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New Year, New Additions

It has been awhile since I’ve added images to my Fine Art Gallery. The image above is a brand new image that I created just moments ago, while the other four images are ones I created in 2013. The following two images were created recently while staying at Occoneechee State Park in Virginia. The first was at sunrise on Christmas Eve, while the other was taken the day before during a rainy sunset.

This next image was taken during a commercial shoot for a local magazine here in Charleston. It’s a group of Citadel cadets standing in front of a construction wall off of King Street that people have been writing their dreams on. I happened to get a girl walking by in this shot:

And finally, this is an image I’ve posted here before. It’s Sullivan’s Island at sunset on a glorious summer day:

Movember Promo Code

Just a quick update on my Movember campaign. I’ve teamed up with Dollar Shave Club to try and raise some funds for men’s health. If you sign up for their razor subscription this month, please use this promo code:

MOVEMBER094

When you use my pro-MO code MOVEMBER094 they’ll donate $10 to my Movember page to help fight prostate and testicular cancer. You get great razors for a few bucks a month, we beat cancer. Everyone wins.

Here’s my week 2 progress photo:

Thanks for reading!

Ashley & Set

Gotta Love a Low Country wedding in the fall. On a beautiful day back in September, Ashley and the ladies in her wedding party polished up their boots…

It was a perfect day out at The Gatherings of Dorchester to get married. It can be a gamble having a wedding outside in the south, but this day was absolutely perfect.

Ahh, to be so young and in love. So much energy & passion. I hope one day, when they’re old and gray, they can look back at these photos and smile like it was yesterday. Congratulations Ashley & Set!

Happy Movember 2013

It’s that time of year again folks. The air’s a little crisper, the trees are full of color, and I’ve shaved my mustache in an effort to raise awareness about men’s health issues as well as raise money for the organizations that are fighting the good fight.

This year I’m flying solo as a “MoBro”. Can we lose the “bro” monicker though? Seriously, the term “bro” makes me think of beer coozies and fist bumps, and that’s just not me. Anyway, here’s the link to donate through my page: MoBro.co/joeL8X. I’m thinking of doing some fun stuff to raise money this year, so be sure to follow me here, on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter.

If you don’t know about Movember yet, you can read all about the organizations vision, values, and goals here.

Swingin' at the #coastalcarolinafair with @frostymac #fair #swing #ride #charleston #sc

While I’ve got your attention, the Coastal Carolina Fair is in effect again. All the rides, attractions, and deep fried things that probably shouldn’t be allowed near a deep frier are available for your enjoyment at the Ladson Fairgrounds.

More importantly, I’m proud to announce that my daughter Mackenzie has won 2nd place in this year’s photography contest for division 3 (Students)!!! She entered shots she made during last month’s World Wide Photo Walk, and her shot of a rusty old bicycle bell earned her a red ribbon.

Mackenzie Wins 2nd Place at the Coastal Carolina Fair Photography Contest

Next up in the information department is that Halloween was this week, and of course my family had to pose for pictures in our costumes:

Kegan’s buddies came over and were promptly stuck in front of my camera. Some kids are so cooperative in getting into character. These kids rule.

My Satyr costume was inspired by this new Halloween themed tattoo I got from Rob Junod over at Holy City Tattooing Collective:

I got my #Halloween #tattoo by @robjunod at #HolyCityTattooingCollective in #Charleston #SC Check out that #Satyr fiddling the night away! I admire his goatee...

In sadder news, we lost a New York legend last week. Lou Reed passed away after losing a battle with liver disease. When the kids and I carved our pumpkins, I decided to make mine a tribute to one of rock n’ roll’s most influential people. From the left to right, it’s Mackenzie’s “Hedgehog-O-Lantern”, my “Lou-O-Lantern”, and my son Kegan’s “Boo-O-Lantern”:

The sadness didn’t last long in our family though, because the day after Lou passed away, Karlina Josephine joined the world:

Welcome to the family, kiddo. Brian & Mira are going to be great parents to you, and you will have more professional photos of yourself than any other kid in your neighborhood, so just accept it and be prepared!

World Wide Photo Walk Charleston 2013

Today was the 6th annual World Wide Photo Walk organized annually by Scott Kelby. I’ve been walking in these for a few years now, check out this and this. Last year my daughter joined me and she had a blast, so she signed up once again for this year’s event.

Last year we did the evening walk at Shem Creek, so this year we went on the morning walk in historic downtown Charleston. We started out in Waterfront park and made are way through the streets of the lower peninsula.

To shake things up this year, I decided to stick with one fixed length lens. My choice? A 50mm f/1.4.

