Brian Wenner

This is musician Brian Wenner. My friend Kyle and I shot some promos for him in Kyle's basement last Saturday. Brian brought his cool LED lighting and I brought my Canon Speedlites. Together we made music...

Art Worked

On Monday night I went up to Legation, a Gallery in Cleveland to shoot some of Annie Stimson's art for her portfolio. It was an interesting experience. The piece pictured above was the easiest one to shoot. The others took some experimenting - most were made out of stringy materials and hung close to a white wall. By far the hardest was a piece that consisted of opaque white squares with white lettering hung on a white wall with pins - it was the polar bear in Alaska in a blizzard. Annie's work was very interesting - I'll post more photos here soon....

Youngstown Rebel

So last Saturday my girlfriend, I, and our friend Lindsey went out to Youngstown to visit my friend Eric(photo above) and see a band play. When I was getting my stuff together I started debating in my head, "should I bring my 7D or not". For me its so hard to go on any trip(even a short overnight) without my nice camera. I knew we planned to meet at a cool bar(but it was in the ghetto), then we'd be heading to a crowded club, and after that wherever the night/drinks took us. It was unsettling to think of carrying over $2000 worth of gear with me. Finally I decided - I was gonna bring my older Canon(a Digital Rebel XT), with the cheap lens it came with and my least expensive flash.

East Park Redux

I did a post about this strange little park near downtown Akron last year. I wanted to show "East Park" to my girlfriend so we went back there on Friday. Its a park that seems to have been left to time - I'm not sure when it was built. Its centered on the canal and sits in the shadow of the former BF Goodrich World HQ. Both times I've been there I've barely seen another soul. Its a pretty photogenic park surrounded by two condo complexes.

The amount of trash that is in this part of the canal is astounding - I think we counted about 6 bikes.

Homogeneous Zone Opening

Tonight Greg Milo and a few of his friends had a poetry reading at the Matinee to celebrate the release of the book "The Homogeneous Zone". It was humorous and thought provoking R rated poetry. After the reading we all moved down to Square Records where there was a "visual representation" of the poetry. A good night, with good people.

The "art show" portion of the show allowed audience participation. There was a table set up with various items on it that could be written on and added to the collage.

Now That's a Pretty Picture!!

Today I wanted to mess around with some lighting set-ups that I had in mind. I didn't want to wait until I could get some one to model for me so I figured it was gonna have to be more self portraits....so I came up with the frame idea.  So for any lighting geeks and or strobists this was my set-up:

430ex with a shoot through umbrella up and to the left at full power.

550ex bare to the right at 1/8 power.

580exII with a snoot behind and right at 1/4 power.

All of these are Canon Speedlites and I triggered them with my Canon EOS 7D's flash.

Neon Pabst

In my ealry 20's my friends and I were all about Pabst Blue Ribbon. At the time it was only $4.20 for a 12 pack and I thought it was by far the best tasting of the cheap beers(not to mention having the coolest looking cans). My friend Brad came to visit me one day and brought with him a neon Pabst sign - I thought it was the coolest thing in the world. He didn't technically give it to me but allowed me to "borrow it long term". I proudly placed it in my front window. One night after getting dropped off from a long night at Annabell's I stumbled up my stairs and into my apartment. Little did I know that my brother had moved the sign to the edge of the window sill to open the window. When I pulled the chain to turn off the sign for the night it went crashing to the floor. I don't remember what shattered more - my heart or the glass tubes.

With how ultra-hip PBR has become over the last decade I didn't think I would ever be able to replace Brad's sign for a reasonable price - so when I walked into Abby Ann's on Tallmadge Ave the other day and saw this sign I was excited and nervous. The price turned out to be very reasonable and I talked them down another 1/4.
So Brad this is for you....but I want to hang on to it for a little while....

