Liliana & Cheetah, before her debut piano recital today. Photograph by Oksana Katsuro-Hopkins.

Douglas Hopkins, photographer, self-portrait, New York City studio, circa 1985. With extraordinary friend & model Shelly Buse, certified Texas beauty. Where are you now, Shelly? Scanned Polacolor print.

Real.iViews: The leap of faith. A smile for the camera.

The Princess in her Palace. Cookie natural light.

The artiste, Liliana; her muse, her work.

Those glorious red carpet days! Emmy Awards. Me & two hot Russian babes. You'll never guess.

Claire, five, our Liliana's best friend...lost her young mother this week, after a protracted battle with cancer. We mourn her loss, are confident of her mother's place in rest, and will do our best to protect and guide this lttle angel's father and his daughter in the days. months, and years to follow.

The Wedding Noire. Copyright 2009 Douglas Hopkins Studios. Lisa Johnson, Ford Models.

The Bergdorf Goodman of Wickenberg, Arizona. Shooting fashion models out back.

Caught in the act! Stealing images.

Five year old happy housekeeper has a moment of meditative composure before her guests arrive.

The happy five year old housekeeper prepares for dinner guests. A very happy housekeeper.

Acadia. Family's first official "mountain" climb. Wife's photograph.

When do you get 3 Princesses, a pink poodle, and...a bepearled bug all in one photo?

My foto blog is getting so large I do remember posting another of this chic event way back, but these sweethearts bear repeating.

A buoyant five year old; swam two laps on her own. (Aided by some foam strapped to her back.) Loves the swimming lessons.

The baby cries, the photograph is there. Daddy puts the camera down and comforts.

The Three Fates. Alive and well, ghosting the grand mansions of the Newport RI, Robber Barons. Copyright 2009 Douglas Hopkins.

The Big Timber Montana ranch I worked as a cowboy in 1964. Bailing hay, branding calf's, herding dumbass sheep. 6am to 6pm, Sunday afternoon off. Surrounded by prime beef, ate only mutton and venison we shot. Three cooks quit. We found a six foot snake in the bunk house one early morning. Don't know which one of us he kept warm with. Wasn't me. I ain't as old as the sepia; truck proves that. I filled it, my shoulders remain proof.

Teaching my daughter, Liliana, heightened visual awareness at an early age. Prescott AZ family home.

Liliana, age five. Hilton Hotel, Atlantic City. No, we weren't burning off spare cash at the casinos, we just purchased another vintage Mercedes Benz diesel, this one from the top used dealer & mechanic in New Jersey, Bill Ditmire. Forty years in business, he's the best on the East Coast, with an eclectic inventory. While on the subject, as big as they are don't ever buy from Palm Beach Mercedes, Florida. Cult of dishonesty.

NYC corners, blank facades.

Wife views the Hudson River and George Washington Bridge.

Obscure corner of NYC, 125th Street.

Bird on a wire, Arizona clouds.

The Prescott yard. Small telescope mount & sundial.

Hotel lobby, a quick change. Prescott, AZ. The final visits to our second home.

The Dells, Prescott AZ. A favorite refuge in a passed life.

Seams, scenes, seems. Oksana dining on the road between NYC & Chicago.

Rockelfeller's gateway to Heaven. New York City.

Baby, babes, & Navy nuke screws. Douglas Hopkins & our Lithuanian friends visit the Nautilus & its spare propellers.

A studio snapshot, Valerie Cates. All rights reserved 2009, photographer Douglas Hopkins.

Valerie Cates, model, artist, & Columbia student. Her extraordinary beauty has roots in cross-cultural parents. All rights reserved 2009, Douglas Hopkins photograph. Photographed for Zotos International.

The Wright Brothers spent their winters testing flight surfaces using a homemade wind tunnel. Neither graduated from high school!

Liliana rides the giant bunny rabbit, accompanied by her body guard.

Hot summer day & Liliana consumes her favorite, a chocolate ice cream cone.

Another culinary masterpiece from the wife. Church BBQ's bring out the chef in her.

Stark, alter afternoon, oceanside light. OBX, Cape Hatteras, NC.

Liliana's beach bolt, Frisco access, OBX.

Colonial silversmith.

Atlantic crossing, Cape Hatteras. More shipwrecks here than anywhere else in the US. From the hand of man and the force of nature lie the USS Monitor to the first WWII German sub, U-85, commanded by a 26 year old. Pirate ships and many torpedoed freighters are on the bottom.

