Friday (June 11th), I made a public announcement on Twitter
and Facebook about some news that has dramatically changed my life for the better and a lot of friends immediately asked me for more context. I started to write this narrative in great detail and then decided to just keep it a little more simple. Sorry if it’s still too long of a read!

If memory serves me well, around age eight or nine I was told by my parents that I had been adopted at birth. My childhood was good. I cannot complain in that department but there has always been something missing. I think there’s a blood bond that needs to be reconnected. As far back as I can remember, I wondered about my birth mother. Things like, where I got my artistic abilities and more importantly, did she think about me. Was she that nice woman running the register in the checkout line?

The search

My mother was sixteen years old when I was born. My father twenty. Anyone can understand the circumstance that led to my adoption. That is obvious. In my mind’s eye I figured the two of them probably went their separate ways. I would find my biological mother, ask her questions, and maybe then be able to find my biological father as well. In no way was I prepared for the reality of it. A more perfect set of circumstances.

I’ve been searching for my birth-mother for approximately twenty years but really got serious about it after my son was born almost fifteen years ago. Twelve years ago my wife spent days or weeks, filling out adoption registries on the internet. They went unanswered. We hired a private investigator who specialized in adoption searches seven years ago. They worked on the case for one year and turned up nothing. I had very little to go on. I had no names and only non-identifying information. The adoptions in Wyoming are closed requiring court orders for information. Something that requires a medical condition. The hospital and young mothers home in Denver, where I was born, is gone. I was informed all records were destroyed, possibly in a fire. We shelved the search about five years ago and while it went unforgotten we had to wait for something to change in adoption laws, or a slight chance someone would see the records that were filed on adoption registries online.

The contact

On Monday, May 24th around 9:00am I got a call from AdoptionDatabase.org. I had often received emails from the registries but never a call. The caller told me they had been contacted by a gentleman who said he was 99 percent sure I was his brother. She told me they were marking the record as “found” and I was to contact his person and do a DNA test. As far as they were concerned that record was closed.

They gave me my potential brother’s name, phone number and email address. I recognized the area code as Baltimore so my wife and I got on Facebook and quickly filtered him out. I think I shat myself at that point. My wife instantly said he looked like me. He had eerily parallel interests, talents and career as me. And even drove a Jeep (I’m a Jeep man).
I reached out by phone first with no luck. I chickened out with the voicemail so I sent off an email. I don’t think fifteen minutes passed before my phone rang.

When he called, he told me we had a sister (Wow!!) and we discussed the non-identifying information I had, confirming it matched.

Over the first week the three of us compared pictures, descriptions of ourselves and were sure there was only about a half a percent chance any DNA test would be negative. My potential brother and I ordered the tests kits and sent them in Friday, June 4th. We spent all this week spamming the sites forms to get the results back. They were posted yesterday morning; a perfect match.

Now when I said earlier that there was a “more perfect set of circumstances” I was referring to my new brother and sister. They are both one-hundred percent biological siblings. Both of my birth-parents stayed together and had two more children. While my birth-parents are both deceased and I cannot get to know them personally, I think a better scenario is that I get to know my little sister and little brother and in turn get to know my parents. My little sister has two kids and my brother has three. Instant uncle! In addition I’ve got an Aunt in California with two daughters who also have children. Our family just got huge.

For those interested, my Brother, Tucker Jones, is on twitter: http://twitter.com/urbanrunic. He’s a talented designer, artist, photographer, web dev and film maker. Friend him up! My Sister, Trista, is living in Chicago and also is a talented artist (though she won’t admit it). I won’t get into personal details out of respect for their privacy.

Going Forward

I don’t know where this will go. We’re just going to take it day by day and get to know each other. We are planning a reunion this summer and it can’t happen soon enough! I can say that in my opinion the three of us clicked instantly. I feel very comfortable talking to both of them as if I had never been separated and I thank both of them for their openness.

Thoughts

I definitely have to thank my wife, Jodi. Without her, my information probably wouldn’t be on so many sites available for my siblings to find me. And I have to thank Tucker’s girlfriend Kristin for actually using her search powers to find the record. These two ladies are the key to this reunion!

To adoptive parents. Please try to put yourself in your children’s shoes. No matter what you do or say you must support your child if he/she wants to find their biological family. A deep desire to find them is something that many adoptees feel and being non-supportive is of no help and will only drive a wedge between you. Give them all the information you have and encourage that reunion. It doesn’t change the fact that you have raised them as your own. To an adoptee it feels like you have started a book from the middle. While you may know how it ends, you never know why.

My adopted Father has been nothing but supportive and is sharing in our joy.

Adoptees… don’t give up your search, and keep a very open mind. I do understand that not all reunions are happy, but there are just as many that are.

Since relocating my family to Charlotte, North Carolina, in August of ’09 I haven’t had much time (or desire) to go out and shoot. There has been too much going on and workload has blocked the enthusiasm for photography. Yesterday morning the bug to shoot got the best of me and I immediately grabbed my tripod and camera and jumped in the Jeep. Oddly, I did not go straight to this property which is only three miles from my home. Instead, I drove a 25 mile loop only to end up here.

We live in the outskirts of Charlotte where there’s a comfortable mix of farms, countryside, history and hints of big city life. I’ve driven by this location many times since we’ve been here and have wanted to shoot it, specifically at sunset. The sunrises are spectacular here, and I’m a morning person, so why not get out and create some great images.