Only having one lens to choose from at one focal length is quite freeing. I had to pick my shots carefully and instead of working it and solving problems like I do on a daily basis, I either had a shot, or I didn’t. My feet are my zoom, and there are no ultra wide angles either. Just one normal focal range. It’s kind of like drawing with just one pencil. The limitations free you up to keep it simple. And that’s what most of the shots I took reflect.

My first lesson for my daughter was to isolate the subject. “How?” she asked. Composition. Move around until you can see just the subject of the photo with the least amount of distractions.

Lesson two was to look for contrasts. Big and small, light and dark, and also contrasting colors. Reds and blues are one of my favorite. Add some green, and I’m excited!

I did look for some people to shoot as well. A mother and daughter were sitting in a pastry shop that we had stopped in to grab a drink in. I was taking a shot of my coffee cup and the mom said, “Why don’t you take a picture of us? We’re more interesting than an inanimate object!” I couldn’t agree more. She then said I should Instagram it. Unfortunately Nikon hasn’t figured out how to post to Instagram from their DSLR’s directly, but that didn’t stop me from giving her some instant gratification. iPhone to the rescue!

@skyfran 's mom told me to post this. I don't know these ladies! #wwpw #wwph2013 #CHS #strangers #streetphotography

I saw this guy power-washing a building and loved how the spray was glowing in the sun:

We took a detour looking for some graveyards because my daughter wanted to shoot an angel statue. She said it was because of the “Weeping Angels” from Doctor Who. Who am I to say no? Unfortunately, all of the cemeteries that we went to were chained up. As we were leaving the walk, we came up this awesome little magic shop, and guess what was outside?

I guess it was magic? Whatever you believe, I had a great time shooting with my kid. You can see all of the shots I took in this Flickr set.

Mira & Brian Are Having A Baby

Pinterest is a great thing. You can find inspiring photography in just about any practice of the craft. Much like YouTube is for video, you can chase an idea and end up in unexpected places along the way, sometimes going off in a completely different direction.

It’s also a problem. You start to see patterns in a derivative way. A search for maternity photography will garner a plethora of similar results. Some expertly executed mixed in with a bunch of terribly imitated images. After a few minutes, everything seems so similar. Photography really is an insestuous form of art – But I guess every form of art suffers from this. It just seems that photography is more readily copied than any other.

So when Brian & Mira announced they were having a baby (and by announced, I mean I accidentally figured it out, but that’s a story for another time), I was excited to try a different approach to maternity photography.

I wanted to put the couple in an environment that captures who they are and what they represent at this time in their lives. They are both very outdoorsy people, and Mira works a lot with Charleston Area Therapeutic Riding, a horse farm that specializes in improving the lives of children and adults with disabilities. What a perfect environment for these two!

They also recently celebrated a non-traditional baby shower under a tree in Hampton Park. No silly “Guess what’s in the diaper” games going on, just a nice picnic in the park for family and friends to come together and show the new parents-to-be some support.

Earlier in the summer, I snapped this shot of Mira at Folly Beach during the 4th of July celebration. It captures her just as she started to become a little more obvious with her pregnant state:

We’re super excited to welcome “Baby X” into the world with them, I just hope they hurry up and pick a name so we don’t have to keep calling it “it” 🙂

Dirty

I woke up one Saturday morning with this image in my head. Inspired by my friend Katie’s new venture called “Black Swamp” in which she re-purposes the wood shavings from her & her husband’s woodworking business into jewelry, I saw that the pieces she’s producing look much like the curls of her own hair. The idea was almost too easy! I drove out to Eutawville, SC that afternoon to make it happen.

Of course, nothing worth doing comes without a price, and Katie did not come out of this squeaky clean.

I like to “warm up” for something like this to get a feel for the location, loosen up the subject, and get my brain on the correct frequency. I shot a few environmental portraits in Katie and her husband Joe’s new shop space. Here’s my favorite of those shots:

You can check out the rest of the photos on this Flickr Set.

Ink & Art

This photo at the top here is of my newest tattoo and it’s based on a painting by Tatiana Suarez called Rosa. The tattoo was done by Charleston tattoo artist/genius Margo, who currently inks at Holy City Tattooing Collective.

Check this out – This is the original painting by Tatiana:

And here is an iPhone shot of the tattoo right after Margo finished:

She interpreted the painting so well, I’m in awe of her skill. To watch her mastery of color and shading as I see the image come alive on my skin – It’s just an inspiring process.

