Few images better evoke the idea of summer than sun, water and happy kids. Ric Peterson's image of children in mid-leap toward a seemingly limitless lakeside horizon is the perfect way to close our summer issue.

The image came about after Peterson had photographed an ad campaign for Guidance Medical, depicting two boys running along a sun-soaked beach using towels as capes. "I thought, 'This has potential,' Peterson says, so he decided to shoot some more images involving children, water and movement for his stock collection.

A dedicated family man, Peterson included his own family members in this particular scene, which was shot on Mille Lacs Lake in Minnesota during a summer vacation. The "models" for the image are (left to right) Peterson's daughter, Pasha; his niece, Natalie Stoffel; his son, Ian; and his nephew, Peter Rolando.

To capture just the right moment when they all leapt off the dock, Peterson had the children jump into the water about a dozen times, much to their delight. "I really enjoy working with kids, so it wasn't a very difficult image for me," he says. "I was trying to make a somewhat structured moment seem spontaneous."

Peterson was born in Tacoma, Wash., but was raised in Minnesota and visited many lakes such as this one as a child. After operating studios and businesses in Minnesota and Portland, Ore., he moved to the Seattle area in 1998 to join the Photogroup studio. After Photogroup merged with Wy'east Color and MarketPlace Design in 2000, Peterson served as director of photography at the new entity, Arscentia, until 2008.

Peterson now lives on Vashon Island, Wash., and has been a freelance photographer for the last year. He has also taught at the Art Institute of Seattle, the University of Phoenix and the University of Washington, and is co-president of ASMP's Seattle/Northwest chapter.

To see more of Ric's work, visit rickpeterson.com.