The Homeless Video

If you’ve been following our blog, you’ve seen some of the stuff we’ve been going regarding the homeless in Detroit over the last few weeks.  Don Pham and Jamie Honce shot some video when we were down there recently and Don put together a really powerful piece.  This is Terry and Thaddeus who we had the chance to talk to and interview.  The main goal of this piece is to help raise awareness to the importance of doing what you can to help our neighbors in need.  We want to continue heading down there to help tell their stories and make people realize that there are real people with real struggles right nearby.  Please feel free to embed this video on your website, facebook account, or anywhere else.  Embed codes can be found by clicking here.

Homeless By . .
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The 4 corners photography road trip

After Imaging USA, I went on a road trip with my friend Ben and Adam.  The trip started off on a rough note with Ben being pretty sure that he broke his foot playing volleyball the night before.  That left Adam and I scrambling to rent a car so we could continue our trip.  Thankfully after going to the doctor Ben found out that he had a broken blood vessel which caused all the bruising and swelling and he was ok to go on the trip with us (although it probably wasn’t a great idea).  We returned the rental car, met up with Ben and headed out for the four corners (Arizona, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico).

We started out in northeastern Arizona at Canyon De Chelly which is an amazing place.  Other than the sound of the wind, it’s super quiet there.  Of course we had to break that silence by yodeling into the canyon which was awesome when after the 12th echo the cayotes down below howled back!  This is spider rock viewed from the south rim of the canyon.

Canyon De Chelly - Spider Rock

After shooting some photos from the rim, I spent some time taking some pictures with my infrared camera.

Canyon De Chelly - Infrared

Canyon De Chelly - Infrared

Canyon De Chelly - Infrared

After exploring the rim, we hired an indian guide to take us down into the canyon. Ben has a 4×4 Nissan Pathfinder which was perfect for offroad driving in the canyon, across the river washes, and through the mud. We shot some video of the truck tearing across the river, but that will have to be posted later.
One of the highlights in the canyon is the White House which is an Anasazi Indian cliff dwelling.

Canyon De Chelly - White House

It was really cool to see all their carvings in the rock faces.

Canyon De Chelly - Petroglyphs

When down in the canyon, going from sun to shade made a huge difference.  The sun provided warm soft light and it was comfortable to walk around without a jacket.   Here are some horses basking in the sunlight.

Canyon De Chelly - Horses

However, in the shade, it was cold with a biting wind. Here’s some ice from an area of frozen river. I loved the warm colors reflecting from the canyon walls.

Canyon De Chelly - ice

The clear blue sky, orange rocks, and white snow was spectacular:

Canyon De Chelly - view from inside the canyon

The light in the canyon provided some good opportunities for some infrared pictures:

Canyon De Chelly - infrared trees

Canyon De Chelly - trees

After lunch we took off for Monument Valley in southeastern Utah. Our goal was to get there an hour before sunset and drive around the valley to photograph the soft evening light and sunset. When we got there however, the road was closed off except for guided tours which were more expensive than what we wanted to pay. Adam had the idea of paying one of the Indian guides to let us in which worked out great.

Here’s a view of the valley from the deck of the visitor center:
Monument Valley afternoon

The evening light in the valley was beautiful and I loved the silhouettes of the rock formations against the clear skies.

Monument Valley afternoon

After the sun went down, it got dark…fast!! Their was a blanket of stars across the sky so we setup our cameras on tripods and did some long exposures. This is probably my favorite photo from the whole trip.

Monument Valley afternoon

That night we drove out to Cortez which is in the southwest corner of Colorado and right near Mesa Verde National Park. Right before getting to Cortez, we were pulled over twice in 10 minutes for having a busted headlight. The headlight was busted because while driving at night, we hit an elk at 65 mph on the highway. We were really blessed to have just clipped the back end of the elk. If we had hit it straight on, it would have been a REALLY bad accident. It was a huge animal…it’s back end was up higher than the hood of Ben’s truck. We were lucky to just bounce off it. However the damage was still pretty bad with a smashed in quarter panel and a driver side door that wouldn’t open.

The next morning we got up really early to photograph the morning light at Mesa Verde. The mountains heading up to Telluride, CO were not too far in the distance which made for some nice photos:

Mountains near Mesa Verde National Park

Mountains near Mesa Verde National Park

Mesa Verde is best known for it’s cliff dwellings. These are some of the largest and most well preserved cliff dwellings in the US. We came across a number of different ruins. The first one was called Tower House.

Mesa Verde National Park - Tower House

After that, we stopped at the most famous spot in the park which is the overlook to the Cliff Palace. It was a spectacular site and really interesting to just look at and wonder what life must have been like to live there.

Mesa Verde National Park - Cliff Palace

The view driving out of the park was beautiful with the snowy mountains and blue sky.

