Merry Christmas

With all that has happened in the last week, it was hard for me to remember that all the people I was competing with for seats on a plane where trying to do the same thing I was. Get home for Christmas. I almost feel bad for being as horrible as I was to some of them. After all, I made it home, I got all my luggage in one piece, and I am alive for now.

Keeping up with the holidays, this one goes out to my brother in Iraq, Ryan Kent, we love you and hope you have a safe holiday in Iraq, come home soon. Heres a picture of my family holding a blanket bought from the Colorado area he was stationed in before he was sent to Iraq.

From 2008-12-24 Ryan

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

Breakfast in NY, Dinner at home

Or not. That was the plan, fly from LA on the red eye, wake up in NY, eat and head home in time for lunch. Of course that didn't happen. I flew into the JFK Airport in Newyork, but what they failed to inform me was that I needed to get to the La Guadia Airport from there to catch my next flight. So of course this means I missed it. After a one hour bus ride I got to LAG, and was placed on a standby flight.

I had lunch and then waited paitntly for a seat on the flight, all for naught. I then went to the help desk and was presented with only two options. Option 1.) Fly to boston, and catch a flight there to PGH. Option 2.) Get a hotel room and try again tommorow. I took option one. Flew from LAG to Boston in an hour, and have been sitting here since waiting for my flight home. its now 5:46 PM EST. I have been traveling for 19 hours now. Slightly drowsy, hungry, and aggrivated. I don't like flying.

Day 3 - LA

I did not really have anything from yesterday, so I decided to combine the posts. Yesterday I went into downtown LA, and just walked around. Started at the staples convention center, across the street from the Nokia Theater. Nothing special, kinda like a mimic of Timesquare in new york. From there I just walked into the center of town and had lunch at a place called Tranquility Lounge. Not a bad place to eat. I then headed to Macy's and bought a pair of socks, and in the bottom floor was a mall area, I stopped at radio shack and bought a Tracphone since my phone doesn't work here. Then headed back to the hotel.

Shortly after a good friend of mine swung by to pick me upfor dinner. We headed into Downtown Santa Monica. Me and Arby met another friend there named Molarus where we had dinner in the Third street Promanade. Then walked to the waters edge and just bullshit for the rest of the night. I did not have my camera with me.

Day 3 I went down to the pier and checked out the beach. Its starting to get chilly around here in LA, yet all the locals are wearing heavy winter clothes as if it was freezing outside, that amazed me. I then headed back to third street and spent a few hours there just looking around.

2008-12-20 LA Day 2 and 3

Traveling should be fun!

I did not sleep last night. I got in my taxi at 4 AM EST. Arrived at the Airport at 4:30 AM. I was told to arrive two hours before the flight leaves, I made it with two and a half hours to spare. I decided to hang outside for the extra half an hour and have a smoke a little since I thought you can't smoke in the airport until the only bar opens. At about 5 AM I went inside and walked up to the United Airlines and checked in, or tried too. Turns out that United handled my flight, but US airlines took care of everything... after finding this out I decided it best to smoke again. Once I smoked I headed to the US Airlines and checked in, checked my baggage, gave it to the security officer and headed to the security check point so I can get to the boarding gates. The officer there said I need a boarding pass... Whats that? handed her everything I had, and I did not have a boarding pass. Turns out the self check in machine did not print this piece of information. Frustration levels rising, I headed back outside for a smoke. At this point I am dead tired, and still have one and a half hours to go till lift off, I just want some coffee. I headed to the checking again, this time got the boarding pass, and headed to security again. I got through security with no issues, hopped the tram to the boarding gates, got coffee, breakfast and sat down to wait a bit for the plane to be boarded, its now 6 AM.

I started to get a bit ancy, as I was nervous about flying alone. So I decided to see if the bar was open. To my luck it was. However, you can't smoke in it anymore... The only way to get a smoke is to head outside. Crap. That means I have to ride the Tram outside, have a smoke, go through security and then ride the tram back. I decided I can wait until we land. At 7 AM the flight was boarded and we lifted off. I sat by the window and looked outsie hoping to see the city. I was wrong. The sky was all overcast with clouds. The entire 6 hour flight was nothing but a white floor under the plane. It wasn't even that cool, above the fluffy clouds look. More like a game that didn't render the ground with the right texture and you have a solid whit floor. It was odd. Almost like the world wasn't real. I then went ahead and watched the dark knght and horton hears a whoo on my Ipod for the remainder of the flight.

I landed in Arizona at 11 am Mountian time, thats two hours behind the Eastern Time zone. This makes it 1 PM back home. Turns out my flight from Arizona to LA left 30 minutes before I had landed. Thats good news to tell someone that hasn't smoked in over 7 hours. I went ballistic screaming at the lady in front of the boarding gate. She calmed me down by calling security, and then issued me a new boarding pass that would get me to LA at 2 PM central time. that's about 4 pm EST.

