If you are interested in entering please fill out the contact form with “Hot Summer Nights” in the Subject field and good luck!!!

*The drawing will take place at 6:00PM on July 1st. All entrants will be informed on the following day.
*Winning couple receives a one hour – on location photography session plus (1) 8×10 print. Any additional prints and discs will be available for purchase at normal price.
*Hair, make-up and wardrobe is at couple’s expense.

What I did notice is that I had a number of people very interested in the thought process and the technical process of achieving the photograph.
So I thought I would take the time to put together a post that explored the inspiration and the technical side.
First and foremost, I owe my entire inspiration to Paul Caponigro. He was in that generation of Art Photographers after Ansel Adams, Edward Weston and Paul Strand that really continued to define photography as an art. His image “Running White Deer” was the inspiration for the photograph I created.

I feel very deeply that photographers should have an education in Photographic History. We as the “new breed” of artists can only do what we do because we have seen what the “masters” have created before us. I hope that doesn’t come across as an arrogant statement. I myself will be the first to admit that even with 18 years of photographic experience, I know very little. In fact I feel like I’m just starting to develop my own voice.
But I do know that if it weren’t for the Caponigro’s, the Strand’s, the Weston’s and Adam’s I would still be years away from where I am now. So if you pick up anything from this blog post, please let it be that history is important for our growth.

OK… Let’s have a look at the image and where I started.

The original subject of Running White Deer was obviously White Deer. We don’t really have that great of an access to White Deer in the States. But while I was living in Austin and taking my afternoon walks on Town Lake, I noticed a few white dogs running along the limestone one day at Auditorium Shores right before dark.
It made me think, “Maybe there is something here…”  And so the idea formed that I would use white dogs instead of white deer. And Austin is weird anyway, so it all made sense… (or none at all – which was probably better).

I’d like to say that there was a lot of forethought put into the image, but when I came to Austin, I had yet to hear from anyone with a white dog to put in this image, or even book a model. And I was so thankful to have the dress on loan from La Chatuise and Elle Couture Designs for the shoot (which only came to me about 5 days before leaving as well!!!). And as the week progressed and more rain began to fall on Austin, it looked like the shoot was not going to happen. In fact the morning of the shoot I was very close to calling the whole thing off.

But, I knew that if I didn’t at least try, nothing would happen for sure, and I would be flying back to San Diego a couple days later even more depressed for lack of trying.

I met my assistant Chris Lin at Auditorium Shores and we quickly went through how the shoot would progress. It had been raining, so we needed to keep painter’s plastic down to keep the dress clean, I knew I would obviously have to remove it in Photoshop later.
We got the camera set-up on a ladder and gorilla pod (thanks to Nathan Johns). Chris Lin also grabbed that shot of me lining up the shot above and right.

So in the first shot, you can see it was very straightforward. Because I had to remove the plastic in post, that gave me some freedom to do some things I normally wouldn’t do, like have Chris Lin be in the photo holding the strobe to make our model Kareena stand out more than with natural lighting.

Chris Lin, the plastic and the additional strobe were easily removed by using an additional photograph that was taken after all the elements were removed, by using a Layer Mask and brushing them out. If you are unfamiliar with Layer Masks in Photoshop, I highly encourage you to learn about them. It is a very important skill to know, even if you consider yourself a “purist.”

Now with a clean slate I can focus on finishing off the theme of the image. Obviously we need the dogs to represent Paul Caponigro’s White Deer. Unfortunately due to rain, all the Craigslist ads, and flyers I handed out didn’t really result in any turnouts. So I waited and waited. And hoped and hoped that a cool dog would show up. Fortunately we had the most amazing White German Shepard walk up with her owner, at just the right time, with the right light. And the owner hadn’t seen any of our ads, and had no idea what we were doing! It was truly a blessing.
The Shepard had the most beautiful wolf-like appearance and fit perfectly with the haunting, and moody feel I wanted. Her owner must have thrown the ball 15 times while I just sat up on my ladder and snapped away in Burst Mode. Originally Caponigro used a 1 second exposure. But I found that dogs run faster than deer, and had to shorten my exposure to 1/20th of a second to get the right amount of blur in the camera.

The Palmer Event Center is a very cool building, however, I felt that a very stormy and grand sky would more fit the mood of the image. I was fortunate enough to have been in Telluride a month before and got a great panorama of the local mountains and passing storm that would fit perfectly into the picture.
The dogs were brought in one at a time, and placed exactly where they were in the original photographs. I wanted to try to stay as true to the original location and moment as possible, rather than just grabbing dogs and placing them where ever I felt was best. So when you look at the position of the dogs, it is actually where she was when the camera fired.

