Costa Rica

Lately I just can't seem to travel enough, so when my friend was visiting from Australia and we found $250 round trip tickets to Costa Rica, we got right on that. We left three days later, and went to the town of La Fortuna (next to an active volcano) for a couple days and spent our last night in the city of Alejuela. Somehow my high school Spanish skills came back to me, so we were able to get around without much of a problem. I was mostly "vacationing" and didn't take too many pictures, but I scanned some of the ones I liked.... and here they are.

Big Guns

Back in March I went upstate to photograph a story for Field and Stream about a woman who won an essay contest they were having on being a female hunter. Now, I may have grown up in the country, but I've never been around guns. Ever. Let alone people firing them so close to my head. I must have looked nervous, so they gave me the big ear phone type things that block out the noise. There was also no snow when we left New York, so when we arrived at the shooting range we found that we were not only under dressed for the cold but not wearing the proper footwear for the snowy/muddy conditions. Thirteen hours later, we arrived back in New York, dirty, soaked and tired, but I got some great shots so I can't complain.

Eddie Adams Workshop, Part 2

I also went to a local trailer park and took pictures during the workshop, and I've included some other random photos and portraits I took around the farm. I think I got a total of 2 hours of sleep a night, and by the last day I was pretty much delirious from exhaustion. Once I got back to New York (after missing the bus because my phone/alarm was on vibrate) I made an attempt to catch up on sleep, although I didn't think things through enough in advance and had bought concert tickets for the night I got back. I survived (somehow), and in my delirium purchased tickets to Costa Rica for the upcoming weekend. I'll be posting photos soon!

Eddie Adams Workshop, Part 1

I was fortunate enough to participate in Eddie Adams Workshop XX at the beginning of the month. I was on a team lead by photographer Vincent LaForet, along with Michelle McNally and Josh Haner of the New York Times. Our project was "the decisive moment", which was a lot trickier than I thought! The same night I arrived I was lead off to start my assignment, photographing the local strip bar with a guy they called "Big Sexy", and following up with them at home the next day. Unfortunately I was only able to catch up with one of the girls, but the following are the images I took that night and the following day.

Working Stiff

Back in August I photographed Grant Stoddard, author of Working Stiff, whose spent quite some time experimenting (sexually) with a great number of women. The article was for Australian Marie Claire, and it proved to be one of the strangest photo shoots I've been on. Why? Just look at the table. One pair of legs belongs to the Penthouse Pet of the Month (an ex-girlfriend of Grant's), the other a computer programmer, not to mention the contents on the table, some of which we were unable to really figure out entirely. Oh, and word on the street is nipple clamps only hurt coming off. Go figure.

personal project

Last weekend I went driving around upstate New York photographing different family members. First stop was Lyons Falls, a little town up by the Adirondacks with a population of about 600. I photographed two of my father's brothers, one of their wives, and my cousin.

Next I went to Auburn, which is west of Syracuse, NY, and photographed some of my grandmother's sisters.

I finally ended up back in Rochester, where I went to school, and photographed a friend of mine as well as visited with more family there.

Overall it was a very exhausting but fun long weekend, it was nice to breathe some clean air and see the leaves changing colors!