This house has to be about a hundred years old or older judging from the size of the timbers framing the structure. I was able to see through missing floorboards and broken lattice work. Pieces of furniture still adorn the house, covered in dust and dirt. Old plastic bottles and toys littered the floor and yard. A dog bowl hinted at the one-time existence of pets.

What struck me as humorous was a sign behind the property that read “Rent to Own” with a realtors phone number scribed in marker. The local fire department (if I have the property correct) has scheduled to burn the house down as a training exercise some time this winter or spring, so I’m glad I got the opportunity to record the house against a dramatic sunrise.

This shot was taken with a Nikon D80 on a tripod. A Sigma 10-20mm superwide and 1 second exposure. This image is NOT HDR. I did however bump up the curves a tad to get the sky true to what I saw. Although I have my in-camera settings set for saturation I still can’t get the D80 to record the colors truer to life. Or it could be the RAW conversion when I sync to Aperture.

Since posting this picture of my son Brodey on Flickr many months ago, I have received a lot of emails asking how I did the post work. Many people think it’s HDR, some say it’s got the Dave Hill feel to it.

I will go through my recipe in detail. It’s not a hard process. It’s something I’ve refined to work for me and over time, it’s become second nature. I have even used it on landscapes with great success. A lot of this works better with higher contrast images and good lighting (not that I’m great at lighting).

Feel free to use the techniques but please don’t republish this article or the images used in it.

Note: Click any image to see larger views.

Shot Details

For this shot, I setup under a bridge in the mid afternoon sun. Dialed down so I could overpower the sun coming in from the sides of the bridge and setup a SB-600 controlled via CLS to the left of the camera through a white umbrella.

Reduce Saturation of RAW Image

I don’t like overly saturated images so the first thing I do is reduce the overall saturation. I usually go back in later and add in a little saturation for certain colors which we’ll do in a later step.

Vignette

For some images, vignettes work nicely. Especially this image because I think combined with the graffiti it adds a feel of darkness and grunge.

Increase Saturation in Blues

Now I’ll add back in some saturation for just the blues which will help pull out Brodey’s eyes and shirt. A little bit of blue exists in the graffiti which will make for some nice accents.

Add Definition

Before I send the image over to Photoshop, Aperture 2.0 has a very nice definition tool which I use to prep the image with some detail. In version 1.5 (the original image) I used the edge sharpen tool.

Send to Photoshop

This is as far as I go in Aperture. With Aperture 2.1 you can do a lot of the following steps but I prefer photoshop for the heavier lifting.

Duplicate Base Layer and Add A S-Curve

Duplicate the base layer and go to Image >> Adjust >> Curves to add an S-Curve. I always click on options and choose “Enhance Monochromatic Contrast”. It will effect the luminosity of the image this way instead of blowing your colors.

Shadow/Highlight

With the duplicated layer still selected, go to Image >> Adjust >> Highlight/Shadow. Unless the highlights are blown, I typically only work with the shadows to lighten some of the dark areas. For this image my main concern is Brodey’s hair, shirt and a little bit of the graffiti. I think this is a fantastic tool and one that is often overlooked in photoshop.

Duplicate Layer and Set To Soft Light

Duplicate this newly edited layer (your second layer) and set the blending mode to “Soft Light”. Most of my images seem to work best with this blending mode. “Vivid Light” and a few others can be used as well so play around after the next step and see which you prefer for the image you’re working on.

High Pass For Detail

I’m a fan of using High Pass for adding detail instead of unsharp mask. I think it does a much more painterly job when sharpening and can add some very nice effects to the image. Go to filters >> other >> High Pass and set the radius slider to about 9. This is highly dependent on the image, but for most I find this setting where I like it. The reason I set the blending mode prior to this step is so I can see the effect of the High Pass tool in real time. If you don’t, the image will look embossed like the tiny preview in the dialog.

Dodge Hair, Eyes and Wrinkles

I go back to layer two, the layer that I did the curves and highlight/shadow to and dodge (lighten) the midtones in the eyes, hair and shirt’s wrinkles to pull out some more details. If you dodge the wrinkles in the clothing, it tends to give it a more three dimensional look.

Burn Shadows in Wrinkles

After I dodge, I usually go back and burn some of the wrinkles just to pull out more of that third dimension. Be careful not to pull the focus of the image into a area where you don’t want it.

Duplicate Layer and Move to Top

When the dodge and burn is complete, duplicate the layer and move it to the top of the stack. We’re going to soften the image a little. When using the highpass and dodge tools, the image can quickly become too harsh with detail in my taste. Some people may want to avoid this step but I typically do it on all portraits. It softens the skin too and helps hide blemishes.

Add Gaussian Blur

Choose Filter >> Blur >> Guassian and set your radius slider to around 1.5, just enough to blur the image and hide some of the harsh details. Apply the filter and set the layers opacity to your liking. For this image I set it to about 80% opacity. Notice you still have more detail than the original image but not too harsh.

Step Fifteen Erase Eyes

Now that the image is softened, I want the original harsh detail from the earlier steps in the eyes to draw them out. I use the eraser tool with a soft edged brush to remove the gaussian layer at the eyes.

When I’m satisfied with my edits and save the image which sends it back to Aperture for cataloging.