Photo Session with Karissa

I met Karissa a few weeks ago and over this past weekend got to meet up with her to take some photos to add to our portfolios. I think she did great and is a natural in front of the camera. Weather was challenging due to high cold winds, but we had a nice overcast sky.

Photo was taken with Canon 50mm f/1.4 with bare Canon 580EXII. I ended up dropping the 580 on the concrete due to cheap light stand adapter connection. Luckily it survived but it has a lot more character now, haha. Also special thanks to my buddy Ken for letting Karissa know I was a photographer, without him this shoot might not have happened.

Los Angeles, California

Last weekend was pretty sweet, I got to go to Los Angeles for the first time. My buddy Alex wanted to check out the opening event of Formula D in Long Beach being the drift enthusiast/driver that he is. I'm always up to check out cool cars, cute girls and new places so I was all for it. Tickets were purchased early in advance so we got a good deal for the plane, hotel, and rental car.

We arrived in LA at the butt crack of dawn, still tired from not much sleep. There's no rest for the wicked so we sped along to the Westin Hotel in our rented Nissan Versa! I was thinking it was going to be a pretty shitty car but surprisingly that car was pretty cool, nice pep and maneuverability which came in handy for the way people drive there. Good times usually start with some beers so we headed to a bar as fast as we could and then headed to Formula D to check things out.

To our surprise the first day of the event kind of sucked, not many people and the models were out shopping or looking hot somewhere else. They also had a giant fence which made all my photos of the cars drifting look horrible. But I was mainly there to have fun so I wasn't going to let that bother me and decided it was time for more beers!...or so I thought. I actually got pretty dehydrated and had a killer headache and was tired so after a nice meal went to sleep! Hell yeah hardcore!!

The next morning we were fully rested and ate at a nice French restaurant where I got fresh squeezed orange juice and crepes, so GOOD! We decided to do some sightseeing so Alex drove us to Venice Beach where we hung out and sipped on smoothies. Then after went to Hollywood to check out all the tourist spots there but it was getting late in the day and needed to head back to Long Beach to catch the second day of Formula D. Los Angeles traffic is pretty notorious but we managed to get back without much headache.

We got there with two hours to spare and this time the place was packed with people. The drifters were also doing tandem runs to determine the winner of the event, the skills they had were amazing. There was just so much going on it would have been nice to have had more time to take photos but I still was able to get a few decent photos to remember everything by. From there it was time for eating and drinking, so we went to a seafood restaurant that had some of the best catfish I've ever had. Bar hopping was next on the agenda where I discovered a beer I've never had called Kilkenny that was really great. We got pretty toasty and called it a night as our efforts to find a cool night club were unrewarded.

The final day in Los Angeles was really nice and laid back. It was my turn to drive so I took us to Huntington Beach where we rented bikes to ride along the trails by the beach. We walked around also checking out volleyball players, surfers, and other people just enjoying the wonderful weather. From there I took us to Beverly Hills to just kill time and check out the area. The place had really nice homes and expensive cars everywhere, it was impressive. But then it was time to go home and head to the airport, our trip had come to an end. I had a great time and I hope to visit California again.

For the trip I packed the Canon 7D with 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS and 28mm f/1.8 and borrowed Alex's 55-250mm f/4.0-5.6 IS. I didn't know this at the time but in the picture with the two girls, the one on the left is Playboy Playmate DJ Alie Layus...