I’ve always loved raw loft spaces: the high ceilings, the natural light, the the openness. Pretty much every time I mow the lawn the fantasy of a loft condo comes back and I have to find a way to beat it back.

Valcucine is a beautiful line of high end Italian cabinetry, with clean modern lines that fit the loft aesthetic perfectly; they’re designed with the European living space in mind, where efficient use of small spaces (compared to the usual American house, that is) is a requirement. But unlike certain other European furniture makers (cough cough IKEA cough cough), Valcucine’s stuff is built to last, with an eye towards sustainability and nontoxic production methods.

My writer friends from the Sample Circuit and I visited the Valcucine showroom last week to do an advertorial showcase piece. Valcucine corporate has some beautiful photos of the actual product, so we decided to focus on the shopping experience.

The latest addition to the snack series happened during naptime at my friend Carrie’s place. Her two daughters were asleep, making it the perfect time for a little quiet work at the computer and a ramekin of Carrie’s go-to snack, GORP.

OK, so it’s not the flashiest, most showy snack, but who can argue with its effectiveness? And Carrie just recently learned that her mom gave her the same snack at bedtime when she was little, so it’s got history.

Interesting conversation during the shoot with Carrie’s brother Brian, in for the weekend from Seattle. Apparently Brian’s favorite snack is apples and peanut butter. He cuts the apple in to eight pieces every time, and he has it down so that he scoops out exactly the right amount of peanut butter every time. I asked him whether he scoops out a little extra on the PB if it’s been a particularly long day and he feels like he deserves a little treat. He said no, more doesn’t make it better – there’s a perfect proportion and he sticks to it. I gotta say that such thinking almost never occurs to me when it comes to food, particularly snacks. Then again, he’s an engineer, I’m a food photographer.

What’s your favorite snack? Can I take your picture eating it? Drop me a line to set something up. chris (at) chrisbohnhoff dot com.

The sweet and the salty. . . eaters the world over seek its perfect balance, and my cousin Mari has found it. At McDonald’s.

Is she content to eat a fry, then a bite of ice cream? No. It’s got to be the dip.

What I like about these shots is the feeling that when you’re with your snack the world just fades away. In a suburban strip mall parking lot? No you’re not. You’re on a grassy knoll eating delicious fries and ice cream.

Cars and guilty snacks go together. Only the best of the best health-conscious eaters can resist jamming the back seat on a road trip with M & M’s, doritos, Slim Jims, and various other gas station delicacies, right?? Of course you’d never eat those things during normal times, but you’re in a car. It’s like a nutritional safe zone.

My friend Alex is hilarious. She told me before we started, “I’m one of those people who count the number of chips and stop at the serving size. Except for the broken ones; they don’t count.”

Alex recommends participation in the snack series to anyone trying to break a food addiction. 45 minutes of eating your guilty snack and you don’t want to see it again for. . . a while.

I had the chance to photograph a wedding this past Saturday, an absolutely perfect Minnesota June day with blue sky and temps in the mid-70s. It was truly one of the better weddings I’ve ever photographed, in large part due to the bride and groom and their family and guests. Great people who let the day happen naturally and didn’t stress out over any schedules or up the level of drama in any way. As is the case during most weddings I photograph, my wife Johanna assisted me. And as also happens at almost every wedding, she had a table full of friends by the end of the reception.

Today I made my first pass through the 2,000 or so images I captured. Of course I uploaded everything to my work computer on Sunday morning and did a little spot checking to make sure everything made it from the camera back home (I don’t think I could’ve let that go for any longer than I did), but today was the first run through the whole batch.

Something that I find useful as I’m editing big huge batches of images is to pick out a few favorites and quickly work them up to a close-to-final form. Once I have a handful of images that represent most of the shoot, as I’m making my way through I have some images to use as models for white balance settings, exposure, saturation, etc. And maybe more importantly, it gets me excited to be cranking out hundreds of pictures.

So here’s my first handful. The ceremony took place in Urness Recital Hall at St. Olaf College in Northfield, MN, and the reception was in the upstairs banquet room at Solera Restaurant, Minneapolis.

Prepping the bridal party

Dad and bride on their way in to the hall

Urness Recital Hall

After the ceremony

A feisty champagne cork

Clink clink clink. . .

The view from Solera's dance floor