Daniel Church, aka Porch Moon, may be the Fort Wayne Derby Girls’ only Fort Wayne Derby Guy.

As long as they have Church, the Derby Girls will probably never need another.

A favor once asked of Church by a Derby Girl is on the verge of burgeoning into a business.

On Friday, Church

and his partner, Beth “Sugar Guns” Collier, will celebrate the launch of a website for their photography/graphic design/too-many-things-to-list-here company called Sugar Moon.

The party, which starts at 7 p.m. at 816 Pint & Slice on Calhoun Street, will feature displays of Collier’s artwork, Church’s photography and projects on which the pair have collaborated.

There will also be a performance from The Sporting Dogs of Kent.

Sugar Moon grew out of a request to take portraits of a Derby Girl in late 2008.

One request from one Derby Girl turned into many requests from many Derby Girls, and a successful sideline with vocation potential was born.

The Church-Collier combo, which reflects a bringing together of photographic, graphic design, production design, fashion, fine art and marketing skills, is the reason Sugar Moon is the sensation it has been thus far.

Church and Collier’s portraits of the Derby Girls are often sexy, always surprising, sometimes shocking, but never exploitative.

“I’m not trying to do what people would expect,” Church said in an e-mail interview.

Church said he and Collier try to make each photo series a voyage of discovery for the subject.

This sometimes means taking that subject out of the person’s comfort zone, Church said, “which is a liberating experience for the client to be able to see themselves in such a different light.”

One thing’s for sure: If you want the sort of photography that is offered in a little room in the back of a department store by a woman who lives in constant fear that she’ll have to use a squeak toy to make a crying baby laugh, it’s best that you look elsewhere.

“I don’t want any of our photos to look like something that you could get at your average portrait studio,” he said.

The Sugar Moon crew has plans for the company that go far beyond mere photography.

It is customary at this point to write that "the sky’s the limit," but it seems unfair to limit Sugar Moon with a limiting word like ’limit."

You can soon see what Sugar Moon’s been up to and what it plans to be up to at Sugar-moon.com.

Northwood going 3-D

When Northwood Cinema Grill opened in the summer of 1998, some people didn’t hold out much hope for its long-term existence.

The concept, a movie theater with a full dinner menu, was as sound as a pound (to quote pre-euro Brits) and had worked in many cities.

But Fort Wayne’s economic climate just didn’t seem all that friendly to locally owned movie theaters.

Twelve gratifying years have passed, and the Cinema Grill’s owners, Jody and Lori Wiedenhoeft, recently decided to upgrade both of Northwood’s screens and projectors to digital 3-D in time for Friday’s release of “Toy Story 3.”

Cinema Grill has long been known to Fort Wayne parents as the easiest and most enjoyable place to take kids to watch movies.

But Hollywood’s sudden yet passionate love affair with 3D had begun to cut into Northwood’s bottom line.

“Everything’s really changed as far as kids’ movies and family movies go,” Jody Wiedenhoeft said. “It looks like almost everything is going to be released in 3-D from now on.”

Admission prices will go up a bit, of course, but it’ll still be cheaper to see a 3-D movie at Northwood than at area multiplexes, Wiedenhoeft said.

Factor in other Northwood perks (table service, beer and wine, etc.) and it appears that the theater has been rebuilt to last.