Angles and Edges Photography

Summer of 2012 - Mantids

2012-09-15T17:02:00.002-06:00

Every year my wife, and my son, and I go to Home Depot and pick up one or two Mantis Egg sacs to tie up out in our garden out front. We love watching the eggs hatch and all the hundreds of hatch-lings scurrying about. It is so special to watch them grow and change colors over the summer and fall months. They do a really great job of reducing the number of wasps that we have out there, which makes it much nicer to enjoy the smell of the wild flowers and to take your time picking tomatoes without having to worry about getting stung.

This was the first year that we didn't buy any egg sacs. They reproduced on their own this year....which really blew me away.

They are also very cool looking creatures and are really docile, letting you pick them up and move them around. The following pictures are of the last remaining mantis of the season. I've looked and looked and haven't been able to find any others in a couple of weeks.

This particular mantis has moved out of the garden and is now hanging out on our bamboo blinds. It is my hope that this is a female and that she is going to create her egg sac somewhere on the blinds under the front porch. Even after pulling her off the blinds and posing her for these pictures, she was right back up in the same spot only a couple of hours later. She is a little beat up and its getting pretty chilly at night, so I don't know how much longer she will be around. I had to get one last batch of photos before she is gone.

Thanks for letting me poke and prod and for posing for me.

Paint Mines Interpretive Park

2012-08-11T13:18:00.001-06:00

August 5th 2012

52 Week Self Portrait Project

2012-03-17T10:14:00.000-06:00

It's been well over a year since I posted to my blog. Any of the followers I had are long gone with the exception of Jason DeWitt! Thanks Jason.

Recently a good friend of mine, Ken Williams, talked me into doing a self portrait project where you take a self portrait and submit it to our Facebook Group page. One a week for 52 weeks. It doesn't sound too tough except that I decided that no photo will be of the quality of a snapshot. Each photo must be thought out in advance. I will do my best to use quality lighting on each photo. That may include natural light, which I hope to use to my advantage.

Here are the first five weeks submissions. I will do my best to keep posting on a weekly basis. Let's see if I can't keep this up all year and get some use out of this blog site. :)

Week 1 - Music Lover

Week 2 - The Waiting / Decieved

Week 3 - To Contemplate

Week 4 - High Key

Week 5 - The Experiment

Week 6 - SPRING BREAKout

Week 7 - Riding The Rockies

Photographed 3/31/2012: Not really happy with the lighting and the fact that I had to cut off the bottom of the photo. I had to stand with my bike because my kickstand broke when I hopped on my bike. That really wasn't going to work out too well anyway. I should have brought my winter trainer and setup my bike so that it stood up by itself on the trainer, straight up and down. The kickstand had me off at an angle anyways. Light was a little too strong on my face and I lost the side light from the sun going down to my right.

Week 8 - Porch Light

Photographed 4/1/2012: Up to this point I have been shooting #Strobist. Decided to give natural lighting some me time. In this shot I'm standing in the doorway to the porch. I like how the exposure makes the light fall off quickly and makes the background dark.

Week 9 - The Gambler

Winner takes all

Seven cards delivered
Fifty dollar chips stacked high
Nervous fingers thump

Poker faces glum
Waiting without a sound
Captivating stare

While others deliberate
Another chip tossed
Remaining gamblers follow

Silently the next card flipped
Worried expressions
Lifted as eyes fill with hope

Multiple chips tossed
Unison agreement reached
Dealer flips last card

Perpetual win
Dealer remorseless, smiling
Egos deflated

Week 10 - The Darkest Hour - Friday the 13th

Week 11 - 04/22/2012 - Serengeti Moon

Week 12 - 04-28-2012 - Digital Color Wash

Week 13 - 05-13-2012 - Transference

Week 14 - 05-20-2012 - "Call me Accccccccce!"

Week 15 - "Crystal Ball"

Week 16 - "Snow Warrior"

Week 17 - "Seriously?"

Week 18 - "Who Loves Ya Baby!"

Week 18 - Try Me

Urban Senior Portrait Sessions

2010-09-19T11:42:00.000-06:00

I was asked to shoot a couple of high school seniors in an urban/graffiti environment recently. Not knowing where to find a safe location for shooting I turned to a fellow photographer for some help on locations (Thanks Sheila!). It turns out that the Santa Fe Art District in Denver has some gorgeous graffiti in the alley ways adjacent to Santa Fe street. This is where we ventured to take some senior portraits. While not exactly super safe, it did provide a great location that was very close to the busy streets of the art district, should we need to exercise our fight or flight responses.
During our shoots we did encounter the occasional homeless person roaming the alleyways. There is a mission/shelter just a few blocks from our shooting location. Everyone seemed very nice and just interested in what we were doing. There is also a school very close by and we had the occasional hecklers and whistles from some of the guys. Others wondered and asked if we were the graffiti bombers and if this was our work of art! Ha Ha! Can't claim this as our own artwork, but it did give me a good idea of having a graffiti party at home. By putting up some large white paper in 4 or 5 stations around the back patio, we could create our own "Canvas & Cocktails" party. Response on my post to Facebook was a resounding call of crickets! I guess I'm the only one who thinks it would be fun.

