Three Years in the Making

I started this blog back in 2010 as a fun way for me to share my photos. Since then it became a creative outlet and a timeline of my life. It's something I'm quite proud of and I wanted a way to preserve all the work that I had put into it, which gave birth to the idea of creating a book out of it.

The task of actually creating the book was long and tiresome. Looking back on it I wish I would have taken better care in archiving all my photos because finding all of the full resolution files of the photos I used for my posts was very difficult. There were some photos I actually had to recreate because some of the photos I had done were made specifically for the blog and were not originally meant to be printed.

But after 30+ hours of getting all the photos together, editing the layout, and compiling all of the 85 posts it is finally done and here in my hands. It's a rewarding accomplishment for me and I feel a great sigh of relief that it is done. I had worries about how the first print would come out but it definitely meets my expectations.

The book contains 167 pages, updated edits, previously unreleased photos, and an exclusive bonus photo series entitled "The Shadows", which is a collection I did during my time with shooting black and white film earlier this year. The book cover comes from a photo I took in Baguio, Philippines during my visit there two years ago. There are a total of 190 photos in the book, all of which will have an everlasting value to me.

View From the Top

Yesterday I went with my good friend Matt and his dog Vegas to hike our very first 14er. We went to Mt. Bierstadt, which is 14,065 feet in elevation with the trail head start at 11,669 feet. This is said to be one of Colorado's easier 14er hikes, but we still found it challenging with the exception of Vegas who probably would have ran the whole thing if it weren't for us. That's not to say people don't run this mountain because there are folks that surely do as we witnessed as two girls flew by us, and yes their bodies were ridiculously nice.

I've been running a lot lately but my stamina seemed deflated with the thinner air, it was difficult to catch my breath as we trekked on. However finally getting to the top was very rewarding as the view set before our eyes showed how far and high we'd come, it was impressive. Going up the mountain was tough but going down was still brutal as it was a lot of wear on the knees and the steep slope made things slippery.

By the time we got back to the truck we were spent and were ready to eat. My body was beat, my muscles ached, lungs hurt, and I was completely zapped of energy. Vegas of course still wanted to play! Overall I enjoyed it, I like pushing myself physically and the day off work was nice. Hopefully I can do another 14er soon.

The Next Big Thing

Last Friday I got to do a shoot with Kyle, a coworker of mine who's into the extreme sport of freestyle kiteboarding. I've never seen this type of thing in person so it was pretty cool and fun to shoot. He was also wanting to get some photos for a new pre-production product he was able to get access to, I'll let you all guess what it is.

I don't usually shoot any type of action photography so it was pretty challenging because things having to be timed perfectly. The wind wasn't always cooperating and shooting with a camera like the Canon 5D MkII that is better suited for still photography, I had my work cut out for me; do I smell a MkIII upgrade...?

Despite the difficulties I got some cool photos and have a new appreciation for kiteboarding. It was pretty cool to see how high off the ground he could get with just a moderate breeze going. I did not do any type of composite or re-positioning of him within the frame, he was literally going over my head a few times while shooting. This photo was one that I managed to get and really liked. It would be really cool to see this as part of the advertisement, look there's even some white space for the product and company name :)

Ava's Dragon

This is Ava's bearded dragon, he eats bugs. 

I've really been slacking on posting new stuff lately but it's because I've been shooting a lot with film cameras and I was planning on saving the photos I was taking for a photo book I wanted to create. It was going to be a series of street photography photos done in black and white film. I even got a Leica to see what the big deal was. The Leica turned out to be a big disappointment and the use of film eventually lost its appeal. I can't believe I was at one point thinking about going completely analog, that would have been dumb.

So, I'm back to digital and it's awesome, but I don't think I will be completing my photo book project anymore. I guess those photos will have to be hidden and kept up my sleeve for another time. I think one of the reasons I liked film was because of how small the cameras and lenses were. Because of that I decided to get a cheap 50mm and 35mm lens for my digital camera that are both small and light. This photo was taken with the cheap 50mm, which is a lens I used to own two years ago but has found new life now that I use a full frame camera.

