gorgeous young lady at celebrity photographers Mike Colon / Bob Davis’ workshop in NYC in early 2008. I impressed her with my fine art portraiture portfolio and she kindly accepted my offer to do a photo session for her. Some of my fans may recognize her from a sensual boudoir session last year which made her ecstatic. Following my work afterward, she pleasantly surprised me a year later with the news of getting married.

Now think about this… A fine wedding photographer is getting married and reaches out to her peers to photograph her. Who would be more discerning and discriminating? I actually made up a term for her, “bridographer”, which she promised to use in her upcoming book. Vanessa is involving several photographer friends to cover this life event but I received the highest honor of having a privilege to shoot her bridal session which I pushed to complement with a trash-the-dress session after the wedding. Yes, I believe these two are the most exquisite and creative wedding-related shoots as they allow freedom, unseen on a wedding day, and demand a highly-skilled vision that is fashionable, unique, and artistic. Just what we are best at. Read more

Past Sunday generously offered me an honor to shoot two photographers, both young and kind, who both turned into brides.

I met Daria on Fotki, where we both were members of a closed group of photographers/digital masters. She’s been a long fan of mine and when she got engaged, knew exactly where to go. It felt so strange not having to “present” myself before the booking… Watching me for years, she would be tough to surprise.

I am shooting her wedding in a week, shot their engagement session already, and now was the bridal session’s turn. Held in the tight quarters of her relatives’ apartment, the session made use of creative lighting to turn an ordinary location into a fashionable corner.

Following a grandiose Gothic Renaissance photo session and a short sleep, we headed to the next artistic session that week-end, unaware of how hyper-intensive it will become. Looking back, I might say it was the most exhausting non-wedding gig I have done so far. By end of the day, I was falling asleep, not quite behind the camera but while the clients were preparing for their last series. Driving the crew around the three boroughs and visiting half a dozen locations in the course of 15 hours might have added to the stress. And all of this fun — just prior to a Sunday wedding, making a third all-out intense shooting day in a row. The outtake is, however, what matters. Read more

Few months ago, Olga and I were in the East Village looking for props for our DragonChik body art photo session. It is then when we walked into an astonishing boutique, Gothic Renaissance, and met two managers, Laramie and Stitch. A word by word, we ended up talking about a joint project, portraying them in a unique environment, or so we hoped for. After a concept meeting, we came up with a couple of locations and I started working on them. One, unfortunately, fell through but I was able to secure the other, even more grandiose… the entire theater, along with the stage, curtains, lights, and a lighting technician! Doreen, the executive director, was just a pleasure to deal with! Read more

photography   music   lighting   mingling   fun

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Our new Manhattan studio has been announced but we never celebrated the opening! What a shame… Let’s fix this, now! Let there be a studiowarming party! Read more

This has been a relatively relaxing week-end, sort of… Well, I didn’t sleep on Friday night, working on putting together a slideshow for Mena and Ashwin 9 PM to 9 AM. Then took a nap, worked a bit, and went to shoot an engagement session for Anastasia and Robert. I’ll get to them in moment but after their session, I watched a movie Babel at home, slept till 10 AM the following Sunday morning when I was awaken to a 30-min story by my daughter. We are taking her to a movie G-Force in a moment, then I’ll get ready for a 4-day workshop by Vincent Versace next week. So, this was a good break before booked-up weekends till end of October. And now, back to Anastasia.

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Thank you everyone who participated in the BloggEd contest. It is reassuring to see that my blog, being personal, fresh, inspiring, and revealing, can offer something to anyone. What is even more rewarding to my human nature is that I acquire a growing group of fans whom I love so much! It is my readers’ returning visits and comments that fuel my inspiration to write and share more. Read more

My summer/spring calendar got so booked up that I am having to combine some smaller shoots such as e-sessions in one day. Such was the day of July 19, when I enjoyed shooting Pamela and Steve, then Nancy and Brian, just following the day of big production for Julia and Gino. Read more

What a power week-end the past one was… Three engagement sessions, one being quite a production — eight people involved, 150-mile trip on three cars, 22 hours with little or no sleep. And all that to cover just 3/4 of the session.

Julia and Gino are among the lucky winners of Zorz Studios’ free engagement session contest 2008, EngagEd. A lot of thought, effort, and discussion went into the preparation in the past few months. The main theme, which brought this brave couple to the final, was the elements of nature — air, water, earth, and fire. Nothing short of challenging. In fact, the last element had to be pushed back to a later time due to some logistical issues although we found a professional “fire tamer” to work on the set. Read more

Another successful realization of a tough request… Meet Irina and Igor, a young couple whose wedding we are shooting early September 2009. They contacted me in May seeing if I can do an engagement session for them, initially not included in the package. A tough part was that they wanted “something a little more exciting than walking in a park, kissing and holding hands”. Not tough enough for us! Read more

What?

