Working with what you have!

 On a recent job, I meet some new friends. Here are two of them, Donna and Skylar. Donna inquired about getting some head shots done for her portfolio but our schedules just didn't work out. She lives in L.A. and I am in Florida. It would be July before we saw each other again. We had a few minutes free so she met me in a hallway that I had found a couple of days before while shooting a runway event in that building. This hall wasn't anything spectacular, but what it did have is a giant window to let some nice soft light in. To make a long story short (because I'm a photographer and not a writer), I placed her in against a plain wall,  metered for the available light, and took this portrait with basically, no equipment other than a camera. No fancy light setups, no backgrounds, just the beautiful light that the Good Lord gives us every day.

Earlier that day, I met Skylar. After we had talked a bit, she told me that she is interested in becoming a model. Well this one was a no brainer, I better shoot this girl before she becomes famous. She is gorgeous, but she had never modeled before and was understandably a little nervous. I had her come on down to the "Hall of Beauty" and took a few quick shots with her. She did great and I look forward to working with her soon. You don't need to have a bunch of equipment to take good photographs, just like owning a bunch of pots and pans doesn't make you a good cook. Speaking of that, it's Christmas Eve, I just heard my wife stirring around in the kitchen. I can't wait until the smells of her delicious cooking fill our home. I hope everyone has a Merry Christmas.

You know it when you see it!

I recently had the good fortune to photograph an event for Ameriprise Financial. The party was top notch with music, delicious food, and live entertainment. Most of my evening was spent photographing clients in front of a large beautifully decorated Christmas tree.That's what I was there for, to provide the guest with a Christmas portrait. As the evening progressed, a few couples made their way to the dance floor, and that's when it happened. I captured this! I knew it was good before I ever looked at it. This is why I enjoy photography. This image tells a story, a story of a couple very much in love, young at heart and enjoying every moment of life.  At least that's the story this image tells me.  As a photographer, you don't always get to shoot the "story" images, but when one pops up, you gotta be ready to capture it!

Time Goes by so Fast

I recently had the pleasure of photographing a young lady that I have known for a long time. This is Mallory. I was her basketball coach when she was a little girl. My how she has grown. It doesn't seem like that long ago. Time flies by so fast. Now she is graduating from the University of Florida. Wow! Which brings me to my point. An old friend of mine, Mr. R.D. once told me, "son, you only go around once, you better give her hell while you are here". He didn't mean go wild and live like there is no tomorrow, but I think he meant that you should do things you want to do, have fun, don't waste time and effort on things that don't matter. Tell the ones you love the way you feel.....OFTEN. Enjoy your life, think of each day as a gift, and maybe go a little wild once and awhile. At least that's what he said meant to me. Mr. R. D. has since passed on and I miss seeing him when I visit my family in North Carolina.  I will never forget him and the little piece of advice that he gave me that day.

Making my First Impression!

As I pen this blog entry, I am submitting my first photos to Swimsuit Illustrated Magazine. Devin and I had one day last week that we could shoot. It rained the whole week. To make a long story short, we had a couple hour break in the weather and we made the best of it. All of the shots have stormy looking clouds in the background. Not your norm for swimsuit magazines I imagine, but that's what we had to work with. Devin was an excellent model, and my wife Melinda really helped with all the equipment and worked hard at trying to keep it dry. This shot was not submitted to the magazine, it's one of those fun shots. If you want to see the whole shoot, check out Swimsuit Illustrated this summer, I hope you see my work in there a lot!

I Know Now That I am Truly a Wimp.

My wife and I went to the Rocketman Triathlon this morning so I could get some practice in on action shots. I was amazed at the amount of athletes there. All shapes and sizes, from all over the world. We were walking along the seawall and I saw a young woman missing her leg. She had a Wounded Warrior wetsuit on. I wanted to photograph her badly, but I didn't. I don't know why, it would have been the shot of the morning. Maybe I didn't want to bother her. Maybe I was afraid. I was completely in awe of this young woman. I imagine she lost her leg in combat.....for me,and my family, and for you and yours. Her leg was gone, all the way up to her hip. She gave that up for us. So here she is, getting ready to jump into the Indian River and swim, get out of the water, jump on a bicycle ride, and then run. I make excuses to get out of walking to the end of the road everyday. So anyhow I was a chicken and didn't photograph her, or even thank her for her service. I feel so bad about that.

An hour or so later, I saw this guy come up out of the water. No arms, swimming in a race with no arms. I quickly scurried over to where I could catch him on the bike part of the race and snapped this. I came away from the event with two new heros, and now I know I am truly a wimp.

Let's Go Flash Somebody!

Or this entry could be called, "Know What Your Flash Can Do!" How well do you know your equipment? If you tell somebody that's writing you a check at the end of the day what you can do, you better be able to do it. How powerful is your flash? How much do you lose with different modifiers? Well today I found out exactly what I can do with my Alien Bees AB800. I set up my flash in a dark room, I marked off five feet and stood there with my light meter. I can usually get my flash to within five feet of my subject. If not I just need to remember the Inverse Square Law. (more on that some other day) At full power my AB800 puts out f.32 at five feet with no modifier on it. With a shoot through umbrella, f.16 and with my Paul C. Buff beauty dish, f.22 with or without the sock diffuser on it. Well f.22 is my magic number. In the above shot, I set my exposure to f.18 with a shutter speed of 1/200 of a second to expose the sky the way I wanted it to look. Then I set my flash to get proper exposure on the model. That's asking a lot from a flash. It takes a lot of power for the model not to be a dark blob. Just look at that sun...it's BRIGHT! A speedlight won't do it. I know that I can get f.22 out of my flash with the dish on it as long as it's within 5 feet of the model so f.18 was no problem.

A Diversified Portfolio

My outlook on photography is a lot like investing. You have to have a diversified portfolio. I recently became a photographer for a swimsuit magazine, and as much as I would like to think that I am gonna be jet setting all over the world taking pics of the planet's hottest women on the most beautiful beaches. It's just not gonna happen that way. The magazine is published quarterly, I am gonna have 6 pics in each issue if I am lucky........man they are gonna have to pay me some serious bucks per image for me to live off that. So here is where the diversification comes into play. My main gig with photography is stock. I take images that companies buy through my agency to use for advertising. That's what this image of Heather is for. I also do senior pics, family portraits, and I will do a wedding here and there throughout the year. I am currently working on a couple of articles for a garden magazine. It takes a lot of little income streams to make a living with a camera, at least it does where I live with the economy like it is.  So you see, my life as a photographer is not that glamorous, heck it's not really glamorous at all, but I love what I do and I feel complete when I have a camera in my hand. On my next post, we are gonna get real technical, and boring, but I think new photographers will benefit from it. So, stay tuned.

New Gig!

This is Krista, a model and friend. No you can not have her number.

Life throws you some funny curves sometimes. Last week I joined the Swimsuit Illustrated Magazine team as a photographer. I will be covering the state of Florida, trying to help up and coming models get some exposure. I will also be featuring swimsuits from Florida based designers. This works out great for me in more ways than one. Of course it's not gonna be like a day in the salt mine, photographing some of the most beautiful young women in Florida, but I can really use the exposure too. Swimsuit Magazine is a global publication that's published quarterly. My work is gonna be seen by hundreds of thousands of people instead of maybe a few hundred or so by just working local stuff here in Brevard County. I've been published before, but never anything like this. So I'm on my way to get some more sunscreen and maybe a new pair of flip flops on my way to the office, uh, I mean beach. Oh yeah, I really am gonna try real hard to blog more regularly. I promise.