They changed how blogger lets you edit posts and it's really bothering me right now. I was used to how things were before, now it's all funky.

Da Vinci's Machines

For the Love of Art

Last weekend I visited the Denver Art Museum, which I'd last visited back in college with my Art History class. Just like my first visit, I felt humbled by the artistry on display. I really admired the Spanish Colonial art and sculptures from the Asian collection.

But my favorite exhibition was the collection of works from photographer Garry Winogrand entitled "Women Are Beautiful". I really love the works of older photographers like Henri Cartier-Bresson and Elliot Erwitt, they would have to be my favorite film photographers of all time. But seeing Winogrand's collection on display in person gave me a great appreciation for his work and inspired me greatly.

I shot a roll and a half of film that day, the first of which can be seen in its entirety HERE. I've been practicing at not taking the same photo more than once, being selective and taking my time with each shot; I think it is helping me improve.

Lighting the Darkness

Took a self portrait with film because I wanted to play around with my flash on my Pentax ME. I'm surprised at how decent it works considering how primitive it is. I also used some expired black and white Arista 400 film for this. I turned out all the lights to see how well it would work and didn't realize how dirty my mirror was, oops.

Got Film?

The weather sucks today, boo. But it's not all bad since today I got a new film camera, the Nikon FE! I ordered it online and I'm surprised of how new it looks considering it's older than I am. I can see now why people loved these Nikon film cameras, the build quality is very impressive, well designed, and it looks awesome. I have it shown next to my Pentax K1000 which is also very nice looking and a camera I enjoy using.

Lately shooting mostly 35mm film I've learned I can still get satisfaction from it but just in a different way. It may not have all the convenience, automation and resolution of digital but it's a tool that lets me create photos which is the fundamental reason I like photography. I only hope film doesn't go away, with news like Kodak going bankrupt it would be a sad thing to miss out on.

Slow Burning Lights

Today I went for my first bike ride in months and it felt great, I'm almost starting to feel like myself again. On my ride I came across this great view of Downtown Denver and came back at night to capture it. The full resolution photo of this is quite amazing, but extremely large as it was made from six photos. The resulting file size after cropping is 58 mega-pixels, the photo you see when clicking on the thumbnail is less than 1 mega-pixel.

Innervision

Lately I've been in kind of a photographic slump and was even entertaining the idea of down grading my equipment or even selling it all. I tend to go through phases where I lack inspiration and motivation but this is the worst its been. I feel exhausted and feel like I've given all I've got to give. Constantly working to meet other's expectations as well as my own has been rough.

Last year I pursued and explored many types of photography, which included club shoots, macro, portraiture, street, promotional, landscape, film, as well as learned the business aspects of it. I gained new found knowledge but I also developed disdain for some of the things I'd done over the past year. I've spread myself out too thin by forcing myself to do something different and better than the last and worrying too much if people would like my work.

I know I'll eventually get my motivation back, especially when I see displays of great talent like the artists who spray painted the above in downtown Denver. I really like the style and the kind of modern take on the Matryoshka doll. I actually got to see phases of it's development as it was started earlier in the week and I even got to see the artists working on it when I visited on one of my lunch breaks.

I know talent like this is the result of continually working hard at getting better and not giving up. I may be burned out by all the various things I've encountered through photography but in contemplating this, I appreciate all the experiences because each has made me the photographer I am today. I feel I've developed a strong base knowledge of photography and I just need to use that to take the next step forward in perhaps reinventing myself; perhaps by no longer worrying about what other people think and just focusing on having fun.

"It's never too late to reinvent the bicycle" -SOAD

Katie's Coffee House, Great Falls, Virginia

I flew into Washington DC to visit my family in Virginia for the Christmas weekend. I really enjoyed seeing everyone and it was nice to have a change of surroundings. On Christmas eve my brother-in-law took me for a ride in his GTR and we drove to Katie's Coffee House where a lot of local car enthusiasts come to hang out.

