As 2009 comes to an end I wanted to look back and reflect on all the the personal and professional events that helped make it one of the best years of my life.

First the personal events.

Without question the single best event of 2009 for me was the birth of our second daughter, Sadie. She came into this world on June 3rd and has not stopped finding new and inventive ways of melting my heart. She’s smiling and rolling over and it won’t be long until she’s crawling. Of course she has seen the camera more than once and I’m working on putting together a film of her first year like I did with Mya. Nice segue to Mya here, she turned two years old in May and is going full steam ahead, no really, she doesn’t walk anywhere, she runs for no apparent reason but to get from point a to point b, really really quickly. We took her to Disney last January and to say she had the time of her life would be a ridiculous understatement. I bet we rode the flying Dumbo ride at least a dozen times and looking back at the smile on her face as if every time was the first time, I could’ve ridden it another dozen times. Those times were priceless! Every day she continues to make Reagan and I laugh at something silly she says or does but we’re also in complete awe of her desire to share and help out with her little sister. These are in fact the best days of my life and I’m certainly enjoying every minute of them. I’m looking forward to the days when Sadie and Mya are able to play together more and we’re able to do more things as a family. Certainly Mya and Sadie have the best mom in the world and I have the best wife. Reagan and I celebrated our fifth wedding anniversary in September and she amazes me every day with her multi tasking abilities. No joke, she can hold both girls and still find a free hand to do something else. She’s been there when the girls are sick and she’s been there when I needed her too. I truly am the luckiest man in the world.

Now the professional.

2009 has been a head spinning year. So many great things have happened and I’m truly blessed for everything. It was a year of new beginnings as I changed the studio name. I went from Glass Eye Video to Studio+Z Films. This change was something I had been working on for a long long time. It took me forever to find a name I loved and once I did, I found a great designer in Renee, owner of Ribbons of Red, to help me bring it all to life. It was important to me to not just add ‘Films’ to Glass Eye, I wanted a whole name change as I felt the studio had gone through more of a rebirth than a name change. Renee helped create not just a logo and awesome site, but also a brand. That was something I never had and I couldn’t be happier with it.

I hired the super talented Josh Emerson this year. He is an amazing asset to our Studio+Z Films team and we couldn’t have accomplished what we did this year without him! We really fine tuned our Same Day Edit that help make so many weddings unique this year.

I was very fortunate to have the opportunity to educate others when I presented at WEVA, Wedding & Event Videographers Association International, the worlds largest wedding videographer organization and at MIVA, Michigan’s professional Videographers Association and I have a few more speaking engagements lined up for 2010. I really enjoy public speaking and to have the opportunity to help other studios grow and achieve their goals is so rewarding.

Also at WEVA, I was incredibly honored to be awarded a Creative Excellence Award, its the Oscar or Golden Globe of our industry and to bring the first International Award for wedding filmmaking to our hometown of Cincinnati is indescribable.

One of the best moments of 2009 came when I opened the mailbox and found my copy of EventDV Magazine where there was a four page spread about my studio and the concept film I created that helped make this year the best year for me professionally. Our studio was also featured on Style Me Pretty, Rock n Roll Bride and two issues of Cincinnati Wedding Magazine.

Lastly, I just found out I was voted Best Videographer in Cincinnati by the The Knot magazine 2009/2010. What a huge honor!

Yes 2009 may be over, but 2010 is right around the corner with so many new opportunities and I’m incredibly fortunate for them all. I have a few things I’ll be unveiling soon, but I’m most looking forward to filming some of the most incredible weddings I’ve filmed so far, including quite a few destination weddings. I’m truly a blessed man and I couldn’t ask for more.