we photographed claire at home for the cedars-sinai medical center’s research magazine. suffering from an inherited autoimmune disease, claire was involved with new genetic testing and therapies offered at the hospital.

one of the benefits of living and working in southern california is that you can occasionally stumble into these incredible locations. claire is on the swim team at her school and the editors were set on having her photographed in the pool. usually i dread those kind of things, being the sort of guy who gets a sunburn in two minutes flat, but claire had this beautiful indoor pool and we couldn’t resist using it. click play below for behind the scenes footage.

behind the scenes shoot with claire from Max S. Gerber on Vimeo.

this month sees the magazine cover debut of my adorable and chubby niece, willamina. i got an assignment to photograph harvey karp, a pediatrician and author of the “happiest baby” series of books and DVDs. it’s all about the five S’s, people. (swaddling, side/stomach positioning, shushing, swinging and sucking) harvey teaches parents how to calm crying babies, which in turn calms frazzled parents.

we wanted a baby for the shoot, but harvey’s own son was 27 years old. that wasn’t exactly the right visual, obviously. luckily having recently become an uncle i was able to provide a baby, and spend some quality time with my niece as well. my sister-in-law (see below) got a free instructional DVD, too.

many years ago when i was working for greg heisler i remember seeing a time magazine cover up on the wall of the studio. he had photographed his own daughter for it and that always struck me as a really great thing. this isn’t quite the same, but it’s a start. hopefully there will be many more in the future.

below are the layouts used in the magazine (i tease my brother that willa looks like kuato from total recall in that cover picture, all scrunched up and wrinkled!) as a bonus there’s willa with her mother in a test shot, and with her charming and talented uncle, as well (thanks to paul). as an extra special bonus, a short video of corporal bennett singing a cowboy lullaby about pooping. you’re welcome, internet.

this week i’m headed off to orlando to the cardiology 2010 conference. i’ll be speaking and signing books there saturday night (2.13.10) at the disney contemporary resort. if you’re in the neighborhood please stop by and say hello!

as part of my presentation to the conference i made this short film. this conference is mostly a medical one, with 26 of us (out of 900 attendees) being classified as “miscellaneous.” a long while ago i met a CHD researcher who told me that one thing doctors and scientists often miss out on is information on the emotional lives of their patients. given that, i wanted to show how some of the subjects from the book are doing now, as young adults out in the world. they’re dealing with the same things we all have to contend with – school, the future, family, love, fear. and they’re all a whole lot more interesting than listening to me speak!

my recommendation: watch it HERE, full screen, in HD for best results.

in about ten weeks i’ll be an uncle. that is, i’ll be an uncle officially. my brother is having a baby. it feels like i’ve been an uncle for a very long time. even though i don’t see my many honorary nieces and nephews very often these days, there’s a strange sort of closeness that comes from photographing someone over and over again, and watching them grow up in front of you. really, with all the kids in the hearts book, i feel a sense of responsiblity, pride and protectiveness that could only be greater if they were my actual children. although, being an honorary uncle/older brother is probably much easier. having ten kids seems quite difficult – especially now that they’re all teenagers, with some even in their early 20s.

ali is going off to calarts next year to study photography. she wrote about me on her application essay. i mean, really, what more could a proud uncle ask? for weeks now since summer break started we’ve been trying to find time to hang out. since holidays don’t mean much to me (or to most freelancers) the fourth of july seemed perfect. ali was in hollywood, house-sitting for her aunt, and taking care of the dogs. she’s 17 now, and if i were in high school ali would probably be the one i’d hang out with. though to be honest she probably wouldn’t hang out with me because i don’t have a studded vest or a mohawk. she’s such a punk rocker, i totally didn’t see that coming ten years ago. i’m sure her mom didn’t, either!

ali’s last open heart surgery happened when she was young enough to let it be just a faint memory now. she’s lucky in that regard, but also unlucky in that she’s unused to all that goes along with such things. case in point, shortly after the 4th of july she had to get a blood test at a routine doctor’s appointment, and i received many panicked messages on facebook along the lines of “max, it was nice knowing you. you’ll remember me as ali sandoval the girl who died when getting her blood taken.” followed shortly, of course, by the more relaxed: “MAX!!! i lived!!!”

below, along with more pictures from the 4th, is a short 2 minute video, and a photo of ali on the first day i met her, almost a decade ago.

my brother and his wife are having a baby daughter in september. my father, who lives in new york, has not seen them since before emiko got pregnant, so i thought it’d be nice to make a video for him for father’s day. also, i figure it serves to mark my brother’s first “official” father’s day – or is that a pre-father’s day? either way, i’m to be an uncle soon and as such it’s my right to subject everyone to time in front of the camera. at the moment, the leading contender for baby names falls to “willamina”. so here’s my brother james and emiko and willa – t-minus three months.

of course, my brother approaches impending fatherhood with his usual humility.

and just in case it’s unclear, that phrase he says at the very end is “chocolate cake and fred segal’s.”

click the play button below.

(music by merle travis, available here.)

during an impromptu, last minute, non-photo-related trip to new york last week, i managed to sneak away a moment to visit marshall in his studio. always a good idea. if you don’t know marshall arisman, you really should take a moment to check out his website. marshall is the chair of the graduate illustration-as-visual-essay department at the school of visual arts.

below a short (really short) video, just for fun. audio stolen from a CD of stories marshall recorded – also having the best radio voice in the world.

i just got a note from marshall’s wife, dee, saying that these are the only photos of him ever taken where he’s smoking. whoops, sorry about that. she also says he’s about to quit. well, okay. . .cut back. these shots were taken out on the street in front of his studio, in chelsea.

thanks, marshall, for always taking a moment to let me visit.