The coffee was awesome and the early morning weather was a nice relief from the blistering cold of Colorado as of late. I got to see a lot of amazing cars I'd never seen before in person, especially so close; it was great.

Later on the way back home my brother-in-law pulled the car over and to my surprise had me get in the driver's seat. I was nervous to drive such an expensive car but the opportunity was too great. The Nissan GTR is a dream car, it's everything that one would want from a sports car and excites you like you're a kid again. The drive was unlike anything I've driven before, everything was so refined and precise; it truly is a remarkable machine.

Photo Session with Anna

Yesterday I had a shoot with Anna using my new 135mm. We'd originally planned this shoot a week ago but due to weather issues it was postponed, but I'm glad because otherwise I wouldn't have been able to use this great lens. We were able to get some awesome lighting before the sun went down providing a nice golden glow. I have to commend Anna for putting up with the cold, she was very patient and had a great attitude which made the shoot all the better.

You can see more from our shoot by clicking here.

The Right Tool for the Job

There are a lot of people under the impression that in order to take compelling photos you have to have the most expensive gear, I can attest that this is not always true. Having a dslr is great because of the lens options, larger sensor, and manual controls; but aren't necessary all the time because depending on the lighting, the subject, and your required final resolution, you can capture roughly the same image with a point and shoot as you would with a professional dslr.

The photo here I think is a great example of this which was taken with my old Fujifilm J10 on a site visit for work. I think that if I were to have used my dslr the photo would have been very similar. Granted I did do some post work on the photo but I would have done that with the dslr file as well.

Being that I was there for work having the big dslr wouldn't have been very practical. I dropped my J10 on the concrete during this visit and I've gotten mud on it at other sites, not things I'd like to do with my expensive dslr so the J10 was the better camera to have. Sometimes there are sacrifices you have to make for what's practical, but as long as you know how to use what you have you can still capture photos you'll enjoy.

Photo Session with Monica

I had the great pleasure of doing a photo shoot with Monica today and I made sure I was early so I wouldn't upset her like the girl last week, haha! Monica is a sweetheart and I had a great time working with her. The shoot didn't last as long as I would have liked due to weather but I managed to get some good ones before rain and wind came in.

I've had a lot of extra time lately and so I've been learning a lot of new lighting and processing techniques so it was exciting to practice them with this shoot. You can check out a few more of the photos from our shoot by clicking here.

Seeing Red

I've had sort of a crummy few days as far as photography goes. This past Friday I had a model shoot planned with a girl I've never worked with before, so I was pretty excited. Usually the models I've worked with are never on time and I'm usually early. But the one time I'm running late, the girl shows up to the location early! I was in rush hour traffic heading toward downtown and I made my best effort to get there as soon as I could while giving her updates along my way.

I finally get there 15 minutes late and call her and tell her where I am. I wait 10 minutes but she never shows and so I call her again only to hear that she decided to leave. She gives me an ear full about how unhappy she was by the whole thing and I feel bad but I didn't see the need for her to get so upset. She lives downtown also so its not like she went out of her way to get there. But oh well, what's done is done.

Then my new ball-head on my tripod broke. I think I now know why it was substantially cheaper than the brand name ones. Just a note out to anyone looking to buy a ball-head, avoid getting a Smith-Victor; they are junk. The thing is supposed to be rated for 40 lbs but that doesn't matter at all once you break off the knob that locks it in place. Guess I'll be shopping for a new one soon...or someday when I can afford something good.

Then finally the photo you see here was probably on the top 5 list of the hardest things I've ever photographed. It consisted of two days of trial and error, a lot of preparation, patience, and frustration. I planned to post this photo days earlier but failed miserably on my first attempt. But I finally got the shot I wanted and finally something worked out well. Macro photography is something I've been thinking about doing for some time now and I'm interested to see if I'll continue with it.

