Mesmerizing Moments Photography
5830 McArdle Dr.
Corpus Christi, TX 78412
361-944-8480
Serving as an Army helicopter pilot in Afghanistan can really change your outlook on life. It certainly changed Denise Mesmer’s.
“When I got back from Afghanistan, I looked at my husband, Scott, and said, ‘Life is too short.’ We were living where we didn’t want to be, commuting to the jobs we weren’t as thrilled with anymore,” said Denise. “It led me to realize the value of family and how fleeting time is. I decided then I’m going to go live where I want to live, and I’m going to find a job there,” she said.
So after twenty two years as an Army pilot, Denise decided to retire. She found the place she wanted to live . . . on the Texas coast at Corpus Christi. She didn’t have a problem convincing Scott to move to Corpus Christi. It turns out that Scott is a pilot also, and has a seasonal job – he flies the Dallas Mavericks team plane. During the NBA season, he just has to catch a flight to Dallas every now and then.
After choosing Corpus Christi as their new home town, the Mesmers turned their attention to finding that job that would thrill them. They found it in photography. So in 2008, after training under such masters as world-renowned photographer Doug Box and leading wedding photographer David Ziser, they opened Mesmerizing Moments Photography. Business went well enought that they recently opened a new studio, equiped with cutting-edge equipment that enables them to shoot their clientele and print photos all in one visit. No waiting around, no return visits, and, most importantly, no visiting a web site to proof your pictures. “A lot of studios you will visit online, and what you’re going to see online isn’t what you’ll see when you get your printed photos,” Denise said. This is because computer monitors vary greatly on how they display color and brightness. According to Denise, “Depending on monitor resolution, color, it could look a lot different.” In the Mesmer’s system, what you see is what you get.
Why did they choose photography? Both Denise and Scott had a long-time interest in the medium. But it was, as Denise put it, “the fleeting nature of time” that inspired them. “We have a great love of family,” said Denise, a mother of three, “and have built wonderful family memories throughout the years. Portraits have a way of taking you back to a particular point in time, whether it is a wedding, or a look back to a child’s first year in school. Certain events have a definite impact and help define our lives. Through understanding the importance and brevity of the moments, we began developing our photography style and developing the goals for our company. Our goal for our customers is to work hard to help them capture and preserve these defining moments in a beautiful photograph that will last generations. We want them to look at a portrait 20 years from now and remember how they felt and what life was like for them at that moment.”
Denise recalls that “French Photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson talked about the ‘decisive moment’, as being, ‘that instant when a shutter click can suspend an event within the eye and heart of the beholder.’ We work to see these decisive moments so our customers can relax knowing we will capture and suspend these life defining events.”
There are certainly moments that are life defining. And life altering. Denise’s just happened to occur in Afghanistan. She and Scott are glad it did.
