This made me laugh so much I wanted to share it. I recorded Mayz singing a bunch of different stuff on my iphone and distorted it using the “voices” app. He was singing these songs all normal but the app made it sound really funny:

This afternoon we got together with Sydney to do some head shots to help her acting career. I’ve known Sydney since we lived on the same hall freshman year of college. We got reconnected when Cheridy and I shot her wedding last year. She is a woman of many talents. In college I remember her being an accomplished musician and now she is working full time as a lawyer. Since she has so much free time (just kidding), she decided to take up acting when the movie industry started coming to Detroit. Just in the last year, she already participated in 7 movies. 3 of those she was a stand-in and 4 of them she was an extra and has got to work on some really cool movies with the likes of Toni Braxton, Al Pacino, David Schwimmer, and Clive Owen. Now she’s ready to move past being an extra and is ready to take on speaking roles.
Go Syd!!!

This past Saturday, Cheridy, myself, and Mayz headed downtown to hang out at one of the barbeques with the homeless. Every Saturday a group of dedicated people goes down there and brings food, clothes, etc. to a park at 2nd and Selden.
Some of you might remember that about a year ago we got involved and were doing interviews and photo shoots with some of the folks down there. We didn’t know why we were doing it, but God told me to do it.
Recently we were contacted by an organization (Rackham Choir that is planning on putting on a benefit concert for the homeless and they want to use some of my images and stories as part of a multimedia presentation for their event….how cool!!
I also found out recently that one of the guys who’s story we told last year (Terry) had been shot twice a few months ago. He had two bullets in his arm and when he went to the emergency room they wouldn’t take the bullets out and said that since it was his arm, it wasn’t life threatening so they just gave him bandages and sent him on his way. What a world!

Anyway, while down in Detroit Saturday we met a bunch of people including the Glen who is in the first photo below. Glen has an amazing spirit. He grew up in a good Christian home and he has 8 brothers and sisters. He said that he was really tempted with peer pressure in high school which led him down the wrong path. He felt like the black sheep of the family because he always messed up. Hanging out with the wrong crowd led to taking drugs and then dealing drugs. He did this for a long time until he got busted for it. There were many times that he wanted to quit but it was easy money and since he never graduated high school, there weren’t any other opportunities good enough for him to stop what he was doing. Thankfully for Glen, he has a great family and brother who loves him enough to take him in. Glen is currently living with his brother downtown. The house they live in is owned by his brother but a while back, he wasn’t living there. While it was vacant, he asked the city to turn off the water but apparently they didn’t and in the winter the pipes exploded and the house was flooded and water logged for an extended period of time. Now the two brothers are back in it and trying to fix it up and make it livable again. They have electricity but no heat since the hot water heater had been underwater and ruined. Glen’s brother led a very different life and just retired from Chrysler but with the bad economy and some bad investments, he’s not in a great spot either. Together the two of them are tackling life and hopefully Glen’s brother will help to get back on track. We had the opportunity to spend some time with Glen and it was great to get to know him and hear is heart and his struggles. He can quote more bible versus than anyone I’ve ever met and at one point he said “I know too much to be doing what I’m doing today….God gave me this knowledge so I can make a difference.” So, we’ll just pray for Glen and pray that he can conquer the things he’s struggling with and start doing some of the things he’s called to do.
This first pic is Glen and the others are some more nice folks that we had met downtown.

Just announced our next basic photography class with a new structure.

Next class is Sunday, January 24th from 9:30am-5:30pm
ALL the info/registration can be found here:
http://arisingimages.com/learn/basic_class

The revised class will include a 60 page class book, one full day of class time plus a DVD with 1.5 hours of Photoshop Elements video tutorials, 75 slides talking about composition and shooting concepts, plus a series of images taken from past students in both their original form and after receiving Photoshop retouching.

Class size is limited so make sure to sign up as soon as possible. Spaces will only be reserved once your non-refundable payment has been received and are done on a first come, first served basis. The January class often fills up because people get a new camera for Christmas and want to learn how to use it so make sure to register early if you have interest.

Please send this along to anyone else who might be interested. A $50 discount will be provided if you sign up with another person that you can carpool with.