thoughts on photography, film, outdoors, astronomy, fun, etc….
I was waiting for my wife Heather to get home from Dallas when I decided to run up to Griffith Observatory to take a few shots. As usual, the view was great, but not so usual, the view was very clear. Isn’t the universe awesome? Jupiter has been good to me this year. Canon 7D 10-22mm 30″ f20 ISO 800.
I took this photo of Jupiter back in August:
An article at Boston.com features color photographs taken by a Russian Tsar’s photographer, Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii. This amazing photo was taken 20 years before conventional color film was invented. Prokudin-Gorskii used the three-color process developed by James Clerk Maxwell. Some astrophotographers still use this process today. I hope I’m not the only one that thinks these photos are very cool. Aside from being great compositions, they prove that indeed “the old days” were not actually in black and white as previously reported.
A good friend sent me a link to this guy: Gary Vaynerchuk. I had seen him do some wine tasting videos I ran into after researching the Caduceus brand being produced by Merkin Vinyards by an unamed rock star. I had never seen him speak in a motivational setting, but after watching just a few minutes, I knew I had a lot to learn from this guy. Take just afew minutes to watch this video and you’ll be better of for doing so.
Its all about video today:
1. I assembled a timelapse of my drive to Rollercon 2010 in Las Vegas this year and you should watch it. Every year, my wife’s band the Pin Ups, plays a show at the Double Down in Sin City, known for its signature drink, Ass Juice. The show kicks off right as 1000-15000 roller derby girls from all over the country “marry” each other in the parking lot of the Double Down in the Derby Wedding as a sign of commitment to each other (derby wives are hardcore connections between two derby gals). I’ll post pics from the show later, in the mean time you can see images from 2009 in this post.
2. A video for Jamie & David.
Have you ever met a couple with a smiling, quiet confidence, as if they know some secret you don’t? Jamie & David have that mysterious and cool connection. We spent an afternoon with them taking photos and exploring Apollo Park.
We give a free engagement session with every wedding that we book. It allows us a chance to break the ice and get to the know the bride and groom. The better we know them, the better they know us and the more comfortable they feel. In the end, the photos show it. We brought a cooler with some food and drinks and had everything waiting set up on a table to loosen the mood from photo-shoot to picnic and we ended up having a great day. Rare birds buzzed around while we hung out in a park on a beautiful day making art, how could that go better?
[Skip the next two paragraphs if you don't like techno-jargon about photo-geekness, I won't be offended.]
We shot this over about two hours in natural light with a diffuser until fill flash was necessary, then when the light was right, we used two flashes with umbrellas as key light and fill light balanced with the night sky and the afterglow of the setting Sun for a backdrop. With the wind around here, my gear would have escaped like Mary Poppins if it weren’t for Jonathan Redman and Sigifredo Castenada who were nice enough to come along and man the light stands. Many thanks.
I had a light stand blow over at a wedding with 20 pounds of weight on it ( I need more sandbags).
Images taken with a Canon EOS 7D + 50mm 1.4 or 10-22mm (f3.5-4.5). We used one large 40-something inch Westcott shoot-through umbrella on a Matthews reversable light stand + Jonathan for the key light and some off -brand cheapo light stand + Sigi for the rim light from amazon. The Matthews stand is awesome, when I make the jump to C-stands, I’ll have to buy Matthews. I’ve also been using the California Sunbounce Sun-Sniper strap, which I have to mention because it makes wearing a camera feel great.
There were a few things that I wanted to try that we didn’t get a chance to because time got away from me. It’s easy to get caught up in the moment when you’re having fun and things are going well. I was in the zone. In the end, I feel like we got some great captures and every time I do this, I realize more and more that this is definitely what I need to be doing right now. Love is the most important thing in the world and I am happy to be out there photographing it. It beats birds and mountains hands down. I feel lucky to have people out there that choose us for their photos and as long as they keep coming, we’ll keep shooting.
Jamie & David are getting married April 2nd, 2011. Big thanks go out to them for believing in us.