Sorry this post was so negative but I felt the need to vent and aside from photography my week has been really awesome.

Your Soul is Mine

Work has been pretty slow lately. My days at work consist of staring at an email inbox containing nothing related to work and studying texts books I drooled on in college. Nothing exciting. Time slows down. Life passes by.

I had to get out of the office so I decided to leave early today; many already had a head start on me. I like to mix it up and lately I've been trying my hand at street photography, so that became my afternoon activity once I escaped the life sucking abyss of my cubicle.

I have to admit, street photography is hard. I think I suck at it, there are many others who do a way better job. I've tried this a few times before and this is the first time I really made an effort at shooting people's faces. Usually it's the back of their head or someone going by on a bicycle.

But I busted out the ninja skills and actually really got into it and started to have fun. It became my mission to track down interesting looking subjects and I got kind of a rush from doing something completely outside my comfort zone. It's kind of like the feeling you get from approaching a pretty girl, you're nervous and you think of all the ways things can go wrong.

I did however have my 85mm lens, which allowed me to keep a little more distance away from the subjects to make things a little easier, less intrusive and hopefully keep me unnoticed. The photos can lose value if the person becomes aware of what you're doing. The thing I like about street photography is that you are capturing moments in people's life when they aren't expecting their photo to be taken and you kind of get an insight into their world, every photo tells a story.

Everyone has things going on in their own life and we rarely care about what's going on in a stranger's life. We focus in on ourselves, our family and friends; people of which who typically share common interests and social class. We complain about things a stranger would find a luxury. We laugh at things a stranger would find sad. We throw away things a stranger would find useful. We neglect opportunities a stranger would never get. We get frustrated with our jobs a stranger would love to have.

But think about this: We are all strangers to someone.

The High Road

I think it goes without saying, drinking and driving do not mix and I encourage everyone to always drink responsibly. I've made some bad decisions before and luckily nothing bad came of it, but it only takes one mistake to ruin your life.

Knowing your limit, staying in control and making sure you have a safe way home is something everyone should remember and do. Also being able to say no when you don't want to drink is important too. Enjoy life, but don't forget how fragile it is.

This photo was taken with my Sigma 50mm that I recently got back from being re-calibrated. Despite the new camera body being able to adjust the focusing, it was still causing problems before. It seems to be working better now and I'm looking forward to shooting with it more.

The Alchemist

I recently read a book called The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho that I thought was really great and I would recommend it to anyone. I won't spoil the book but it's about going after your dreams and living your life to its full potential.

It got me thinking about my own life and the things that I would like to do. While I haven't fully figured out all that I want to accomplish, I know one thing I'd like to do is travel and see the world as much as I can. Hopefully by continuing to expand my horizons I can one day discover my own personal legend. But for sure I'll be taking photos the whole way.

Cheyenne Mountain Zoo

Yesterday I went to the zoo with my family and shot some animals. Then we went to eat dim sum at the Empress on Federal. The food was good but the smell of the place reminded me of the zoo. If you go, order take out.

Botanic Gardens Denver

Today is my birthday, yaay! I have family visiting and yesterday we spent the day at the Botanic Gardens, here's a few photos; enjoy. I'm off to go buy me some new sunglasses as a gift to myself. My titanium Italian made Ray Ban frames after 5 years broke on me this morning, of all the days for it to brake!

Message from the Pulp

When I was ten years old I saw the movie Pulp Fiction in the movie theater. Not the best movie for a ten year old to see and at the time not a movie I liked. I'm walking through Target today passing some DVDs and it just stands out to me for some odd reason and I buy it.

I just finished watching it and it is a totally different movie from the way I remember it. I like it a whole lot more than I did at ten years old. I now find it humorous, original, and thought provoking. In the last chapter of the movie Tarantino revisits a scene with Jules and Vincent not shown earlier in the movie. By some miracle they're untouched after being shot at multiples times while caught off guard. Jules (Samuel L. Jackson's character) describes it as "divine intervention" and starts viewing the world differently.