Local island talent. "Hardy" the dog, master OBX skateboarder. Also chews boards to destruction.

My wife and I at our Arizona wedding, with Loki, our Icelandic nephew.

Vika & Loki discuss a puzzling matter. The children of Russia & Iceland meet. Fallen Leaf Lake on the background. Corner Klipsch horns to the sides. The Arizona home.

Roots, Cottonwood Creek, Sedona, Arizona.

Liliana with backyard shed & spring tree blossoms.

Liliana, 5, self-portrait with iPhone.

Seeing light with abstraction, photogtaph by Liliana, photographer's daughter, at age 5.

Sky worm with light.

Smaller street arrows, with shadow.

Confrontation with street arrow.

No pictures, please. Rock 54, borderline.

Firegirl Lili with sidekick Minnie leave the station in their 1939 La France.

Dog daze chez mall with Liliana.

Two Russian-Americans, also neighbors. Lili's good friend, Phillip.

Mother and daughter network.

Rock 54 & friends upstaged.

Rock 54 requests a revisit.

Our fashion platter prepares for a journey to the backyard. She has learned life on the road from her parents.

Rock 55 moving in.

Easter Sunday dinner centerpiece includes traditional Russian Lent cake and our handcarved Polish candlesticks.

Easter egg decoration time. Free-hand and age-old Ukranian shrink wrap decals. We got good egg color this year.

Our precious pink angel. "S" is sunshine & Minnie's happy dance. This is our little girl to the end of time.

Basic fresh poodle princess beauty.

Colonial church.

Claire & Liliana, Fall friends.

Playground rendevous, first after winter.

NYC streets, ghost of wife, so many ghosts. Douglas Hopkins photographer in the background making a Nokia cell snap, but male or female, you're looking only at pale blue.

The daughter of an esteemed fashion photogtapher must be chic at all times. Or is it anti-chic?

From the Douglas Hopkins Studio archives, promotional card, late 1970's. Legs are for Vogue.

Liliana goofing in the office.

Rock 54 is back. Damp stone.

Oksana knit this for the next door neighbor new-born. Both parents are piano teachers.

Liliana, the bubble bath princess. We finally found a use for the jacuzzi: making huge quantities of bubbles.

Liliana hits the big 5. Vocabulary now organizes into paragraphs.

Spring seems to be arriving, solar hot water and electric arrays are definitely ramping up daily output. The state Attorney General has agreed this week to investigate Home Depot & British Petroleum Solar for putting our array in the front yard rather than on the roof, along with no building permit. Please comment if you wish to know the outcome.

Good friend married last weekend...yet another superb and happy Russian import.

Nanny & friend Olya, Oksana, Liliana, The Director. One of those many Arizona National Parks.

The Dells, Prescott, Arizona.

Russian-style bow, but not happy.

Doctor, lawyer...decorator? Twenty more years to decide.

Rabbit and Rock 54. Both labelled.

Training wheels.

The old NYC back yard. Kept it preserved as is for photogenic purposes.

Liliana with rocks.

The remains of a child's confirmation dress of at least a half-century. Found in the dowry trunk of a friend's mother after she passed away. The lightness, the faded form speaks.

The Oldest Rodeo in America, Prescott, Arizona. Hubby took one quick shot; these fine cowboys are just a little too handsome! No lingering.

Russian babe attends Arizona rodeo. Announcer, learning of this, tells crowd she came "All the way from Moscow..." East meets quintessential West. These two gentlemen are rodeo clowns, the safet control experts, luring away the 5000 pound, very pissed bull about to stomp on you after being tossed 20 feet off his back and flat on your back.

My wife.  Her mug shot.

Our agent and our products in Milan's top perfumerie. Lower left cubby. "Z".

Milano Meeting. Such warm elegance, and lunch was one of the best ever.

Where was I going? That's not my wife, either. Neither one is. Guess I better not post this one.

"Red" rocks in Sedona.

Last portrait of 2008, wife and daughter.

New Year's 2009 countdown. Who doesn't use a TV these days for that purpose? Times Square is a few blocks outside the window, but much colder.

Liliana & good friend Claire. No solar electricity today.

A step up in emotional status this year; Lili went onstage with only a bribe, not even out of the plastic bag yet.

Hubby photographer acknowledges spousal portrait sessions don't always go as intended. Hopefully you agree wife's natural beauty overcomes unwanted position in front of camera without make-up. In fact she was there to test the lighting for a studio job, and she has great presence...despite her imposed impediments. To quote our friend Montel Williams, "She cooks, she sews, and she's a fusion physicist; what man wouldn't want to marry her!"

