Happy Mother's Day!

It's that time of year once again when we take a moment to say "I love you" to those special ladies in our lives.

I love you mom!

Dana Lee - March, 2011

Shoshone Falls

Been in the studio working with a new camera that I will post about soon. It will hopefully be the set up that I use for the Empty City (working title) series I'm working on and takes a lot of getting familiar with it for me to be sure that I'm getting the most of out it. It looks like it's going to be a great system and can't wait to get some images out of it.

In the meantime, here's a photo I took during my short trip back home early this month. I took a mini break from photography while I was out there, but couldn't help but get a few photos anyway.

Rainy Beach

It's a rainy Sunday in Chicago and I decided to take a trip to the beach and poke around a bit. The beach in winter is such a strange world - hostile and desolate, and very beautiful. Here are some photos from today's walkabout.

Neli

Fantastic photoshoot yesterday. Great model, great laughs, fun photos.  I'm very happy with the outcome of this shoot. I couldn't have asked for a cooler, more laid back model in Neli. As you can tell, she's a pretty hip Haitian with serious style. She came to me wanting some photos done for her annual birthday photo (pretty cool idea if you ask me) and I don't think she was ready for the results. 

*Blogger has an annoying tendency to darken photos. There is more detail in these photos than meets the eye in this post. Sorry! 

Wrapped

Very excited to share 3 new photos for a small portrait series I began over the weekend. It's an exploration of a few concepts that have begun to penetrate our portraits: the obfuscation of the subject's face and the tension it signifies between expectations and the persona (see Son of Man and Hannah for more on this theme), combined with archetypes of high fashion - the female nude used as a hanger for some ridiculous piece of haute couture. The fun of combining these two ideas is the use of common place materials as representatives of this idea - manila rope, plastic drop cloth, and red yarn. Each material presented its own unique challenge, but the red yarn was especially tedious. It required about a half a pound of yarn and an hour of wrapping to complete the headpiece.  Well worth the effort though, for what I feel turned out to be some great photos.

Untitled Work in Progress

Here is a sneak peak of a new project I've started that explores the city during its twilight hours - when the din of urban chaos quiets to a murmur and we are left alone with the opportunity to experience the infrastructure that makes the machine work. It has been beyond freezing the past few weeks in Chicago, especially at night, so the pace of new photos has slowed a bit, but look for more of this project in the future as it develops into a cohesive body over the next several months.

Lost and Found {L&F}

Sorting through some past work it's amazing to see just how many photos fall through the cracks. Photographers are always shooting - it's like breathing. We do it unconsciously and often. Even when we don't know why we want to take a photograph, we take it anyway, and with any luck it might turn out to be something special. But somehow, for one reason or another, even good photos get lost in the stack of photos we take everyday. 

Here's a few photos I fished out of the cracks, blew the dust off, and found worthy of sharing. The first in our new Lost and Found {L&F} series:

Empty City

This is a test photo of a new series that I'm working on - photographing the city as a backdrop in which the ebb and flow of our human existence fades into nothing. Deep stuff right? Still working out the technical kinks, such as when the best time of day is to shoot. I thought a dull gray morning like today would be perfect, but I'm not loving all the headlights. Each exposure is 8 mins long thanks to my +10 stop ND filter but I think I'll try to double that exposure time next go around and see what kind of ghosting I can get to appear. Not perfect, but it's shaping up to be an interesting series.

Rose

Morning

Hannah

Jessica

Happy Holidays!

2010 has been a heck of a ride, and RedTown is sad to see it go, but 2011 is shaping up to be our best year ever. BIG PLANS PEOPLE!  Our resolution for the new year is to crank our photography to 11 and really watch this thing take off.  We appreciate the love and support and wish you all the very best of holidays and a happy new year!

We Sometimes Dabble

Redtown is about creativity, exploring and creating. Photography is but one of the many ways we express ourselves. I'd like to share a series of single fold sculptures I did over the summer. Each page is folded only once and is freestanding by its own support. I made a small army of these, but I found these 10 to be the most elegant. Enjoy!

Giovanni "DJ Gcue" Sandoz

Two photos from a recent shoot for Giovanni's upcoming single. Haven't seen him spin yet, but I can't wait to hear his track when it finally drops.

Robert

Kenmare, Ireland

What a beautiful land Ireland is. I've been going over some scans from our trip there last spring and wanted to share this panorama I shot while driving down the Kenmare pennisula. We truly lost and found ourselves over the course of 10 days, driving cross country discovering castles, sharing with locals, and of course, drinking fine Guiness! I hope to find more images to post from our fantastic trip soon.