Some untouched photos from both shoots:

OptimusYouth Benefit Concert

2010-04-28T12:22:00.016-06:00

So, I work with this guy and we are talking in the break room about life, and I find out he plays bass in a band. Cool!! I used to play bass in a band. I tell him that I would love to come down and do some photos of the band playing sometime. I also told him that I always wanted to do CD cover art photography and that it would be a fun opportunity to shoot the members of his band for their demo cd or whatever.

It turns out that he and his band and three other bands are going to be playing a benefit concert in downtown Denver at The Walnut Room.

The four bands will be playing and all proceeds from the night will be going to the Optimus Youth Organization.

To quote them from their website:

"The goal of OptimusYouth is to support well-positioned community efforts at home and abroad by providing requisite resources and skills to better serve the local population. OptimusYouth is a bridge to pass along the support of our international donors to well meaning leaders, projects, and neglected children around the world."

Here are some more OptimusYouth links to follow: Blog & Facebook.

Nice! What a great opportunity, I said, you must be jazzed! I told him I'd love to come down and shoot while his band was playing. After checking with his band mates and the members of the other bands I was asked to come down and photograph the entire evening.

Not knowing where The Walnut Room was located I quickly Googled it and checked the map. Needless to say I was a little concerned about it's location. Back when I was in a band we used to practice in a warehouse down in this area of downtown Denver and it always freaked me out. Back in the 1990's this area was all warehouses and you never saw anyone on the streets and it just seemed like a really shady area. The street view of the place looked ok, the restaurant/bar looked new although the surrounding area still looked like mostly warehouses and really old businesses. Still, I was determined to do this photo shoot.

Well, it turns out my concerns were for naught. As I was driving down 38th street, Blake street and Walnut street, I noticed people were everywhere. They were walking down the streets in groups, families pushing strollers, and riding their bikes down the street. Just a block away from the Walnut Room was a newer condominium complex and so I parked in front, feeling much better about my safety while walking into the bar with $5000 dollars worth of equipment and not having to worry about whether my car would be broken into. Sweet. Looks like Denver cleaned up this place since I was here last.

The Walnut Room is part restaurant/bar and part live music club. The restaurant has a great mix of pizza's and typical sandwiches hot & cold. I did try a slice of pizza and it was very good. The club and stage were kinda on the small size but big enough that you could bump and grind without really annoying anyone. Plenty of room up towards the stage to dance and get close to the bands. The sound was good even in the back of the room. I highly recommend this place for both the food & the tunes!

The rest is show biz of course! All four bands were a fun mix of progressive/psychedelic rock, A blues-rock quintet that will have you writin' home to mama, the sultry blues of the likes of John Mayer and the eclectic folk sounds of Dave Mathews, and some good ol rock and roll/folk. Pretty impressive sounds and a great mix for the night.

Here is a list of the bands:

The Mourning Sickness

Thanks To Philo

Chris Michlewicz

Tommy Weber

Alana Opie

Erin Armstrong

Charlie O'Neal

Stan Jones Band
Photos coming soon

Stan Jones Band

Hot Cheese Soup
Photos coming soon

Hot Cheese Soup

All in All, I had a really good time and I got some really good shots of the bands. I learned a lot while shooting in a night club. It's dark!!!!! During the first two bands I was shooting at ISO 800 and soon had to change that to ISO 1600 to get the good shots.

The lighting was a little dark in my opinion and that does not mean I had wished it was lighter so I could take better photos. I think the guys running the lights could use a little help or maybe just a suggestion.....Use more of the bright lights unless someone is doing a solo!!!! Too many times nearly all of the lights went dark except for the drummer who wasn't even doing a solo. I quickly learned that I had to wait for the lights instead of waiting for the best expressions from the band members.

I didn't use a flash cause I didn't want to take away the ambiance of the stage lights. So some of the photos are blurry...which can look good & bad.

I met a lot of really cool people! I want to thank Erin's (Thanks To Philo) mom, dad, and brother for letting me hang out at their table during the show. I got to know them a bit and they made me feel welcome. Thank you! I really enjoyed meeting all of the band members....really cool! And, I met some of the other photographers shooting that night....awesome to meet ya!

Let's do it again!!!!