Maggie Han, star of The Last Emperor...and me, her snorkelling instructor. She moved from bathtub to pool to under the waves in record time. There wasn't an hour when she didn't make me laugh. On purpose, not her swimming.

So sultry Susan graces the Outer Islands, off Hope Cay, Bahamas. I never thought of endings out there.

Oksana requested this snap of her ceremony, DHS/INS clerk warmly congratulates her on citizenship.  Patriots of 1776 hover in the background.

Left Wing, Liliana pauses.

Dinosaur ready for lunch. This isn't small.

The edge of Rock 55.

George Washington returns to Rockingham. War's reflection and the finale on his military life.

light versus light, samples taken.

clouds still float by, started in childhood. 

lili looks for the animals. 

i snap tops thinking, ee cummings.

Rock 54 moves forward.

The Princess stands proudly by her loyal (and savoire) Knight of Armor. This isn't Halloween, this is real life.

Yes, I am a very proud husband! This is my wife's third "life's goal certificate". I count myself as one, certified at least, and from the theoretical point of view, as taken from her New York Times quote at our wedding. The second parchment was her physics PhD, and today the third, becoming an American. Following day is our ninth wedding anniversary.

Nine years here, my wife proudly swears her allegiance to the United States of America. She is now a "naturalized citizen", as was my mother. And with our first black President-elect, also as of today, it is a particulary vibrant time to officially join this country.

Halloween started with emergency iPhone snaps, leaving resolution to be desired, plus distorted edges.  The girls do glow despite the medium.  A pink poodle, an antennaed buggy, and three princesses.

Lili responding enthusiastically to the wacky chimes of an offbeat David Byrne interactive installation, echoing in the huge old NYC historical harbor ferry station, Battery Maritime Building. People are lined up to use the modified keyboard, wired up to banging "things". Maybe it was musical, hard to say. Byrne calls it "Playing the Building". That's how Lili saw it. See: www.creativetime.org.

Backdoor to monumental places, Princeton.

Assistant carpenter.

Liliana, OBX.

Liv Ullmann, Douglas Hopkins, Linn Ullmann. Opening of Douglas Hopkins NYC photography show, "Unseen". Liv & Linn, such gorgeous spiritual intellect, always made me dizzy. Loved those two beauties and miss them with sweet nostalgia, even these years later . Linn's portrait dominated the show...why I never had the ferrari in me to shoot Liv, I'll never know.

1968. San Diego. Yes, this ambience also documented last week on public television's "American Experience" series with the "The Summer of Love".

Thank you, my good buddies, for coming over to the new digs to assist in the massive moving-in clean-up, and then labelling the foto as a "party".

Crown Point, I had almost forgotten that domicile. The morning bedroom view across the bay was fantastic.

Thanks so much for surfacing this flash from the past. Who took it?

Can't wait to have the time to get back into my archives from then, thousands of negatives. Anybody want to do a book? My first is almost finished. "Real.Views, Learning the Art of Snapshooting."

Oksana, October in Acadia Maine.

Spring sprung. Solar panels back to work, electric bill down below $10/month.

Sakura Park, yes but not sure if I'm in Paris or Harlem. General Butterfield stands mute here in bronze, and the Emperor of Japan dedicated the cherry trees. See the lamp post again in a different mood, the cover I did for a same-named compelling poetry book mirrors this invisible niche in NYC:

This could be a family portrait, or my personal photographer-at-work cliche portrait, or yet just another inane shiny hubcap image. Said wheel belongs to the 1940's, spiffy, volunteer fire department's working parade truck. Fire station open house day.

Liliana, with her calico lab apron on, testing my brainpower enhancement device. We do goof around.

Douglas Hopkins cover photograph, American Photographer. My Black Period, a Wedding Noire.

The Bunny Master, Liliana.

Serene Elegance by Douglas Hopkins, photographer. Polaroid 35mm film. In memory of Fran Fore, cherished studio styling partner of many years. My framing and timing of her dress, dove, and location.

Oksana in my suburban Moscow hotel room, trying to locate my luggage. We had just met the day before; I wasn't thinking about luggage. My condition could fairly be called "blown away". Today is International Women's Day, a big holiday on Russia, when the usually dominant men have to run around at female bidding. What man wouldn't? Going on ten years later and I'm still blown away, happy to say.