Margo also recently did this tattoo for me, which is based on a creature from one of Caia Koopman’s paintings. The little guy looks like he’s gonna take out my Patch Whiskey monster tattoo:

This is what Caia’s original painting, entitled “Bad Bee” looks like:

And the Patch Whiskey tattoo was done late last year by Cristian at The Queens Ink Tattoo in, you guessed it, Queens, NY:

Here’s a shot of the original by Patch Whiskey, which was painted on a vinyl record:

And here is Cristian Neamtu at work on it:

The reason for this is not to show off my tattoos, but to show off the artists involved. The Patch Whiskey and Caia Koopman ones are like small little bite size samples of their bigger work, which in Whiskey’s case is usually the whole side of a building, like this:

And Caia’s work is filled with little details that could stand on their own, but are usually part of a larger story involving a pretty woman. The Tatiana Suarez tattoo at the top of this post is the largest tattoo I’ve ever gotten, and it really does capture what I love about her work. Her paintings have such emotion in them and they’re sexy and soft. Her Brazilian and El Salvadorian heritage mixed with American pop surrealism makes for work that I find highly attractive.

I actually have an appointment set for next month to do an even bigger piece featuring another one of Tatiana’s paintings on my forearm, but I got a little too eager and visited Margo on her shop’s walk-in day this past weekend and pretty much monopolized her time. The reason I chose “Rosa” was because it simply reminds me of my wife Amy (and her similar birthmark on her bicep). I’m sure my wife would kill me if I posted a photo of her topless, so you’ll have to look at this lovely head shot instead :p Needless to say, I’m a lucky guy.

So, if you’re a fan of my Facebook Page, you may have seen a post recently calling for models, designers, & stylists. I’m putting together some ideas for personal work and really want to capture some of the inspiration from my favorite artists and do something on my own terms. I’m excited to meet up with a friend this week who I’ve worked with in the past and bounce some ideas off of her. I’ll be formalizing my plans soon, so come back!

Now, here’s a concise list of the people involved in this post:

Tattoo Artists:

Margo Karolides AKA Margo Venomous
Facebook
Holy City Tattooing Collective
Cristian Neamtu AKA Cristian Zink
Facebook
The Queens Ink Tattoo

(both are kick-ass painters as well)

Artists:

Tatiana Suarez
Website
Facebook
Twitter
Tumblr
Caia Koopman
Website
Facebook
Patch Whiskey
Website
Facebook
Twitter

Lastly, I’ve got a Lowbrow/Pop Surrealism board on Pinterest that I pin lots of my favorite artwork on. If you’re a Pinterest user, please go ahead and follow it.

Charleston Fashion Week 2013

Last night I shot the runway show at Charleston Fashion Week again for TheDigitel.com. I wanted to write up my own post to focus on some of the shots I like from the show – mainly the little moments of expression and surprise.

Here’s Cassidy Elizabeth Mae Brown taking a rare walk to the end of the runway shortly before she won the people’s choice award in the Emerging Designer contest.

Speaking of winners, this is the line of Wednesday night’s Emerging Designer contest winner Serena Da Conceição just above. Local designer/retailer JLinsnider always brings the sexy and provocative to the show. This outfit received a roar of applause from the crowd:

The job of the runway model is to be a stoic moving frame to showcase the art of the fashion designer. Every now and then they throw in a hint of personality, but for the most part the designer is the star. Last night, between designers Lulu Long, Neve / Hawk, & Ike Behar who featured children’s lines, I think as far as showmanship goes that the kids stole the whole thing. Fashion is about change, right? Maybe the world of fashion could learn a few things by the spontaneity of children and introduce a little more personality and character in the big shows. These are the moments that the crowd embraces!

This was a great scene – the little girl in red stalled out halfway down the runway, and the other girl came out to her rescue and brought to the end and even showed her how to do a little curtsey. The crowd when wild for these two guys, especially when the adult helped the boy remove his coat and throw it over his shoulder like a boss.

And this little guy got so into it that he just stayed there hamming it up even while other models came up to pose:

Here’s a slideshow of all of the runway show images I took last night. If you want to see some of the red carpet and candid shots, please check out this facebook album.

Charleston CPA Nails It

Just a quick shout out to the gang at Molony & Phipps, LLC who had me come to their offices recently to create some head shots for their new website. The woman in the shot up top impressed me because she nailed that on the very first click! I usually see a huge progression as I ease my subjects into getting their portrait made. The first shot is usually looks a little on the nervous side, and I have to work a bit to find the best expression for the what the photo will be used for.

I remember taking the shot and chimping the back of my camera in amazement and saying, “You’ve done this before!” Some people are just naturals 😉

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