Bristol | Scottsdale Baby Pictures

April 18, 2012 by Rick | 1 Comment

Newborn Photography 

Although taking pics of newborn babies is not my norm, I am still a photographer right?  It can’t be that hard… plop the baby down on something furry, stick a fun hat on them, and shoot away.  Easier said than done. 

Ambient light from the large windows was not cutting it.  Enter 1 SB600 on 1/32 power in a Westcott 50” softbox camera left (just out of frame) and a 42” silver reflector camera right.  The low power of the speed light enabled me to keep my aperture in the f1.8 to f2.5 at ISO 320 to 400.  Baby Bristol was just shy of 4 weeks old, roughly twice the outer age limit for newborn photos, and was much more active and inquisitive than anticipated.  It took the combined efforts of Mom and Dad to keep her sleepy and “moldable”.  As a result we were only able to grab 3 solid poses before we had to call it quits.  Here is one of my favorites.

 

Bristol is a beautiful baby!  Thanks to Mom and Dad for allowing me to capture this special time, and thanks to my good pal Ken for “renting” me his hats.

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SheaXero ™ | Commercial Photography

April 13, 2012 by Rick | Leave a comment

SheaXero ™ 

Needless to say, I was excited when the great folks at Trilogy® asked me to shoot parts of their new ad campaign for SheaXero.  SheaXero, through a number of innovative construction techniques and the generous use of solar panels, reduces electric bills to $0 is most cases.  The best part?  SheaXero is now “standard” on most, if not all, Trilogy® homes.  For the campaign, they built these amazing studios to show off the features of Xero and in case you weren’t sure where to go, they marked the studio entrance with a gigantic 6 to 7 foot tall aluminum “X” covered in artificial grass.

 

Below are a few shots from a very quick 1 hour shoot out at Encanterra Country Club.  As a commercial photographer, or any kind of photographer for that matter, it is always cool to see your photos in various forms, whether that be in newspapers, magazines, or plastered all over the web.



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Pine Island – Part 2

April 4, 2012 by Rick | 1 Comment

Things have been quite busy so far this year, with a number of new commercial clients in Scottsdale as well as Seattle.  Add to that the house we’ve been remodeling and it’s not left me with much time for any “me” photography or much time to keep up with the blog or partake in social media.  Take today’s photo for example; I took this at some point in the late summer of 2011.  It is one of many photos I want to share, but simply haven’t had the time to post.  Related photos from the same beach are here and here.

 

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Stars – Joshua Tree National Monument

March 8, 2012 by Rick | 6 Comments

Stars

 Heavy, grungy guitars defined the rock sounds from the early to mid 90’s.  Rock gods such as Nirvana, Stone Temple Pilots, Pearl Jam and Smashing Pumpkins defined the genre, while a series of one hit wonders provided a hit here and there.  Hum, the band best known for their single “Stars”, is no exception.  The song, sharing the same name and premise as a Maxfield Parrish painting, talks about a girl sitting “out back counting stars” is filled with heavy guitars.  Check it out on iTunes. 

What does this have to do with today’s image?  Absolutely nothing other than it is a picture of Stars.  This is from a recent overnight trip to Joshua Tree National Park with some buddies.  Other images from the trip appear here, here and here.  Stay tuned for a few more from this trip.

This was a 30 sec exposure at ISO3200 with light painting courtesy of my iPhone and rendered usable through the magic of Topaz DeNoise 5.  The D90 starts to deteriorate significantly above ISO 1600.  My new Nikon D800 (on pre-order baby!) will be a welcome improvement overall and certainly at higher ISO… enabling me to shoot this at a proper shutter speed of 10 or less (helping eliminate minor movement blur in the stars). 

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Dead Calm – Movie Title Wednesday

February 1, 2012 by Rick | 5 Comments

My man Mike Olbinski does a great series most Wednesdays called “Movie Title Wednesday”.  Today he was kind enough to allow me to pirate his series and bring you “Dead Calm”, another image from the Salton Sea and Bombay Beach. 

Much like the Salton Sea, “Dead Calm” has a little bit of everything: nudity, sex, profanity, violence, gore and the mysterious and ever present “adult situations”.  The story of this 20+ year old movie goes like this: Nicole Kidman and Sam Neill take an extended vacation on their yacht to escape from a tragic car accident.  While on the boat, they come across a sinking boat with Billy Zane being the only survivor.  Turns out Zane killed the crew of the boat and eventually pirates Kidman’s boat, kidnapping her in the process while leaving Neill on the sinking boat in the middle of the ocean. 

I won’t give away the rest of the plot, but there are a few twists, a spear gun, a flare gun, a dog and of course the “dead calm”.  Not a bad movie all in all. 

Although today’s image has no nudity, sex, profanity, violence, or gore, I think burying your tripod legs 3” into the dead fish and salt laden muck to steady your rig against the lapping waves to grab 2 minute exposures is an “adult situation” and not for the kiddies.    

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