Santa Fe Motel

I went out Sunday night looking for an image to capture.  I have been drawn to night photography again which is something that I do periodically.  I really love the feeling of the night.  I am not sure if the feeling is conveyed through the image but for me when I look at it I can feel the crisp air, the quiet and the solitude.

With it being a new moon it complicates night photography because other than artificial light there is nothing really lighting up the scene.  This sign caught my attention and I stopped to capture it.

This was shot with my Nikon D300s and Nikon 50mm F/1.4 lens at 10 secs F/16.

Inspiration...

I had an opportunity to do some night exploring with a friend and we were searching for an interesting scene to photograph.  The moon was nowhere to be found and we came upon these wind mills with the lights from a local city lighting up the night sky. 

The shot was a 5 minute exposure at f/5.6 with my Nikon D300s on my Nikon 12-24mm F/4.0 lens.  

First Baptist Church of Glendale

I had an amazing opportunity to site walk and take some test images of the historic First Baptist Church in Glendale California.  The original building was constructed in 1912 and then was expanded upon thereafter.  It is a truly amazing facility with a lot of character and grandeur.  I spent a lot of time looking at the building and then a lot more capturing some of the images you see here.  I hope to return and spend more time capturing the history of this great location.

The lighting was a bit tricky trying to balance the interior with the sunlight coming through the beautiful stained glass windows.  With this being basically a test shoot I was attempting to capture some nice images and then analyze the results later to fine tune the exposures and techniques used.  I was really pleased with the results that I achieved.

But the best part of the day was meeting with with an old friend from High School who I haven't seen in over 23 years and just recently reconnected with.  It was wonderful to be able to catch up.

Most of the images I shot this day were captured with the Nikon D300s with a Nikkor 12-24 F/4.0 lens.  

Trip up to Lone Pine, Ca...

I met up with my buddy and excellent photographer friend Mike Cassidy for a trip up to Lone Pine, Ca to capture some incredible landscape, sunsets and clouds.  We were not disappointed and after setup and waiting for the weather and sun to line up we were rewarded with a majestic view of the mountains.

It was a really great time and a wonderful time.  We explored a lot of the areas around the area while chasing the light.

The shot above was shot with a Nikon D300s and Nikon 12-24 DX AF-S lens.

Film Noir Shoot

I had the opportunity to team with Faith and Cliff from Oval Studios on a "Film Noir" shoot they scheduled a few months ago.  It happened to coincide with Faith's birthday which made the entire event even that much more special.  It was a super great time and we worked with models Jessica McGoldrick, Diana Dominquez, Jules Ensey, Amber Jones, and Samantha Griffith.  We had a great make-up artist Amanda Moore who did a fantastic job making the models look beautiful!

In the tradition of the Film Noir style the lighting was harsh and everything was in black-and-white.  I pulled out the super large black backdrop, grid-spot and speed lights.  We set up around 5pm and finished packing everything up around 4:30am the next morning. 

Faith was the main shooter and I mainly worked the lights but I did capture a handful of images that I'm pretty happy with.  Click on the image above to cycle through the selects!

These images were shot with the Nikon D300s and Nikkor 85mm 1.8 AF-S lens.  Really great combination!