Portrait: Sharon

I've been looking forward to this shoot for a couple weeks. Monday night Sharon, myself and an assistant headed to SMU & Snider Plaza to shoot a portrait session. Sharon is great in front of the camera and we came away with some fun pictures!















This was great fun and I had an excuse to use some off-camera flash. This is the first shoot I've planned out with that in mind and I'm really happy with the results.

Adventures in Eyeballs

So, this may not be the coolest post ever, but it's a true story!

So, last week I hurt my eye:



According to the doctor, my eyeball dried out whilst I was sleeping and my eyelid stuck to my cornea. Then I ripped some of that same cornea off when I woke up. It's pretty much as painful as it sounds and is definitely a "say eight" level situation. This has happened to me over the past 3 years every 3-4 months in alternating eyes. I'd always thought a bit of sleep was stuck under my eyelid and was scratching my eyeball. Boy, was I wrong. Last week was by far the worst ever. My usual procedure of 'take two excedrin, go back to sleep, feel better in a few hours' wasn't working. At all.

I ended up calling a friend to take me to the eye doctor. The doctor managed to get the hurt eye open, put in some numbing drops and figure out what the heck was wrong. He shined some lights in there, poked it with a Q-tip, he *painted my eyeball with some stuff* and then taped my eye shut. I went home and slept for two days straight until my follow up appointment.

At the follow up on Wednesday, the doctor said everything was healing ok, but he wanted it to stay shut another couple days. The patch came loose due to some Wednesday afternoon adventures with Michelle (the brakes in our car failed, it was kinda exciting), so I replaced the gauze + tape with a better patch:



On Friday (go go Rebecca Black) I was allowed to go patchless. My left eye was still super blurry, but it felt nice to be back in the land of stereo vision again. I celebrated by making a self portrait with a nice blue sky in the background:



My left eye still isn't 100% clear, and it affects my ability to get shots in focus with my camera. I hope it clears up soon. Anyway, at least I lived, got to wear a cool eye patch and had friends I could call when I was in full-on 'Ouch' mode. I have to put crazy eyedrops in every night now, but there's reason to hope that this won't happen again. (Fingers crossed)

Engagement: Jesse & Sheree Pt: II - Film Edition!

I got the film back from Jesse & Sheree's engagement shoot. The film grain adds some neat character and yields really nice skin tones. I really like the low contrast and subdued greens. Here are a few:

















The film shots have a simplicity that is really great. It's probably a combo of the unique 'look' of the film and the fact that we slowed down more for each shot. I want to shoot more film!

Film: First Roll Back!

I got my first roll of film back from the lab and wanted to share a shot or two.





The grain and color character of film is a definite plus. I should have a couple more rolls coming soon. I'll be excited to see them.

Engagement: Jesse & Sheree

I had the privilege of shooting an engagement session with Jesse and Sheree last Friday and I'm really happy with the results! This is a location I scouted last week at sunset. We ended up meeting to do the shoot at around 9am, which offered completely different light! We came away with some great photos of good looking people sharing a special moment. Check it out:





















I know I posted a jillion images, but you can see the rest of the set on Flickr (click here) . I also shot a roll of film with my Elan which I should get back in a week or so. I can't wait to see how those look! (That's blogger code for "stay tuned for an update!")

Film: New (Old) Camera!

I got my Elan IIe yesterday and I am already in love.

It's just a little bit too awesome.




The big bright viewfinder is AWESOME. It makes my 50D look bad in a few ways. It's got every feature of the digital, a larger viewfinder and is really smooth to use. It's also probably 15 years old. I used it on a shoot earlier this morning and I think I'm gonna try and shoot a roll or two a week. I find that I really slow down and work for a better picture when I know I only have 24/36 of them.

Scouting: Dallas Water Works

I headed back out to White Rock Lake last night to poke around at the Water Works. I know, it's a cliche to love photos of red brick buildings, but these buildings look so good! Really, I want to live inside of one.

Again, in the absence of smiling faces, a flower will do:




This little pier is going to be an awesome spot for portraits. For now, this beam will have to do


I want to go to live in there.

Scouting: White Rock Marina

I headed out to White Rock Lake yesterday to scout out a portrait location near the marina. It was beautiful out there, but a little hot.







6/6/11 Update: I came back out closer to sunset this evening to get a look at the different light. This place is gorgeous!




In the absence of smiling faces, a flower must do.








This location is dyno-mite at sunset. I'm excited to shoot here!

New Camera!

I finally earned enough photography dollars to replace my Rebel. My new 50D arrived today! I was kind of excited.



OMG, 50D!