My wife, the ex-Young Pioneer. How did the Cold War happen? On roller blades? We probably would have lost.

A visit with Dad [Cleveland Hopkins] to Ukiah in 1995 to "The White House". This is the house where he grew up, the house his father, Charles Blodgett Hopkins, built. California Modern, but likely pre-dating the modern period. It was set in walnut or orange groves and is a few hundred feet from the railroad track, hence a portion of Dad's deep interest in trains, from Lionel to the Santa Fe. What were his hopes and dreams as a teenager some 70 years earlier? It was a good day...why didn't I take notes? Was thinking "archival" this day as the camera date printer is rarely on. I never anticipated the black hole of parents passing away would be such a tusnami of love and information wiped away. Carpe diem. Dad did.

"House for Sale or Rent. Inquire Within." Found this incorporated as a panel in a box, presumably crafted by grandad Charles Blodget Hopkins, Ukiah, California, carpenter and house builder. Such unattributable ephemera clogs the imagination. I tried, not hard enough, to take my parents and a video camera around our family homebase before they died, filled as it was with personally precious artifacts of family history and accomplishment.

Now all of family is faded, just as this old message, once indelibly stencilled on wood, now erased of present significance. Video image and computer text, perpetual storage and comprehensive index, the future has a handle, holds forth to each our limitless Library of Alexandria, only bounded by user resolve.

I did get one videographed tour with Dad of our Arizona Family Home, even as he was building it, some twenty years ago. In the film he explains his plans, dreams, and desires, walking through the structure, still in the framing stage. The house was his retirement nirvana, and through Mom's contribution it became a warm centering for my prodigal, long distance visits, increasing with frequency later in life, then finally the few, recent years, a place of solace for my new family, that gemutlich refuge only grandparents can do, cloaking an imigrant wife and new baby with love. It was home as well to a magnificent telescope, Dad's superb lifetime engineering tour de force, built in its own out-building .

These evidences, shreds of past comforts in family strength, now serve to assist in letting go. Releasing from thought its ugly demise after my parents passing. Indigent greed invaded its doorstep while still warm and squatted until its former occupants left, weeping in heaven. Our 60's musician told us don't look back, and so we go.

Even the present holds ephemera. I do remember the hot lemonade Grandad Charles once made for me as a very young child, at bedtime. Had never heard of such a strange and delicious drink, but took it as natural, coming from a trusted source. I still feel and taste the freshly squeezed Califonria lemons, the sour heat. I only remember seeing him that once, he died far away when I was ten years old. I have the burial receipt. Here, on Scribd for my children.

Liliana and her bunny brood. It is true, they do multiply rapidly. Quiet as can be, though. Maybe because these are mostly orphans, fortuitously rescued in a church parking lot on a nice sunny Saturday afternoon, a class-action adoption when a kindly neighborhood lady told Lili, already lost to the world, knee-deep as she was in polyester menagerie nirvana. Hundreds of homeless stuffed creatures spread out on a 15x15 tarp. The church lady told Lili that for $2 she could have all the rabbits that would fit into a shopping bag...or two. Notwothstanding that limitation, in Lili's eyes, these little creatures are amazingly compressible, so our beloved Zi-Zi (Russian = bunny) population jumped in a blink.

I think we have a photo of the parking lot event...pre-foto-keyword. Have to look. Art collection is sawn but not seen here; hasn't made it to the "new house" walls yet. An artifact of the estate, Mom's worn chair, sits alone...perhaps happy again, couching such backend treasures.

The smashing, sparkling Joanne Colan, powerhouse Rocketboom beauty icon of the internet intelligentsia. At location Le Charlot, following Valentine's Day fragrance interview. To the direct right, my German classmate from Immanuel Kant Gymnaisum, BadOeynhausen, Dr. Dietrich Hahne, visiting NYC with family. Not to be missed overhead is fave omen biplane buzzing us with bonne fortune. Photograph by Mike, thank you, MTV/Rocketboom videographer/cameraman.

Restless souls struggle.

The Nose.

As in fragrance & rabbit, mine and its. Lili & bunny equally bemused.

* * * * *

Unabashed & long overdue for a commercial break. No free blogs!

The top fragrance aficionado site had a slow news day and interviewed me. I secretly turned it into the longest blog-clog self-immolation ever done, courtesy Dragon Dictate.