The next thing was to convert to Black and White and do tonal corrections with Curves and Levels to make the image really sing, as well as cleaning up some bare spots in the grass and getting rid of any signs of “Photoshopping.” (A paradox if there ever was one – using Photoshop to make it look like it wasn’t Photoshopped).

And this is the final image.

While this is not my typical style, I do believe that this is some of the finest work I’ve ever done. From a technical standpoint it really challenged me to think about how to accomplish such a complex image and make it simple for the viewer.

I may have sounded like a sore loser because I didn’t place in the PPSDC Print Competition the other night.
But I am so proud of this photo nonetheless. It represents something that I planned and really thought out for many months and it still took a lot of good luck and faith, I believe I achieved very close to what was in my head when the idea came to me.

Thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please feel free to use the comment form below.

Honestly I was hoping to be writing this blog post in celebration. And maybe I should warn you, I may come off as a whiny, spoiled and misunderstood artist as you read this. And, I know a lot of you have been waiting to see this big secret I’ve been brewing since I was in Austin

But… I’m incredibly upset by what happened at Tuesday night’s PPSDC, (Professional Photographers of San Diego County), Print Competition…

Maybe it’s my fault for expecting to walk out with Best In Show, but I received the highest score out of all entries. I thought it was a sure thing. Then I find I get bumped in the first round of the “play-offs” like my Green Bay Packers… Only I had scoreboard…

I suppose I was way too close to the image. I had this planned for about at least 9 months and was only just able to execute it when I was in Austin back in November. And I was so wrapped up in this image I’ve had in my head… It just really stings to see it lose so badly after scoring so well. And, not to take anything away from the Photographers that received Best of Class and Best of Show that beat it, but when multiple members and one of the Judges comes up and says that I was “robbed,” it really hurts.

So… I’m going to finish my beer that I’m crying into, and move onto “what’s next” tomorrow.
I would like to say a quick “Thank You” to Kareena (my model in this photo), Chris Lin for assisting, and BWC for printing the exquisite print I entered in competition. I don’t care what the judges say, this is a great photograph, and there is no way I could have done this without you guys.

Last week I received a call from Edythe Blackwell at BWC PhotoLab in Dallas, who does all my printing, asking if I had time to help her with her booth at the show, if so, they would sponsor my attendance to the seminars.
I obviously jumped at the chance since it would be:
One, great to see Edythe and help her out with anything she needed,
Two, this is an area of my business that I would like to develop and offer to my clients here in San Diego starting this year.
And Three, I wanted to make some industry connections both here and nationally that were involved in this area for future ideas/help/comraderie, etc.

Well, Edythe has always been so great to me. I met her in Austin for a friend’s presentation at Austin PPA. She is one of the most hard-working people I know and she doesn’t stop or slow down ever. And it’s all about her clients, she really wants each and everyone happy.
Please excuse the commercial, but if you are a Photographer looking for a Pro Photo Lab, I’d seriously put BWC on that short list. You will appreciate the quality and the attention to customer service they provide.

The education aspect kicked off with a big ol’ bang. Larry Peters who is a pretty big deal in the High School Senior world led off the first day. And what I got most out of that, was that photographing seniors so very different in structure than photographing families and babies. Everything from the session, to proofing , to products offered. Paramount knowledge I was receiving right off the bat.
The rest of the week I sat through just as insightful and just as informative programs delivered by TRU which does demographic studies on teens and twenty-somethings, Tasra Dawson was there talking about video implementation and video promos, as well as her own project called Teen Identity, Rod ‘Awesome’ Evans and Brian Demint did live shoots.

What I noticed while socializing with the other participants, was that the attendees were a veritable “who’s who” in the Senior Portrait industry. I’d often be drinking a beer at the bar at the end of the night and having a casual conversation with a cool, down to earth guy, only to later find out from one of his groupies, that it was a Photographer from a $2 million/year photo studio! Most of the people I met were from the Mid-West, and only did High School Seniors.
So I just wanted to take the time to say “Hi, and great meeting you all” to some of the cool people I met this weekend, Mark Ellis, Ken Kneringer, Teri Fode. Amy and Maurice Wright, and Geri Goodale were a couple of the rare San Diego photographers at the event.
I even bumped into some people I recognized from Texas, Chuck and Abby from Vasara Photography who I met through the APPA. And Ross Benton, who was there representing Canon. He, I and Edythe all hung out and talked Texas. The best part was taking them down to Imperial Beach and making them eat a carne asada burrito from Sombrero’s, and a walk on the pier, unfortunately it didn’t have the desired effect of having them swear-off Tex-Mex for life.

All in all, it was a wonderful event and opportunity. And I can’t thank Edythe and BWC for having me there.

Jenn, her husband Gary and their new addition Kai were looking for a new family photo for the upcoming holidays. Here are a few of my favorites from the session. What a cute family, and Kai is adorable!

Miss you guys, eat some BBQ for me.