Sunday evening I assisted Kelly Hawkins in a photo shoot. Here is a video of her and I getting everything set up. The time on it has been increased by 310%.
Enjoy the show.

Disappearer live at The Orange Peel

No flashes were allowed which is what I prefer to use when shooting bands. So this is not that great in my opinion.
enjoy.

Quaker Haven Road.

Here is another video for you.

1957 Imperial (reprise)

So I was showing dad some nerdy camera stuff and how much the aperture settings can change the final image. He was telling me that he could not remember what this part was for or where it even went on the car. I am thinking this might be a fuel line filter but I do not know anything about cars.

Kansas Road

1957 Chrystler Imperial

My dad has been rebuilding this car for a little over ten years now. It was in a pasture in north central Kansas for a few decades before he bought it to rebuild. Needless to say, it has been quite the project. Paint is being done now and this car sure is going to be pretty once it is finished. A lot of the body panels are off still so photographing the car is hard to do at this point simply because it is not a car, it is a lot of car parts...
So I found some of the cars sexy curves and wanted to show them to you. I hope you enjoy them.

Kansas Sunset

My brothers, Travis and Chris and I took a little road trip to 'the end of the road' of all places while I was home for Thanksgiving Break. We were there at sunset and I ran off into a wheat field to get some photos while they threw rocks into the river.
The end of the road is a real place. The road just stops at the river. If you did not know it was there you would take your car for a little swim.
Here is the sunset.
enjoy.

I am flying right now using cosmic wifi or something.

Light Painting.

I tried some light painting. I tried to keep it simple and organic looking. I don't know. Some old guy came up and started talking about how he tried to keep thing the old way by shooting double exposures on film instead of using photoshop. I thought to my self, 'if you only know half of the assignments I printed in the darkroom'. It was funny, he thought I was some digital kid who didn't know anything about traditional photography.
It was funny. I guess you had to be there...

Here is another sad attempt at making an album cover for a mixtape.

When I was in Pennsylvania last month I took a series of photos with my point and shoot so I could make a panoramic out of them. Here is that panoramic.

Mom and Dad

My mom and dad have been here all week visiting from Kansas. They are staying at some RV park on Lake Norman. My boss, Brian Gomsak, gave me an assignment to take their portraits while they are here. Needless to say with the tropical weather system that moved through here this week I was thinking I would have to shoot these indoors. However on my way to the shoot today the weather cleared out and made for some very nice light!
These were shot in the shade cast by their RV using my Alien Bee B800. Many of you know that shooting people is not my cup of tea and that I struggle with it. However today I have to say that everything fell into place. Of course I love the photos because they are of my parents, but I actually think they are good! Most of you also know that I am never satisfied with my own work, so this is a great accomplishment for me.
Mom and Dad were talking about the last time they had their photo taken and trying to figure out when it was. They decided it was one I took of them way back when I was in high school for their wedding anniversary. I remember shooting that in the basement of their house with my Canon AE1 and a regular lamp and aluminum foil as a reflector.

Anyhow, here they are. I hope you enjoy them. I like the Black and White one the best.

I love making mixtapes. I always try so hard to make a "real" album cover.

The story of the Weddington Estate.

This home has been deemed as being "unsafe" by the powers that be.



Go ahead and come on inside and take a look around.



We were doing a little remodeling a while back and we never got around to finishing, watch your step!



Perhaps we should start a fire to warm up the place.



If I had known you were stopping by I would have cleaned up, sorry about the mess.



Here is where I have been sleeping.



Part of the remodel we were doing was the addition of a wing on the west end of the estate.



We never got around to putting the handrail back onto the stairs.



Please be extra careful as you go up the stairs!



As you might have guessed, the banister has been removed as well.



So please do not fall down, it is a long drop!



The lawn needs to be mowed as well. Watch your step out there on your way out!



Thanks for stopping by, you are welcome to come back at anytime!


Urban Exploring has always been something that interests me.
There are so many empty buildings that have stories to tell.

Earlier this week I was in PA in the middle of nowhere. I decided to take advantage of this and shoot some stars. This image is a 35 minute exposure taken with my DSLR at 10:30 at night.