Nevertheless, the editor at Scented Salamander is a scholar of fragrance and extremely well informed, smart cookie, hard working on a labor of love. Please make the jump & pump up her site. You don't actually have to read through, but in any case do have the cup of tea she politely suggests before starting. Many thanks. No quiz today.

http://www.mimifroufrou.com/scentedsalamander/2007/12/interview_with_douglas_hopkins.html

Is this not totally cool? I am one happy dude. Baby hike, out Sedona way. The camera strap may be Kodak, but the box is Leica, Digilux 2, superb image quality. That's a Garmin Forerunner GPS on my right wrist. Should tell me in retropsect exactly where this was taken, as long as the cameras are timed to it. Sort of carrying the advertising, should have a baseball capon with "Prastara Cologne" written on it. My brand. www.PerfumeFactory.org Wife Oksana took this snap, she's soon surpassing my photography skills!

Liliana finds direction.

North of Rome, Montecatini spa. Classical architecture gets mystical. Modern never does this for me, even with favorites, such as Louis Kahn's Salk Institute (below somewhere). Trying to figure where some Doric columns can be wedged in my 1950's "modern" bunker. Have to strip the 70's siding first. What a ripoff! Nice domain pedigree: an idiot lived here. Nothing mystical on the premises except me barefoot in winter on the new radiant floor.

Always look forward to my rare Big Sur visits. Such a compelling place for photography. This is a snap, no excuses for art. Anybody know a place more photogenic than here? The resort-laden coast south of Rome has some of this potential, what it lacks in drama it makes up in classical ruins. Same dramatic highway, pottery stands instead of Big Macs. See what I can find in my files.

One trip out, spent an afternoon with Ansel Adams. He had just bought his first microwave and was running around the house with some very curled prints, happy with the time it might save! More to tell in my book, "Real.Views"...soon.

Dad's funeral. He was a co-inventor of radar and scientific manager of SAC's DEW line in Alaska. As a kid he used to take me on float plane moose hunts, 100 miles from nowhere in the middle of Alaska. I miss him, there wasn't a question he couldn't answer. Niece Casey in black and Uncle Al in beard (now 91 and still computing).

Me and my Dad. Love this picture! I think Mom made my seersucker outfit, or my Grandma MacKenzie. Nobody left to share such details.

I hereby award Dawn Gallagher an Emmy for gracious charity work. Noteworthy is her particular ability to scoop up the dough out of Wall Street tightwads, and they love her for it!

Our beloved investor took us to the International Emmy Awards. We obviously didn't have have much fun. Moreover, Brits won most of the awards. We did get to meet a gorgeous and gracious Bollywood actress.

I'll add names to the caption as the participants give me permission. My wife couldn't attend. That's Dawn Gallager in red; friend, author (Get her skincare book on Amazon.), and never-ceasing super-star model...gives most of her time to charity, such as St. Jude's. She's got everything and gives it all back. I'll try to dig in the files and find her initial teenage modelling headshots I did. Such a talented group: I confess; we had a blast that evening, although I missed my wife.

Family snaps. Cousins at the Phoenix zoo. Such excitement!

This won't mean anything to anybody but me, one of those personal snapshots with mostly hidden implication. A last image of home, the kitchen in Arizona while Mom was still alive.

I talk about this in my personal photography book, "Real Views". Photographs have layering, just like poetry. A photograph is a map, with borders; the obvious. The sometimes less apparent layers are intent and emotion.

On an Arizona roll here, sunsets, wrapping things up. Doesn't hurt to repeat, closing the day down, in all of its variations.

Another Arizona sunset aspect, not the whole thing, just a corner.

Time for a Prescott, Arizona sunset. The light before the dark. Can you geotag a sunset? It isn't there anymore.

Yacht approaching beach, Costa Smeralda, Sardinia, Italy. By helicopter.

The day drill is to head for one of dozens of remote, tiny island beaches. Be sure your yacht's cook has plenty of lunch-time, Barilla pasta.

The Emerald Coast, perhaps the most exotic resort in the world. Combines both Italy's spontaneous warmth and unparalleled sense of restrained design.

Photography by Douglas Hopkins, (c)2007.

Sharon Stone, studio portrait by Douglas Hopkins. Pre-shoot Polaroid proof. She had no name then, just a knock on the studio door, by herself. I nearby in the studio lobby at that moment and grabbed the door: this was a good number of years ago, but I still remember, as an experienced beauty photographer the explosive visual impact she had, in that very milli-second of eye contact, even before the door opened fully. Guess I learned first-hand what "dumbfounded" means. (c)2007. Ruined my vision for months.