Mesa Verde National Park - mountain view

After Mesa Verde, we checked into our hotel in Farmington and took a nice nap. Then it was out to the Bisti Badlands in New Mexico for a short sunset hike. The Bisti Badlands are known for their unique rock formations. They reminded us of the unique desert rock formations we saw in Egypt back in 2004. We walked across some really odd terrain. It was very dry and cracked in some areas and extremely wet and muddy in others. I think we all gained about 5 pounds on this hike from all the mud stuck to our shoes.

Bisti Badlands dry ground

Here’s a panoramic photo that is 5 shots stitched together:

Bisti Badlands panoramic

As we waited for the sun to go down, we sat back and enjoyed the soft light on the rocks with the wispy clouds in the sky:

Bisti Badlands rock formations

Once the sun went down the clouds lit up with spectacular colors to give us an amazing show:

Bisti Badlands sunset

Bisti Badlands sunset

We started hiking out after sunset and we found a mud pool that was reflecting the last bits of color in the sky. This made for a fun abstract photo. It looks like a large lake but it was actually a 4 ft. mud puddle:

Bisti Badlands sunset

When we got back to the car, it was nearly dark. Rather than heading back to the hotel we decided to setup to do some more star trail photos. Shooting photos in the dark, you need to be very careful to make sure your focus is set right. This first picture was a 20 second exposure to just test my focus, but it still brought out a lot of light and color in the sky with just some hints of the first stars of the night.

Bisti Badlands starry night sky

We then waited for it to get VERY dark when all the stars came out. This photos is a nearly 30 minute exposure of the night sky:

stars at the Bisti Badlands

The next morning it was on to Chaco National Heritage area where they have more spectacular Indian ruins. We followed our trusty GPS to take us on a short cut that was going to cut about an hour off of our drive. However, we soon realized that the shortcut had us going down roads that weren’t really roads. In the end, we made it to our destination and DID save a lot of time, but for most of the drive, we weren’t sure if we were going to be able to make it there. When we arrived to the park, the ranger was ever so helpful and told us to never trust the GPS in that particular area. Thankfully we had 4 wheel drive and were able to go where we needed to go.
Here’s a quick shot at sunrise before turning off onto the side roads:

power lines near Chaco

When we arrived in Chaco, we were unfortunately there at a really bad time of day where the light was bad. The photos didn’t turn out that great, but it was still a unique experience to see all the spectacular ruins. Here’s a photo taken after hiking up the cliffs to look down on the main ruins of the park – Pueblo Bonito:

Chaco National Park - Pueblo Bonito

and here’s a photo taken from inside the ruins. It was really cool to be able to walk through and see how everything was built.

Chaco National Park - Pueblo Bonito

It was time to start driving back towards Phoenix as our flights were going to be leaving tomorrow morning.

We stopped at the Painted Desert National Park which had some beautiful colors in the landscape but was otherwise not too thrilling.

Painted Desert National Park

There were a few wispy clouds that provided a nice backdrop for some infrared photos:

Painted Desert National Park

Our last stop was at Sedona where we went to watch the sunset at the Red Rock Crossing. There were lots of other photographers all doing their best to stay out of each others way. What a spectacular location:

Red Rock Crossing Near Sedona

As we walked out, I saw these tree roots which I thought made a cool abstract photo:

Tree roots near Sedona

Just after sunset the sky turned a beautiful hue of pink above the red rocks:

Red Rocks near Sedona

Here’s a photo of Adam, Ben, and myself at the Bisti Badlands:

Adam, Ben, Prem

Imaging USA in Phoenix, AZ

Last week, I attended Imaging USA out in Phoenix.  For those that don’t know, it’s a huge national convention attended by thousands of photographers for the purpose of education, networking, etc.  I was honored with a chance to speak at one of the workshops which was a lot of fun and I hope to have more opportunities like that in the future.
The convention filled my head with lots of new ideas that I’m excited to try out.  In this industry/economy, it’s always important to continue to reinvent yourself and constantly learn, change, and grow.  These conventions are a perfect opportunity for that!

Musician photos for Tommy Steele

 This afternoon we took some pics of country singer Tommy Steele.  We planned to shoot a few head shots inside and then go outside for the rest of the shoot, but when we were ready to go out, it decided to snow too hard to take photos.  So…part two of shoot will be in a  couple weeks.

You can check out Tommy’s music at:

http://www.myspace.com/tommysteele

Here’s a few pics that we did inside today:
tommy steele band photos

tommy steele band photos

tommy steele playing guitar

tommy steele and steele canyon band

Amy Cremen from the Biggest Loser

This morning we had the chance to meet Amy Cremen.  Many of you will recognize her from the last season of the TV show the Biggest Loser.  Amy is looking to get into acting and modeling so we got together with her to do some head shots.  Amy is a lot of fun and will hopefully be able to use all her personality, singing voice, and her cute new look to make a long career!

Amy Cremen head shots

Amy Cremen from biggest loser

Amy Cremen headshots

biggest loser Amy Cremen head shots

Amy Cremen from the biggest loser tv show

Promotion senior pics