Panoramic Assignment

Here is a panoramic composite of over 26 images all stitched together.

Promo 4

I wanted to shoot this piece of pottery for my fourth promo. Pottery by its self looked kind of odd so I put some Sushi from the grocery on it. The image is not for the food, its for the pottery.

Enjoy!

Self Promo 3

I had a request from Justin Mower to see the final shot from my previous post.

Self Promo 3 Lighting Set-Up

Here is the lighting set up for my next self-promo shot. This is in black and white, but the final image will be in color.

Rick Smith Assignment

Today Rick Smith visited us at school and gave us an assignment at 10:45 that was due at 3:00pm.
The challenge here was not the time but the specifics and lack thereof. We had to incorporate three elements, paper, glass, and metal and have an image that projects the strength, longevity, confidence, security of a company that is celebrating its 125th year of business. The image should be dynamic, memorable, thought provoking, original, and creative.
Here is what I came up with.

Panoramic revisit

For one of our assignments right now we are taking a series of photos that will be stitched together to for a panoramic image. I started toying with this idea back in 2004 when I lived in Kansas. With all of the wide open space out there options were limitless. I thought I would share an old panoramic. This image was made of six vertical images. The camera I was using at the time was a Nikon 990.

Us and Them

Us, and them
And after all we're only ordinary men.
Me, and you.
God only knows it's not what we would choose to do.
Forward he cried from the rear
and the front rank died.
And the general sat and the lines on the map
moved from side to side.
Black and blue
And who knows which is which and who is who.
Up and down.
But in the end it's only round and round.
Haven't you heard it's a battle of words
The poster bearer cried.
Listen son, said the man with the gun
There's room for you inside.
Down and out
It can't be helped but there's a lot of it about.
With, without.
And who'll deny it's what the fighting's all about?
Out of the way, it's a busy day
I've got things on my mind.
For the want of the price of tea and a slice
The old man died.

Promo 1

Here are the lamp and radio promo shots.

Retro Photo

These two images are not new and have probably been seen before. Anyhow it was fun day at the Air Museum over the summer in Small Format. These images are both exposed with a radio flash that has a pink gel on it stuffed into the exhaust of the plane flashing out.

Anyhow I hope you enjoy them.

Lighting Setups

Here are the two lighting setups for my self promotion images for Photographic Illustration. The subjects are old items this time around. The first image is of a green lamp that someone gave my parents as a wedding gift. I don't know the story behind who gave it to them or even how I ended up with it. I know that I have always loved this lamp so I probably just took it from them. The second item is a short wave radio that my father gave me. I really don't know how to tune in any stations on it but I wish that I did. He gave it to me a few years ago and I was able to tune in one station once back in Kansas. It was some insane religious station or something... they were speaking in tongues, which is complete nonsense.

enjoy

Bad Trip!

This is what I came up with for John Rash today. We had to use three elements, the top hat, pears, the ganster in the suit, then paste them on the nice background. Anyhow it was fun, and it was a test. Who said learning isn't fun?

farming fields

On my daily drive I see many fields of crops. The fields in North Carolina are nothing like the vast openness of my home state, Kansas. Anyhow, today I stopped and snapped a few images of one of these fields.

Image Destruction?

After image destruction.

Before image destruction.

We had to take an "Edgy" portrait for Photographic Illustration and then destroy it in photoshop. Dan Rough of Randolph County, NC came and gave a demonstration in class on Monday. He went through some of his wonderful images with us and explained what they were used for. He then went into photoshop and gave a demo on things he uses and helped us "play" with our edgy photo.

Oak Island, NC

This is looking south into the Atlantic off of Oak Island, NC.


The exposure is around four minutes.

Breakfast, n0m n0mzz

This is my first commercial assignment. We were to set the mood for breakfast and illustrate a breakfast. After creating several images I went with this image.

Simplicity.

Requirements...

Written description for each photo that tells a story about the image or shoot.
EXIF data.
What lighting used to make the shot.
A photo of the set built to complete the shoot for the "concentration" shots.
At least 1 Concentration based post.
At least 1 free choice post.