Trouble Books

Akron band, the Trouble Books, were interviewed for the forthcoming issue of Cleveland Magazine. They called me up to do the photograph for the article. In the interviewed they talk about how they mostly like to hang around home - so they had the idea to have the photo show them at their kitchen table playing with Magnetic Sticks. The above photo was one of my favorites - I'm waiting to hear which one they will pick.

Palm Bush

This is a small plant that is a relative of the palm tree. My uncle gave it to me a few years ago when I was visiting him in Florida. I snapped this sitting at my desk the other evening near sunset. There is just something about it I love - so I decided to share it with you, gentle reader.

View From The Roof

This is the view from the roof of the former Acme Bakery. The orange-ish brick building to the left is the Thirsty Dog Brewery on Grant Street. The whole complex in the background was once the Burkhardt Brewing Co. a major beer brewery in Akron. I thought that this photo made for a pretty cool view that most people don't get to see. I want to get a view facing the other way but I would have to do it at a different time of the day - this was taken near sunset.

Sign of Life

Unless you live in Northeast Ohio its hard to understand our excitement at the early signs of warmer days. Spring is coming - I took some photos around my yard today to prove it!

Happy St. Pat's

Green beer, green clothes and The Pogues. This holiday is easy for me to handle!

Virginia Kendall

I think I've probably gone for more hikes at Virginia Kendall than anywhere else. What amazes me is that I can still find places at the park that I hadn't been to before. I went there today with my friend Lindsey. I love taking photos like this - you hold out the camera(with wide angle lens), and shoot into the sun with the flash on. Sometimes when I see someone shooting with their simple camera into the sun I tell them to turn the flash on. They look confused. Some people understand what a silhouette is, some don't!

Snow Blur

The other night I had to take my parents to the airport at 4 in the morning(or at night depending on your perspective). After the little taste of spring weather we had here in Akron I was shocked when I walked out my door and saw the biggest snow flakes of the winter - pictured above at 30mph. As a life long resident of Northeast Ohio I should be smart enough to know that we aren't even close to being out of the woods yet. Its a crapshoot this time of year - it could be 65 and sunny or 20 and a blizzard(not to mention everything in between).  Lets hope for the former!

Blue Hen Part IV

I'm not sure what "part" this really is - but I've tried to photograph Blue Hen Falls multiple times. Its kinda my photographic nemesis. The last time I went the falls were covered in ice and snow and not very pretty. The time before that they were just a trickle -and the time before that the sun was too bright to get a long enough shutter speed to blur the water. This time I was prepared. It was a rainy day and I knew the clouds weren't going anywhere, between the snow melt and rain I knew there would be a good flow, and I had a new perspective in mind to really bring out the scene.

I snapped this with myself and the tripod in the river slightly - which was a little nerve-racking but ultimately worth-while. Blue Hen, I knew I could make you look good - now for Brandywine Falls Part III.

More photos below...

Cascade Locks

Cascade Locks is one of my favorite places to walk in Akron. I've been going there since before the towpath was built - the trail used to be on the other side of the canal from where the above photo was taken.
The last time I went before they had put the towpath in I shot a roll of film with my Minolta XG1.  I was glad I had captured the park before it changed - or so I thought. Turns out this roll of film is how I found out my Minolta's film door was no longer sealed - the roll was exposed.  Bummer.  At least I have my memories.
More photos after the jump..

Rogues' Hollow

Today I went for a hike near Doylestown in Chippewa Township. There is a small park run by the Rogues' Hollow Historical Society with an old Mill. The photo is of the remnants of the dam that used to feed the mill race. I found a rock to set my camera on so I could use a slower shutter speed to get the motion blur of the water. The bridge by the mill is referred to as "Cry Baby Bridge" and is supposedly haunted. We ran into the man who tends to the property(and lives in the restored mill) and he said he's been there for 17 years and nothing ghostly has ever happened - and he mentioned that Ohio has 27 "Cry Baby Bridges". I found an interesting article on the history of the area here.

