Tower Records Documentary

The death of the music video in popular culture

In reflection while I was growing up I had always wanted to be a music video director. In a lot of ways I believe music videos were treated with upmost respect during the 90’s, many artist putting their hearts and souls into their music video creations. David Fincher, Spike Jonze and Michael Bay were amongst a few of these directors whom all have gone onto feature films.

Since then as the music world has fallen from its pedestal so has the culture of music video creation. This may be most apparent with the death of TLR from MTV’s show programming, no longer serving a function while website platforms such as Youtube have taken over. For the last few years while I have attended social functions with my college peer group Youtube has been used as a jukebox for the music being played. Technology has changed the way our generation embraces and values music.

In a way, I still wish to create music videos though it seems silly, as I have no clue if there remains any interest in this form of art. If anything it would only serve as a ode to my childhood and the nostalgia I feel from watching music lead visual media.

Currently editing a music video

Stills from edit. 

Photography as a lifestyle

I never intended to become a photographer. Throughout my life I had no interest in the art of photography or cameras themselves. I became a photographer because of a break up at the end of my senior year in high school. We had spent two years together in what would probably be some of the more defining years of our lives and after it all only had maybe a handful of photos together. I didn't journal about our relationship and I knew my memory would fail me, so essentially our lives together would come to fade into a sentence. Six years after the fact, it mostly has become a paragraph at best.

Shortly after this realization I went out and bought my first digital pocket camera. Everywhere I went the camera came with me. And it began to change the way I lived my life. Were my photos interesting? If not, I needed to live a more interesting life. Did the same people and places show up too many times? Then I needed to change my life. Everything got organized by the year, month and day. My life in chronological order. Not one photo deleted, every memory saved.

Even now years after the fact I still live by that same mentality. Though my camera has grown in size and the quality of the photos which I produce has gotten better, I do it cause I want to remember my life and the people I experienced it with. There is never an occasion too trivial to leave my camera at home for. Though there are moments when I leave my camera at my side, cause with wisdom I learned some moments you need to simply experience and let go of.

It is odd to think that my relationship in high school would give me a career, but if you allow yourself to reflect on significant moments in your life you can maybe find that which means the most to you. To me it is that which I experience with the people I love, the adventure of life. Photography is a means of remembering the adventure. So it has become my passion, my lifestyle.

I fail at blogging

I remember last year I was going to attempt to use this blog to post information about photography, but somehow that failed. Royally. So, essentially this is my attempt at trying that again!

Though I am not sure what I will use this blog for yet. I fear it becoming to self promotional as my interest in communicating are symbiotic, not to speak out loud like a dictator. Not to mention there are stock piles of other Blogs out there that are very beneficial for photographers, like the Strobist blog by David Hobby.

Though that already conflicts with my opinions on photography, or art in general. Often I find clients contact me about rates to contrast and compare with others, like I am a product you price match at a retail store. I believe that vision is unique and that no two are alike. As an artist I believe if one allows themselves to progress they begin to sculpt their personal vision through time and practice. So this blog is my personal take on photography, my unique dialogue on that which I practice out of passion.

So hopefully anyone who stumbles upon this blog can benefit from it, even if for just a small detail. I imagine that by using dialogue to analyze my journey through photography that this blog will essentially change the way I go about creating. So in the end, I am writing to myself.

So, lets try this again.

The American Riot

In December I shot some photos of a friend of mines band, all a bunch of cool guys really. Anyway their myspace music page is finally up and decorated with some of the photos! We shot in a real high school class room which was tricky when it came to lighting, but it was a very fun challenge to experience. My friend and photographer Matt Gibson came to assist me, and I doubt I could have done it without him. Check them out.

Link Here

Chicago Magazine - September 2009

Following the Best of Chicago issue of Chicago Magazine I had another opportunity to work with them on their September issue, specifically the section about teens in Chicago. I met up with writer Cassie Walker at North Beach in Chicago and we walked around the Chicago shoreline interviewing teens (well she interviewed, I as always just took pictures). Before night fall we ran into a big group of teenagers, and I ended up waist deep in water (the photos were cool though, not to worry). Long story short, the last group we ran into were our saving grace, and I learned the virtue of bringing a second pair of pants to work (which I did not have, but learned the virtue of).

After I got my copy of the September issue of Chicago as I browsed its articles I couldn't help but be intrigued in the photo work that lived on the page to the left of mine, so after some research (Google) I ran into the work of Ryan Robinson and as well as his Blog. His work is great, huge, colorful, energetic, and inspiring. If your a photographer like I am you will probably want to follow his blog, lots of great behind the scenes photos in there. It is also nice to have a local artist that you can really appreciate, up until now most of them weren't in this country :D .

My birthday is in September as well, so nothing cooler than having a magazine with your photos in it to go along with some cake.