Earlier today I think I may have had some divine intervention take place. I went on a long bike ride and ventured further than I've ever gone down a particular path that runs along highway 470. After riding for about three hours I start to feel my thighs tightening up, so I start to ride slower but when I reach parts of the trail that go uphill the feeling comes back. I soon get to the point where I have to stop and that's when the real pain began.

Once I stood and had my legs straight both my quadriceps immediately tightened in an excruciating pain. It felt like my muscles were being crushed and they were hard as rock to the touch. I couldn't even bend my legs so I just stood there waiting for it to pass. As I stood there I turned to the highway and noticed a black car that stood out to me as it passed by, no big deal.

The pain finally goes away and I can bend my legs again so I start to ride, much slower and careful this time. Soon I can hear sirens up ahead but I don't know why. I get closer and I see a fire truck, two police and an ambulance. I expect a car accident but I see no car...until I get closer. The same black car I saw earlier had driven off the highway and crossed the trail and landed into some bushes.

After hearing about Samuel L. Jackson speak of divine intervention it had me thinking. Had I not had to stop riding earlier, I wonder if I would have been closer to the part of the path the car ran into? It's unlikely but it just has me thinking. The car by the way looked just like my very first car, which was a black 1994 Honda Civic EX coupe. What year did the movie Pulp Fiction come out?

Another Shoot with Alyssa

Put the new camera to use and did another shoot with Alyssa. She was once again great to work with. Last time we shot I suggested Alyssa model with a motor cycle and a car we found in an alley hoping the owners didn't come back. This time she suggested we do a little trespassing and hop a fence, haha. I like that she's adventurous, open minded and willing to put the extra effort for an interesting photo.

It's been months since I've worked with her and I can tell I've improved as a photographer since we last met. I just felt a lot more confident and way more photos turned out the way I wanted.

You can see the rest of the photos from our shoot here.

...And Now It's On!!!

My 5D Classic breaking on me got me really discouraged and I felt it was time to finally step it up and upgrade to my dream camera, the Canon 5D MkII. This camera is amazing and so far I've had a lot of fun with it. Even the Sigma 50mm f/1.4 that was mis-focusing I was able to micro-adjust on this camera and get working properly. I absolutely love the combination of this body working with this lens, the results are amazing and I hope to post samples soon.

Getting this camera is a big deal for me and I thought it would be cool to do something special and artistic to announce its arrival. Completing this photo took many hours spent over three days to finish. I had this vision of what I wanted to create but it was a challenge figuring out how to pull it off. Looking back there probably are some easier ways I could have done it.

My 5D Classic was able to be fixed by Canon and it was used to create this photo which will sadly be the last time it is used. Like the 35mm which was sold recently, this will be sold also to make up expenses of the new camera. Another unfortunate side note is that my Gorilla Pod was broken during the making of this photo.

Lights Out...

My day starts out with excitement over getting a new Sigma 50mm f/1.4 lens. I'd ordered it a week ago and was greatly anticipating it's arrival. When I get it everything seems great. I admire the new finish and size of the front element. It appears to focus correctly only to disappoint me later on as I find out it front focuses. Damn Sigma, you got me again!!!

But the nightmare doesn't end there as my camera starts to no longer meter correctly. Everything is underexposed and I'm like wtf?! I take another picture when suddenly the image through the viewfinder shakes and goes black. I look down the lens and I see my reflection (to those who don't know, that's not supposed to happen). I take off the lens and out falls the mirror. Trying to put it back is no use as it just falls out again, it doesn't even look like it was firmly set in the first place. Funny how I'd been warned of this happening to this particular camera only a week ago. Hopefully I can get this fixed, but in the mean time it's game over for me...

Pikes Peak Drift Event

1.) You wait in line.

2.) You drive to me...

3.) I take your picture!