Sharon Stone, fleeting model, before acting. Douglas Hopkins studio portrait. Of the hundreds of women I photographed, and with the rare exception of the images of those whom I both loved and photographed, Sharon is the most beautiful. Unparalleled depth of energy. From my forthcoming book, "Real Views", a gurustic manual of creative snapshooting. All rights (c)2007.

Oksana's Masterpiece T-Day Dinner...30 page script, all precisely on time. Amazing! Delicious!

The Shed. Maximum permissable size, 10x10x10. Verticle corner beams, 6x6, foundation beams 2x10, wall studs 2x6. The neighbor's boy, 10, declared it "over-built". Maybe not for the hurricaines that come through here every 60 years or so. Had expert help building it, Andrew, David, & Joe. Four concrete foundation columns, 10" x 4', were 1/8th inch in level alignment.

Liliana, left in teacher's lap, and her "Jolly Whales" at the Goddard school. A brilliant and beautiful bunch. The personalities are bursting out.

The last of an angry eruption, just before dawn.

One of my volcanoes, the famous Stomboli. Resting at dawn.

Mom and the wife in Paris.

Who wouldn't blog this! Our church wedding in Prescott, after the required government visa 3 month quick one in NYC. Anniversary eight this week.

Susan and Carole. Bahamas, Ababco Inn. Polaroid SX-70 scan.

Bahamas, Hope Cay, Ababco Inn. Maggie Han, Harvard student supreme, model, actress; lost to the Left Coast. Carole & Susan. The men know who they are. It is 20 years later now, more or less, and we're all married to others we never supposed at the time.

Trick or Treating in the hallowed grounds of the Princeton Seminary ghetto. Identifiable adults, Cady & Oksana. Lili & Lucy start the lineup. Photography by David Andrew, father of 4 of the girls.

Pleased to meet you, my name is. Bosch post-nups hotel breakfast. Mr. Hans Kageneck in green.

Paris rests alone.

Real Views: soda can with stepped tourists.

Snapz. Real Views: lake & trees, Acadia Maine.

Liliana makes a curtain call on Olya from Minsk. Her documents are in order.

Happy days with Grandma, Olya, and Sage in Prescott.

The Physics Girls. Anya, Noelle, Oksana. Three Phd's. Push away Hollywood, Hooters, and Paris Hilton.

Bosch Alpine pre-nups: toute le Monde was there. (Pardon my highschool French.)

Real Views: the tomb across from our Harlem apartment. Who's buried there? Ipaq snap.

Catching blog up on our wedding trips. Dina & Oliver Boch. Creme de la Eurocreme. Great fireworks.

Oksana in the Ysenburg castle courtyard.

Valerie's repression has a moment of release. Rome, courtyard.

Charlene Engelhard in repose, restrained background. Cambridge, courtyard.

Rest stop movement, chained. Circular motion restrained.

Late in the day: the rest stop movement meets a fixed element.

Worn rotation: the rest stop movement, chained down.

Anxious friend Lena gets Dr. Lili's full check-up.

They wait, they watch. They listen, they sleep. Each an angel.

Liliana & her Bugaboo stroller. Harlem days.

Alexandra Paul, intellectual, fresh out of Groton. Bypassed Stanford to become model, evolved to acting, grew to be activist, a well-compensated Baywatch beach bunny and ardent jock. Now reportedly a fine wife and remaining beautifully on-screen. Photograph copyright 2007, Douglas Hopkins.

Oksana needed a new passport mug shot, so Lili wanted one, too.

OKH, Lili, and her cool fusion Columbia colleagues next to the TOKAMAK donut.

One more graduation pixr. "Another one?" says the Graduate. Sympthetically, Lili renders an apprpriate photo face.

Very young understudy at Valentina Kozlova's exotic New York City Ballet School. We served on Valentina's dance company board. We gatefully fulfilled the ballerina's fragrancing requests and attended rehearsals; that's where you really see ballet is tougher than the Marines.

TS/S Stefan Batory Ocean Liner - Autobiographic Novel

TS/S Stefan Batory Ocean Liner - Autobiographic Novel

dhc archive prastara poland ts/s stefan batory cruise ship

Migrating house trailers, parked. RazrSnap.

True snap. Lili with mole baby and earlier lipstick experiment. We watched as mole mother retrieved all five kids back underground. Cautious, but very fast, gripped in the mouth. They make such a mess of the lawn topography and thereby the mower blade: should they be terminated?

