It never fails ..........

There was a travel day in the budget so I left a little early, thought I'd cruz the Blue Ridge Parkway do some hiking etc. It'd be interesting to look through the archives on this blog to see exactly how many times I've been up here shooting, 7 maybe 8 ?
It never fails the weather is always crappy rain,snow,fog. This time was no exception, it was chilly,foggy and rainy. I had my snowboard coat in the car left over from last winter ? I rolled the windows down and cruised the Parkway jamming to the Stones and the Cure. Kinda of a Zen moment.
I decided to hike to Crabtree Falls ( a moderate 1.5 mile rocky all downhill hike ). Had my Sinar ND filters with me, but not the right time of day for a great waterfall shot. I hadn't seen anyone for @ 2 1/2 hours and started thinking about Bears and gave myself the heebie jeebies, and made record time heading back up the trail.

Random Spruce Pines

Just some random shots around the town of Spruce Pines.

Time Magazine Behind the scenes

About 4 months ago I got a call from TIME to do a shoot (any photographers dream assignment) but I was already double booked that day. I was totally bummed ....... My wife was very supportive and said they'd call back, and they did.

Taking the photo's was the easy part, it was a logistics nightmare. 12 people 2 set-up's each over 2 days in and around Roxboro NC. A big shout out and thank you to photographer Mark Petko for assisting me on the shoot.

I'll probably be going to hell for goofing around in the church, but Oh well life goes on.

Tech info.- Kept it simple, there were so many shots and not a lot of TIME (no pun intended). A combination of Profoto and AB's

Time Magazine

Some shots that didn't make it into the "The Ripple Effect". The story got bumped due to the passing of Kennedy.

In print TIME Magazine

Main Street in Roxboro NC

New Project "American Pawn" ?

A couple weeks ago I had a 2 day editorial shoot for a BIG Magazine, my feature got bumped due to Kennedy's passing away and the story is on hold ( what a bummer ). The story had a lot of substance about what is going on in America today, and so it got me thinking ........... I pass this Pawn shop on Wilmington street called "American Pawn" I thought it'd be interesting to photograph real people who are buying and selling stuff. I think it says a lot about the economy and what people are going through theses days. I did some test shots, my problem is the direct screaming sunshine coming straight onto the subjects. I'm trying to do this in my spare time and don't have time to fly in a 20x20. I'm not sure what I'm going to do ????? I think I'm more in love with the concept and title "American Pawn" than the execution so far.

Not a desk job

Some editorial work Shhhhh........ (can't say who,what,why or where).
How can people spend all day behind a desk ? I've been hanging with some other photog's lately and we've come to the conclusion, we got into photography because we love to take pictures. The problem is we spend more and more time in front of a computer editing/retouching and uploading images. I'm picky about my files, so when a client request only RAW files I cringe. My formula these days is one day of shooting = one day of editing. I'd really like to get some time back so I can concentrate on shooting.