When it doesn't go your way.

Working with a flexible and patient model can make all the difference in the world. I recently did a shoot with a new model named Alberto as part of a series I'm working on featuring night time scenes throughout the city. Unfortunately for Alberto, it being February and well after sunset didn't really click in my head until we arrived on location to do the shoot and our teeth instantly started chattering. To make things worse, the wind was driving through this underpass like we were in a wind tunnel (go figure) and I was having trouble with my lighting. So after wasting 20-30 mins with my head on backwards, and my fingers frozen from fiddling with the equipment, and poor Alberto spasming uncontrollably, we finally were able to start shooting. And luckily for me, Alberto really sucked it up and gave me some great poses. Unfortunately for both of us, I wasn't able to get as many solid photos as I would have liked, so we end up with a less than great collection of photos to choose from. That said, I think there is a valuable lesson to be learned here about working with models who take this seriously enough to put up with freezing temperatures and photographers who aren't 100% on. I may not have a lot of options from this shoot, but I did get a few solid photos instead of going home completely empty handed. Bravo Alberto for being a sport and I can't wait to photograph you again.

Monolith

There is something ethereal about empty parking garages at night. Alone with acres of concrete and the flickering green of the overhead fluorescents, these monolithic tombs of our automotive cultural identity become surreal landscapes of proportion, scale and symmetry. The most efficient parking structures have proven to look nothing like the ones we build here in America, and yet with all our desire to increase traffic volume and fit more suv's per square foot we continue to make these monstrous, multi-leveled ziggurats in the fashion of our own rather lazy western notions of space and urban planning. And as utilitarian and stripped-away of excess in order to be as cost-effective as possible as they are, their vastness and blandness turns into a gorgeous arrangement of contrasts and forms which gives way to some really beautiful photography. When the cars have all gone home the purpose of their existence seems to fall into question and it allows you to re-contextualize their form and see the beautiful landscape we build within our own cities.