Muscle Bake

Yesterday my girlfriend, Laura, and our friend Lindsey decided to get together and cook muscles. I had never had muscles before so I was excited(and maybe a bit nervous) to try something new. Since I'm not of very much use around the kitchen I decided to document the feast with my camera.

I put together a little photo essay of the "experience" - meet me after the "jump"!

Down in the Valley

This photograph is from the Towpath Trail in the Cuyahoga Valley. I started hiking in Peninsula with the goal of getting this far(to the Turnpike Bridge)because I was on a time table(had to get to my parents for dinner). It was a hike that was tougher than I expected - slipping and sliding in the snow takes it out of you after a while.

I added a lot of saturation and contrast when I was processing this photo to give it some pop - it looked really flat directly off the camera. It was my favorite shot of the day.
Two more photos after the jump.

Trouble Books and Gabe Schray

On Saturday night Gabe Schray and Trouble books both played a record release party for their respective forthcoming CDs and LPs. They both can be purchased by clicking on the links that follow - Gabe's Effective Demonic Experiment & Trouble Book's Gathered Tones. I was glad there was some large artwork up on the walls at Square Records - it made for an interesting background. I had brought a light stand with me and hoped to set a flash up high for more interesting lighting but I got there a little too late and didn't have time. So I just bounced my flash off the ceiling and I think I got some pretty decent photos.

Under Construction

This blog and all the other pages on this website are based on blogger templates but unfortunately blogger plans to no longer allow users to upload to external FTPs. Never mind the technical mumbo-jumbo - I bring this up because I'm going to use this as an opportunity to revamp and improve this site. I'm going to add photo galleries and redo the navigation - its a work in progress. The first thing you'll notice is that I've created a new banner. I only have it up on the blog right now but it will soon grace all the pages when they are redone.

The above photo was an accident from earlier today when I was shooting portraits for the banner. I liked the reflection of my old camera in my new one.

The Unguarded Moment

Today I went to the Joseph Saxton Gallery of Photography to check out the exhibit of Steve McCurry's work called 'The Unguarded Moment'. Steve McCurry is an award winning National Geographic photographer most famous for his photo titled 'Afghan Girl'(visible in the exhibit poster above). All 50 of his prints on display showed beautiful color and detail. They're portraits of people from the Middle East and Asia - with a focus on showing "a person caught in the broader landscape that you could call the human condition". It was truly an amazing collection of work. The Gallery also had many other photos from their collection on display.

I'm glad I went - I've wanted to make an effort to get out to see more things like this. There really is a difference between a page on a website (or a magazine) versus seeing a large, beautiful print in person.

Behind the Eight Ball

I know I've posted photos of pool playing at the Matinee before....but I had to share this shot of Wes - because it is awesome. We were out that night because my friend Mike had flown in from Seattle for a funeral. I shot this without flash at an ISO of 3200 - which is kinda cool because my older camera was limited ISO 1600. My Canon EOS 7D goes all the way up to 12,800 - though the images get quite noisy at that point - but sometimes a noisy image is better than no image.

30,000 Clicks

This is the first photo I uploaded to flickr back on June 13, 2006 - taken with a borrowed Canon PowerShot SD400. Today my flick 'PhotoStream' received its 30,000th view and I was taking a little trip down memory lane looking at some of the older stuff. Its amazing to see my niece and nephews grow and to see the vast improvement in my digital photography skills. Hopefully I can look back in another four years and see just as much improvement....

No More Borders

A Friday night in the Winter of 1996, hanging out with the gang in Pete's basement, we'd already had band practice and watched the same skateboarding video for the 100th time, what next? I know - let's hit up Borders. Borders wasn't a store then, it was a hang out - we'd stand in the magazine aisle for hours reading all the band interviews (and occasionally buy a CD), not to mention probably run into other friends from school. I don't usually mourn the loss of a chain store, but I'd be lying to say I'm not nostalgic about the Montrose Borders. Yesterday I decided to head over there to check out there store clearance sale(30-50% off)...and maybe more so to say goodbye.