Columbia University 2007 Graduation. Hot day with 40,000 people. Never did find Oksana until the reception.

The Backyard Girls: Anna makes a face & Lilianna swings.

Heather and Derek are suddenly out of JPG Magazine | MetaFilter

Heather and Derek are suddenly out of JPG Magazine MetaFilter

INVESTMENT MAGAZINE CNET COMMENT BLOG OUSTER VENTURECAP

The Backyard Girls. Anna visits when her sibling does piano lessons with the wonderful music teachers next door.

The Columbia Chapel, beautiful building. Setting for the Class of 2006-2007 PhD Convocation.

The Arts & Sciences students, awaiting official "crowning". What a profuse pack of densely filled gray matter!

Lili kept herself amused with a new Arial DVD on mama's laptop...until the batteries ran out.

Exiting the Convocation.

Oksana's supervising professor. The Professor has our deepest gratitude for his attentive, personal mentoring through her seven years. This was taken at the reception following the Convocation. (We wish to direct praise more specifically, but have a policy of not using full names in the blog.)

Dr. Oksana...officially tomorrow at Columbia University, New York City! Six years!

Nice driveway. Thanks, Dina!

The Bill & Rudy Show. Bill Gates & Rudy 9/11 . Such potential. My photo, I was there.

Considering the package design for the numbered edition, silver and procelain flasks in the Zazou and Åse (pronounced "OH-sah") luxury fragrances. Somewhat fancy for my minimalist taste, although with a projected retail of $665, maybe the flask should have a fancy nest for delivery. What do you think? About the box, not the price!

A sample shot of our new Douglas Hopkins & Co. product, not out yet. Based on a rare, extremely pure, natural, Russian clay. It is a dry powder mix for facials and skin care regimes. Nine formulas for specific conditions and body sites. Can be mixed with yoghurt, water, or milk. The line is called "Clay Management". There wil be more info on one of the sites, www.DouglasHopkins.com, or new site in beta: www.PerfumeFactory.org. We'll be selling some sample nine clay kits at a special trial price, let me know if you are interested. There's an email connection on the PerfumeFactory site. Hope it is working! If you don't get a reply, try again in a week.

My wife's hairdresser went too far this time, don't you think, I mean the bangs aren't in this year.

Looking back to 9/11.

Mademoiselle magazine liked Prastara Blue and the limited edition Ase & Zazou Flasks, although the latter are not yet in full production. Edition is limited to 500. Price is approximately $750. Solid silver top, fine Chinese porcelain body. One ounce with refill, "Extrait" is 30% oil, so a drop will do.

Prastara Blue from the cover of the Villeroy & Boch European catalogue, the only American product therein.

One of our old catalogue pages from Cambridge Chemists. The Botaenica line will be reborn, maybe under the "Geothermology" trademark.

Kayak is ready to go. Shoot down the hill into the canal. But I'm not recovered from the pneumonia yet, so maybe this weekend, twmp will be up in the 70's. Always colder down on the canal.

Spring arrives in The Garden State (= East Coast rainforest) & we are looking for the first grid-tie positive energy month. Watch out PSG&E! Solar hot water tube array on the roof is pumping out 85-100 degrees all day long. Soon have to figure out where to unload it; big heat sink needed.

These are the kulich pastry before decoration.

Oksana has cooked a batch of special Russian cakes for Easter, called kulich. In the Motherland it wouold be left overnight at the Orthodox catherdral to be blessed and eaten on Easter. It celebrates the meal the Apostles had with Christ after he arose.

Liliana is starting assemble her own chic outfits.

Lili awakened.

Who did it? "Not me."
Liliana merely meditates on chocolate, she does not participate in it. At least when
the surveillance camera is on.

I had other covers. This was from my NASA/MIT project time, measuring the ballistics of volcano eruptions. Italy, Stromboli. About 100 feet away. Almost ate it.

Once I was famous, now I am not. I did get a few more than 15 minutes, and I did photograph the guy who said that just before New York Hospital let him die there. (Andy Warhol) Anyway, just to set the record straight, I am not Eugene Smith. Not Antony, either. I'm Doug. The rose is not a tattoo. This was my Black Period, my model girlfriend of nine years had an affair and left me. Or did I leave her because she had an affair, I don't know. She was otherwise very funny, pretty, and a great friend. Still working on my book, Real Views. It is about Life and Awareness through Vision, but no guru stuff.

