Studio BTS

While in between productions in 2018 I had intended to post more frequently (more than 2017 at least) but as time is limited, the posts seem to be as well. I did want to get a recent collaboration out there. Awhile back Motivity Pictures stopped by the studio. Motivity is a production company producing excellent work. They spent an afternoon in the studio for new portraits for their website. And as all photographers/videographers tend to do, they brought their cameras along. What followed was great conversation, awesome photos, and a wonderful little bts video. Check out the bts...

And here is the group image from my side of the camera....

Motivity Pictures

There's a heavy tone here for a different look. All in all, a good afternoon's work. Hopefully more to follow here sooner than later...

Quick Shout Out

Along the road of photography I love to meet people and be a part of their journey. Awhile back I met Terrence... Super cool guy and incredibly hard worker. His journey in-front of the camera has only continued to grow over the months and yesterday he gave me shout on Instagram after a lot of that work. I'm happy to help and working with him over the last few months has been great. Super excited to see where he goes.

Anyway, pretty cool stuff. Aaaaand it's a pretty busy week so it's a short one. Looking forward to a video production with a new client that should be pretty fun. More to follow on that... Have a good one!

BTS Detroit

Just a quick one as we wrap up the week...it's a nice BTS shot taken by the most excellent Artie Bowman onsite at company in Detroit. The client needed some warehouse images to showcase their new facility. I needed to get above it all to capture it. Clearly it all worked out with the help of a lift. The images turned out great and this BTS is pretty cool. Looking forward to posting more content here and some of the project in the hopper for next week. Have a good one out there. More to follow...

Hotwheels

About a year ago there was a significant transportation change in my life. In fact you can see the progression start here. Coming in hot, on route to Chicago, I lost the majority of a muffler on I-94. Well, didn't loose it, but started dragging most of it down the road. I was "that guy you did not want to follow" down the expressway. After that, it did make me wonder what the larger implications were of having a 2002 Subaru with 250,000 miles on it. I still believe that it had some life left, but it was a gamble. And after more consideration, gambling with safety isn't a good idea. And if I were going to a production where my car couldn't physically get me there, that would have been a problem as well. In fact, depending on the contract you sign, many have a clause built in for needing reliable transportation. While I had unyielding faith in my ride, it may at times, been misplaced. Maybe. I mean look how majestic it looked. 

2002, Subaru Outback

It is a strange thing, that year, that car, as it was a year ago...was probably one of the rapidly disappearing mechanical cars out there. It had a CASSETTE TAPE DECK. Virtually all of it was mechanical. There's something strange about that now. You really feel the idea of it being a tool, device...a machine when driving it. It wasn't a computer. Modern day cars are a computer. Very little question about it. The gas petal doesn't make the car go. But it's how you tell the computer that you would like to go and it determines if that's going to happen. Times change. Computer or no computer I had plenty of fond memories in that car. It lived through a time in my life where change was never ending. Virtually everything was changing every 3-6 months. I crossed the country from east to west, north to south and all back again several times over. Through sun, rain, whiteout blizzards, late nights and early mornings. It saw, along with me, virtually everything. Sights, sounds, places, weather... clichés and drama... it was sad to let it go. But as with time, things change, cars change. One thing that does seems to stay with us is music. Odd how that works. I remember finding, for better or worse, Coldplay in 2002. A Rush Of Blood To The Head was essential listing for me. I had a cassette tape that I would play in the darkroom at college. Printing in the darkroom until early hours of the morning. Always last to leave. There were floating boomboxes that would find themselves in darkrooms and random classrooms. You had to search them out if you wanted one because there were only two, but if you got one, that was lucky timing. They only played tapes though. The Coldplay cassette made it to the Subaru, to the darkroom, and back again, over and over... and then eventually to the shelf because CDs became cheap to make. And now, CDs are becoming the rare commodity as well. Such is time. But as time changes, the music seems to stay. Coldplay and Dashboard Confessional occupied the majority of what I listened to in college. And I still find myself listening to those albums from time to time. And with a little imaginative encouragement, I'm back in the darkroom, or as this frame of mind would have it, a 2002 Subaru off to a new place and a new adventure. Nice little reflection for midweek. Hey Subaru, let me help you tell a story, because as I have it now, this photographer's off on a new adventure and with a newer #Subaru. 

A Newer Subaru Outback

Architecture Photography

Like I said in the last post, things have been busy behind the desk, but I'm happy I've been able find time to post here in the last week or two. It feels good to write again.

That being said I've never been a photographer who does "one thing" in terms of subject matter. When someone says, "You're a photographer? what do you photograph?" And my answer is usually, "a lot" or "everything" ...and while those are "answers" it's never an answer that people can latch onto. "Everything" doesn't really give them a relatable concept. But it's true! I find myself photographing such a wide range of content. There isn't anything I haven't photographed or won't photograph. I suppose I lead "studio first" but there's nothing I leave off the table.

Recent case in point, a project for River City Studios. They celebrated 40 years of providing quality sound to those needing professional audio. I spent the day along with Artie photographing their studios and space. It was a fun project and allowed different levels of collaboration. Here's two quick images from the production. And if you need quality audio, don't hesitate to reach out to them. River City Studios is an excellent team to work with. More to follow...

Studio A Control Room at River City Studios

Studio B Control Room at River City Studios

16/17

It's fast approaching the lull between Christmas and New Years where, unless your an EPL fan, it's a gap of time that seems largely different from the rest of year. It doesn't quite fit with the normal hum drum beat of everything before it. If you're an EPL fan, the frantic pace of the games over the next week are in the very least, something to talk about. Or at worst, something to be desired. That being said, I hope the Arsenal can do what Stella did circa 1998, and get their groove back. COYG.

But as thoughts drift, as they tend to do this time year, I am still overwhelmed with the amount of change this last year has brought. And yes, it's a mellow dramatic sort of reflectance because a) everyone says it's a need at this time of the year, as opposed to say, February, which when you think about it, why not February? I mean, it's got it's own things going on. And b) in the eyes of many, most change is small, or even insignificant. But in the eyes of the few, particularly my own, it's impossible to miss, and even still, impossible not think about. Life in all of it's majesty. Cue sunset, or as us in The Mitt know, cue sunset in 4 months or so.

As this blog progresses with thoughts and images I did want to pause for a moment and say to you reader, whoever you are, where ever you are, I hope your day is merry and bright. I hope that you are well, with family and/or friends, you eat well, and you drink well. I hope you're able to smile and be nice to each other. And if not today, maybe tomorrow, because while it's not a holiday, it's another opportunity. And I raise my glass to you : )

Next week I hope to post my top 5 albums of '16. Because it seems 10 is too much these days. Maybe, we'll see...

More to follow... cheers!

Viva SPE

Now safely at #spenational in Las Vegas my eyes have turned away from the hill and back on the world of photography. While I have one foot in the commercial world I also have another in the world of photographic education. Working with new ideas and conceptual thoughts helps stoke the creative fires that be. SPE is a great forum for that. I'm looking forward to meeting up with some more old colleagues and hopefully making a few new ones. There's already been more than one surprise or two.

It's also hard to believe it's 80 degrees here in Vegas when a mere 48hrs ago I was looking at this...

The Canyons

Life never ceases to amaze. More to follow...