What a wonderful weekend...

Thanks for everything baby!

Walking out the Front Door

Sometimes taking pictures is less about the final product and more about the people you meet and the glimpses of life that you are allowed to witness. Taking pictures has never been easy for me. I am not the most vocal person and talking to people, especially strangers, is something that I have definitely had to work on over the years. I actually really like this about myself. It forces me to watch and be calculated about things. This picture isn't particularly great or moving, but I like it. I like their faces and the textures. I sat and talked with these two for about a half an hour and it really made my day. I guess what I am trying to say is that I need to get out there everyday and just talk with people. I just started freelancing full time last year and somehow managed to steer clear from the full time newspaper job that offers a false sense of security. Instead I am competing with an incredibly talented group of photographers who are both intimidating and inspiring, working my ass off to diversify my client base, and working on things that I actually care about. Although frustrating at times, I am grateful to be where I am and for all of the talented editors and photographers that I have worked with over this past year. Stay tuned for an update on a couple of projects I have in the works.

2010 Purpose Prize Winners for Talking Eyes Media

Several months ago I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to work with Talking Eyes Media on a project they were working on for the 2010 Purpose Prize Winners given out by Civic Ventures. It was an exciting shoot for me because I shot both video and still photographs with the 5d Mark II, which I hadn't done a ton of, especially without doing my own editing. The shoot was 2 days in Portland and 2 days in Oakland with Julie Winokur and Marshall Leaman who were great to collaborate and work with while trying to tell these two stories. Both the subjects, Barry Childs and Margaret Gordon were a pleasure to work with and hear their stories. Check out the videos below...

Rio work featured on zReportage.com

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The Music Man of Starbucks for The New York Times

Last week I spent an hour with Timothy Jones, of Starbucks Coffee. I dragged some lights, stands, and my camera gear in there and ended up liking the one that I didn't light. Jones, along with his team of employees, are in charge of selecting the music that thousands of people hear and purchase at their stores throughout the country. I wanted to capture him in a unique way, without using obvious props such as piles of CD's and other things that he had at his desk.
Working with publications is always interesting because you never know how much space they have or which image they will want to run. In this particular instance, they only had space to run a very small picture so they chose one of the images that wasn't my favorite. You can view the story here, but I think this image that is bathed in yellow light is very telling of Jones' personality and what he does for a living.
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Ingalls Peak Attempt

Climbing Ingall's Peak by either the South Face or the East Ridge is fairly easy rock climbing, but didn't pan out yesterday. It was a late start, well, left seattle by seven, more snow than expected, and possibility of weather.


The middle peak in the image is the one that either is climbed on the left ridge (south face) or the right ridge (east ridge). Once we made it up to this point, we decided to try another day with proper snow equipment and more sunlight.


We did however get to catch a view of Mt. Stuart, which I like to describe as a damn sexy mountain and would love to climb one of these days.