Wonder Woman Photo Session April 10, 2010

2010-04-18T08:39:00.004-06:00

Company HR Dept

2010-04-18T08:24:00.005-06:00

2010-02-27T22:37:00.004-07:00

2010-02-26T12:08:00.001-07:00

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A Very Large Family

2009-12-03T18:20:00.019-07:00

My latest challenge came in the form of a large family portrait session. I knew it was going to be a little difficult due to the number of bodies and the number of children involved. I had to work fast and furious to get all of the shots that were requested. With so many people and the fact that half of them were little kids, I was working against time and short attention spans from the children.

Spent some time getting my bearings and searching for a good shooting location. The family didn't want to shoot outdoors, even though it was a beautiful 60 degree and sunny outside. Probably better since the little ones might have gotten chilly and possibly dirty.

The house was a 2 month old home with lots of windows and lots of space so no problems there. The first thing that I saw when I walked into the house was a nice long, one turn stairway leading up to the second level. I was thinking this would be a great spot for the entire family. Then I remembered I didn't bring my second camera that has my only wide angle lens. It has the S type mount for the Canon Rebel and will not fit on my Canon 5D. So I kept that spot in mind for later if we decide to go for it.

The living space had a nice sized two walled alcove just off the kitchen and the living room. I had good light coming in from the windows in the living room and I filled the rest with my two Canon 430ex II flash heads behind shoot through umbrellas. This space had only a large couch on a huge rug. We moved the couch so that it was sitting at an angle and which allowed me to place people standing up behind while the rest were sitting on the couch. I decided to place the family matriarch and patriarch in the center of the couch with everyone else surrounding them. I took lots of shots in this spot to make sure I had at least one good shot of everyone smiling and looking at the camera.

Then I had everyone climb the stairs to see if I could get a decent shot of everyone on the stairway. I didn't have my wide angle but I tried it anyway using my Canon 50mm. If it weren't for the one person closest to the camera, the shot would have turned out just fine. The closest person was just too close and was out of focus. The stairway was huge but just not big enough for 16 people.

After a few attempts on the stairs we moved back to the couch to do just the grand parents and the kids. By this time the very young kids were already starting to get antsy, but we pushed on. We got some good shots of the grand parents with the kids and also shot the grand parent's son's family.

All that was left was to shoot the kids alone and to do as much as possible with some of the little ones by themselves and in little groups.

I spent a grand total of 25 to 30 minutes shooting. It was kind of stressful but I thought I did pretty good until towards the end when the family offered me some shots or a stiff drink. I must have looked a little frazzled by that time. I remember spending most of the time towards the end with this little girl. Her parents say she doesn't have a good photo of her and that all of the photos they do have look like FBI photos.

I was a little disappointed that I didn't get a better shot of her. I think if I could have spent some time alone with her without everyone else trying to get her to cooperate we could have gotten at least one to look good. This is the best shot of her...well maybe not the best...but the best that was not blurry from her moving around like a whirling dervish!

Fun shoot...good people!

Corporate Leadership Photo Shoot

2009-10-19T12:37:00.023-06:00

I recently photographed the senior leadership team at SquareTwo Financial for marketing purposes. This was my first experience photographing corporate executives and I wanted to do it in an environmental format. Something I learned from this experience was to choose more than just 3 or 4 settings when photographing 12-15 execs from the same company. More variation in subject placement would have made this project a little more interesting.

The photos were shot using 2 Canon 430ex II flash heads. One with a shoot through umbrella, the other with a grid snoot. I used what natural light there was coming in from the windows as rim lighting. All photos were shot with the Canon 5D with a Canon 50mm 1.8 II lens.

Senior Portrait Work

2009-10-03T18:47:00.025-06:00

I had the opportunity to photograph this senior last weekend. He came to the shoot, astonishingly, with a lot of humor and charisma. Joking the whole time with his father and step mother, he was full of youthful expression.

We worked in the shade under this tree and along the beautiful ponds that are the peaceful rest areas around the Waterpark building on Havana and Parker.

I found this place while working for Kaiser Permanente in one of the buildings here. I spent many breaks decompressing and chilling on the steps or benches.

Thanks to mom, who did a great job holding the reflector and bouncing the light just right onto our subject, I ended up with some really nice shots with great light.

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The Yearbook Photo

In this next shot the subject was sitting in diffused light. Working in close I was able to man the reflector while mom held up her hand to block out some light that was falling on his cheek.

This is the shot they chose for the class yearbook. Not my first choice but it wasn't my decision to make.

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More Photos

Overall a very successful photo shoot in my opinion.
Here are the rest of the photos.

2009-10-02T23:02:00.000-06:00

End of the night. Looking forward to processing some senior portraits tomorrow and executive portraits on Sunday.