This is the Rebellion against overproduced images often in the digital world. These are images made from my film cameras. Each image I shot myself. The subjects are often friends, and acquaintances in their world.
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However she does live in the LBC and we’ve known each other since High School. Let’s recap. We are Juniors in high school, she’s from Cocoa Beach, I’m from Lake Mary. But living in Florida allowed you to work at Sea World. So I meet her through a mutual friend Jason, and I guess that he still can’t get over how Pharaba and I still really think on the same page. So much so, that she later becomes my producer on several jobs that I do and still remains my friend. (which says a ton of what we think of each other if we can still be friends after a job).
In life, many have Jimmy Buffett dreams, but hardly never act upon them. Pharaba has. Diving in Coral Reefs, Fishing in the Carribbean Sea, living in the Florida Keys, working in Ski School on Mammoth Mountain, Producing Films and Television shows in Hollywood, and marrying the Man of her dreams.
During July 4, two buds of mine caught the train from North Hollywood Station to Long Beach to go her pool party. She had always bugged me and bugged me about not being on the blog. Which had merit because she literally was the oldest friend I have thatI still regularly email and keep in touch with.
In fact if you want dirt on me, there’s plenty of opportunity that she’ll not only have it, she’ll have the pictures to prove it.
Well I brought the Rollei south to LongBeach that day for one reason. To take this photograph of her. If this is a blog of my life and the people who are in it and bless me continually, then she needs to be on this.
She gave me a chance working on one of her jobs which led to even more work, and even more work, and because of her, her advice, and her trust, I was given opportunities that many only dream of getting. I owe her so much.
And to think, while she was working cush job of helping the Shamu Character walk around the park in the suit, I was scooping the poop at the clysdale farm and during the daily anheuser busch parade. (Incidently when those clysdales get “excited” it’s quite an amazing thing. Take it from a guy who has to trail behind them in a parade when they get back to the farm and hospitality center at the park, they not only poop a ton of those nugget things, their schlongs are well…long and swing haphazardly all over the place..ahh memories.)
In retrospect, Pharaba has given me a ticket into my dream profession, and shared a little bit of that Jimmy Buffett life with me.
Long Beach, CA
Rolleiflex 2.8E 80mm Schnieder-Krueznach Porta 160 NC
Ghostbusters on Flickr.
The Tire Swing
So I am working with some guys and the shoot is on The Sony Lot in Culver City. Upon entering through the guard gate, I see this. If you remember Columbia Pics produced Ghostbusters and was later bought by a Japanese company(Sony), this was the beginning of outsourced Los Angeles.
So in a corner, next to some portables and a dumpster, was this relic of my childhood. It was a good day, I just DP’d an A/B Lister for a national spot, and was hooking up with the other wing of our production so they could take some of our gear.
As a kid, you dream of being in movies, because Indiana Jones was the coolest thing you knew, and James Bond was possible, and perhaps I was that Farm kid either with the Force or that green crystal in my barn. And you throw yourself out there, you sacrifice much, you dream of something better. You dream of impossible odds, and yell at a Gold android, to “Never tell me odds!
It’s all part of the lore of pop culture, and getting to work in that field, makes everyday at work, very very interesting. Because surprises like this, can blow you away. And especially when you have an ability to namedrop, but don’t, a part of you feels pretty darn stoked that this is the reality.
Bagging groceries at Winn-Dixie(southern supermarket) to rubbing shoulders with the stars. Life really is just a tire swing.
Culver City, CA
Rolleiflex 2.8E Portra 160 NC 80mm Schnieder-Krueznach @ 4
Raphael’s joint in the West Village on Flickr.
A little bit of France in the West Village
My little brother is New York now. Black shirts, black shoes, black jackets, black on black with a sprinkle of black.
Upon arriving on a red eye from LAX into JFK, and an expensive gypsy cab ride later, I slept on the floor of his Harlem apartment when I arrived at 1:40 in the AM. Keep in mind I had just spent five hours on a flight and this was the hospitality that he gave to show his NewYork to me.
You know as brothers who survived out of difficult situations in a small town in Central Florida, there is something cool about our professions and how they led us to the two competing metropolises of our Nation.
I type this on westbound flight from Orlando, headed back to LA, reflecting on the egg white omlettes, and black coffee. The blur of NY, has fond memories, but I’m more and more entrenched. In the idea, that Southern California is home. Because it is.
Home. Home is the place where we get chances to construct our experiences, not the places we used to live. Not the places that we are comfortable in. Home gives us purpose. And NY is my brother’s home as LA is mine. However Home shall not be confused with our Roots, which has and always will be the Beautiful South.
West Village, Manhattan, NYC
Rolleiflex 2.8E Kodak Portra 160NC 80mm Schieder-Krueznach
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