Zorz Studios’ blog is turning one year old! About a year and 70 entries ago, on July 23, 2008, the blogosphere heard a hiccup announcing the birth of yet another opus. To me, however, this turned into an entertaining and successful initiative. I also realized that I managed to attract a modest group of followers to whom I am sincerely grateful.

To celebrate blog’s first anniversary and to express gratitude to my devoted readers, I am announcing a new contest, BloggEd. Read more

At the beginning of this long holiday week-end, we covered a two-day Indian wedding of Mena and Ashwin. Our connection was a perfect example of a long-distance booking. Mena, who is from California, found me about a year ago via one of the online listings that I employ and where I am periodically featured, WedPlan.net. As she wrote to her wedding webpage’s guests,

“I [...] fell in love with his work immediately!  I told Ash the minute I saw his photographs that I had found the perfect photographer to capture the days details and events.  Aside from being a talented artist Ed is extremely personable and a pleasure to work with.”

Although we haven’t met until about two weeks before the wedding, we have had no problems sharing our vision and expectations. The entire booking process was smoothly handled by Zorz Studios’ online booking system, integrating e-mail, billing, and legal components along the way. Read more

Few months ago when I discussed an artistic nude session for one of the clients, an idea came to me to involve a body art painter who recently moved to the US and came across my way during a preparation for another elaborate session. The idea was enthusiastically accepted and soon Olga and I started to prepare, choosing a theme of a little dragon (phonetically, the word “little dragon” in Russian is almost identical to “DragonChick”, hence the name of the series). Read more

As our partnership with a couture millinery atelier Anya Caliendo continues to flourish, I had an honor of photographing her newest collection, “Russia Divine. Tribute.” The session was conducted as a product shoot with no models involved. This vibrant collection, filled with memories, love, and pride, is scheduled to be unveiled on June 30, 2009 on Mrs. Caliendo’s website.

It is remarkable to note that Mrs. Caliendo was invited by Stephen Jones, one and only milliner for the House of Dior, to work for him on the Fashion Week in London. She will also be in the team of designers for the House of Dior, a privilege given to a few from thousands of applicants… Our dear friend will spend months in Paris and London and we wish her a full hat of inspiration, excitement, and productiveness!

We invited Anya Caliendo to join one of our art projects, slated for Spring 2010. She graciously accepted and we already had a concept meeting. The project will be as huge and deep as spectacular… and as nothing done by us so far…

We drew attention in a couple of places in the past week or two…

First, Sarah Johnson, the founder of Seeking Designers came across my mailing on underwater and body art maternity and immediately put us on the top of their Newsflash (not to mention an “advanced” booking). Seeking Designers is a service provided to both consumers and professionals, connecting them within the design industry, as well as sharing the insiders’ press opportunities.

Second, Our Wedding Day recently launched a new series of articles highlighting wedding services in New York.  Each article focuses on one vendor category, ultimately resulting in an amazing resource for local brides. I was pleasantly surprised when they informed me of having Zorz Studios featured in an article on NY Wedding Photographers (ironically, although we are NY-based, the photo that they chose was actually shot when covering a wedding in Pam Beach, FL, with palm trees in the background…) Read more

Our friend and extraordinary artist, Anastasia Durasova, had a gig last night at Greenhouse. Recently moved from Moscow, Russia, this talented and renowned body art painter showed off her skills at Made in Russia party, produced by SashasPromotions and Anastasia’s husband, photographer Michael Bernadsky. We had a pleasure of watching her masterpieces created on the bodies of three models, a process taking her and her three assistants 11 hours.

Right before the models hit the stage and rocked the crowd, I grabbed my camera, few portable lighting pieces, and did an express 5-minute photo session with just one of the models. The good news is that tomorrow we are having a dedicated session with Anastasia in one of our studios. There, we will have several hours to explore the beauty of body, art, styling, and photography. This will be our first such a project. Stay tuned. (06/18/09 update: More details on this session are now available here.)

Disclaimer: Smoking is bad. I never smoked and do not endorse it. Read more

My trip overseas right after a 2-day photo tour to California in mid-May caused a delay in posting a sneak preview of this magnificent session. So here it is now. More details and samples will follow.

06/19/09 update: The session was conducted in a similar way with our iconic Heirdom of Atlantis project so I will not go into  technical details. Only this time, I shot in higher 22-megapixel resolution with my new Canon 5D Mark II body which still fits in my Ikelite housing. And to avoid a trouble with building a roof over the pool across the country, we bought a large canopy from a local store and mounted it right in the pool. Read more

We are pleased to announce that Grace Ormonde Wedding Style Magazine has chosen to list Zorz Studios on their invitation-only Platinum List, a directory of top wedding professionals from around the world.

Wedding Style, the wedding world’s premier magazine, is a breathtaking publication that showcases the “best of the best” of the wedding industry in the U.S. and around the globe. Synonymous with innovative, elegant, luxury weddings, Wedding Style, is an absolute inspiration to photographers. For a bride and groom planning their nuptials, both the magazine and its companion website provide the very best resources available to help them create meaningful, one-of-a-kind weddings. Read more

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