The certificate arrived this week in the mail. We didn't buy this on the Internet from "Phoenix University". It is the real thing, a Columbia PhD. We bought it with six years of time. My wife's smile sez it all.

Speaking of the wife's cooking, have to include her layer cake for Lili's third birthday last weekend. It was incredibly good. None survived the party.

Seven years of marriage and I'm still photographing Oksana's great cooking! She got up at 6 AM to bake for my Saturday men's meeting at 8. It a Russian non-sweet pastry, the "Lark", usually done on the 22nd of March during Lent, signaling the bird's return in Spring. The guys loved it. The tail has realistic detailing, somewhat dark here...it was photographed on Saturday at 7:45 AM; I wasn't awake yet.

The two family redheads. Dana & Liliana.

Lili's new early morning school "do". Enabled by Oksana's patience and Lili's new -- ocassional -- willingness to not scream and otherwise vigorously protest anyone touching her hair.

Renovation continues. This is Zone 3 of "North Wing" radiant floor project. HVAC is up and running, PEX is already hot here, floor nice and toasty. Bathroom floor will require tile removal and concrete pour. Easier install than the "above-subfloor" method used for the rest of the rooms, also better waterproofing.

We agree, this is the most beautiful tree we've had. Found bubblers at Home Depot, a real 50's flashback. A Blue Spruce, and it smells great, too! From Whole Foods, as our usual tree-cutting farm down the road was closed (Too warm? No snow?), creating an all-afternoon, 25 mile car trek, looking for a subsititute.

Lili loves books. These are from Aunt Mary.

Christmas presents are exhausting!

Lili does a final check for additional presents. Highlights were books from Aunt Mary & bunny slippers.

Handsome dudes of the local Volunteer Fire Department arrive in front of the house, rushing out with NOT a bucket of water...

...rather another load of peppermint candy canes for Santa Claus to disperse.

Another grim session with Santa Claus, this time in his open sleigh, at the endo f the driveway. She was happy to get a candy cane.

Our Russian Princess.

Friend Dasha, professorial colleagues, Peter Rabbit, and Mom.

Columbia Professor Navratil, Oksana's doctoral program supervisor, recounts to the gathered group the early events of her "late admissions" arrival at the University doorstep. One factor in granting her entrance was his familarity, and that of his colleagues, with her lab in Russia.

Lili's new comfort location is under things.

Prefessor Chu entertains Lili, who was in high spirits the entire evening. Oksana's defense took two hours. She may have follwoed my advice to put everyone to sleep with a long presnetation. "Friends and colleagues" and family (misspelled on the cake) were awaiting awaited for her to emerge from the stressful event, but after the first hour, Professor Chu exclaimed, "What are my colleagues doing to her...don't they realize this is just a formality!" The defense finished right on time, two hours long.

After six long years the event took place: Oksana's PhD reception at Columbia University. Her mother, Tamara, spent two days preparing the Russian spread. It was quickly consumed!

Yes, I was alive in the 50's, maybe early 60's. They are gone now, the ones close who knew and care, the specifics. Alaska, the location, or maybe McLean, VA, at this frozen point in time. Mom's handsewn matching dresses for my sisters. Proudly a Cub Scout, end of the scarf carefully knotted, one of the insider rituals. Dad's B&W photography hobby.

The Penguins, MIT Class of 2026. Pardon the pixilation, some people are still using textured paper. Photographer was not indentified by the school.

Lili and Santa Claus did somewhat better this year than last, no crying from either. Nevertheless, several minutes of coaching by fashion photog Dad couldn't undo her frozen fear. Russian demure.

Lili assists with the plumbing.

One last season transistion image form the backyard.

Oksana initiates the official start-up of the solar hot water system this weekend; nearly a year in the planning and execution. Just in time to heat the house, with new radiant floors. Glass tube collector, on the roof. Copper feed lines will be insulated.

Lili at her most self-confident chic, sunglass fit notwithstanding, giving us a song and a dance.

My twenty years of fashion photography must have landed in her genes. I most certainly didn't train her to do this, especially in the middle of the zoo's monkey house. Maybe it was the inhabitants that inspired her.

Many would find my wife's portrait, taken at the Philly Zoo, wholly appropriate. Lili isn't yet decided. Want I want to know is how he can make his knuckles flat with thumb out and I can't. A million years of evolution?

Real Views (c)2006. Changing leaves last year. Oksana's spot.

Real Views. Places to be.