The Pheonix airport is very nice. It has a huge food court before the security check point, as well as all kinds of mall shops. I didn't shop any, but I did have lunch at a pizza parlor there. It was kinda neat to say "I had breakfast in Pittsburgh, then flew to Arizona for lunch.". A few hours later and a few smoke breaks later I realized I was timing my self on the wrong clock. I was watching the LA clock I had added to my Ipod, not realizing that Arizona and LA are in separate timezones. If I hadn't looked at the flight delays and saw the current time, I would never had left. I rushed to the boarding gate, hopped on the plane, and was sat next to a young couple with their 1 year old son. Yes this is as bad as it sounds. The trip was only 55 minutes from Phoenix to LA, but it felt like hours. The kid did nothing but scream in my ear the whole time. I did get a good view out the plane window and took a pic.


Once the plane touched down I went to call home and let everyone know I had made it. It was 3 PM PST, 6 PM EST. Turns out all the roaming minutes I added to my phone means nothing in LA.... I got no signal. With all that has happened in the last 10 or so hours, I felt like something worse was about to happen. I just knew that the airline had lost my luggage or something. I went outside and had a cigarette, then headed to the baggage claim. After ten minutes I was able to grab my bag and leave! Hopped a cab and gave him the address of my hotel. OK, this is where I should get screwed. This guy is gong to take the longest route to the hotel. Not the case. I rode in the taxi for an hour on the freeway, but it cost me less than it cost me to get to the airport back in Pittsburgh. I tipped the guy the 15 dollar difference.

Alright, I am at the Hotel! My Journey is over for the day! Oh wait... Murphies Law. What ever can go wrong will go wrong. I started assuming the worst. My reservations where given away because of my absence during the check in time. Something had to have gone wrong. I walk in, mention my Reservation, and boom, I get a key. Headed upstairs and got in my room.

All in all, the trip was very frustrating, but I feel rewarded. I feel like I did something that I would never even thought of doing before. Tomorrow I plan on going into Downtown LA, and take some photos of everything, everybody I see. Hopefully I can get a hold of my rinds out here in LA and meet up with them as well. Maybe I will get one of those track phones with like 25 minutes to use while I am hear as well. Enjoy some of the pics from today.

2008-12-18 LA Day one

Strange new lands await

Two more days until I arrive in California. Exactly 48 hours. I am excited, and nervous all at once. I am experiencing the packing woes right now. I need to get packed for the trip, but have no clean clothes. Which means a trip to the laundry mat, which is a hike and a half from my house, in the freezing cold weather. As well as this, I am charging my camera battery, and my Laptop battery, as well as a few portable game system batteries. Although I still feel that I am going to forget something.

The filming went OK on Sunday. Wasn't anything spectacular. Just two people reading from a paper to the camera for about 10 minutes. I still have to do a little editing on it to eliminate the moments when they stutter on the screen. I tried to give them suggestions on what to do in front of the camera, but other than framing, and mic'ing the scene, they didn't want to have it. But meh, its their grade not mine.

Speed Vs. Opportunity

This morning was a bail out. Unable to get the second person thats involved with the school project to pick up his phone. So the filming never took place. Instead I went to my old job and had breakfast. It felt good to be able to walk in there and see that they where struggling without me. Almost empowering.

At about 1 I decided to lie down for a nap. Only got about 20 minutes in before I heard the cat running around like crazy yelling at something. I opened my eyes to witness a bird fly into my room and land on the Final Fantasy 9 wall scroll I had hanging. Thinking quickly I opened my window and screen so that the poor thing could get out, shut off my fan to try and save it from injury, and then realized I have a perfect opportunity... I could be photographing this thing! I slinked over to my camera bag and pulled it out, snapped two images and it flew out the window. I wasn't able to get anything stunning. But I felt it was a cool enough thing to share.

What the hell is an update?

No real news on the front today. I have a small project coming up this weekend involving school students giving speeches on film, then I head for California. The students are friends of mine, so I am taking this opportunity to light a scene in front of my brand new Canon GL2. As well as play with the new Boom and Shotgun Mic I got to go with it. I doubt I will need the Wide angle converter.

Wednesday I get to see the fabled Trans Siberian Orchestra, followed by hours of laundry and packing. My flight for California leaves at 7 AM, so i have to be at the airport at least by 5 AM. I am really looking forward to going out there, to see the lay of the land, to check out real estate costs, and to meet some friends. this will be the first flight I take alone, and the first time I travel out of state alone. So I am defiantly nervous. I plan on taking my laptop and my D80 in hopes to catch some real stunning images, not the touristy stuff, but true art.

As for the Walking with Dinosaurs, while I am sure that Beth is angry over the whole thing, she stayed very professional, and just said "It's ok". Aparently she worked it out with the contacts at mellon arean had so that she could post some of the images they supplied to her. However, I think I know the problem I had. I was reading things backward. A very amature mistake. I turned UP my Fstop, which meant less light not more. So I was picking a good shutter speed, the aprature was just closed so tight that I wasn't getting any light in the lens. I defenatly want to get to another setting like that and take some photographs just to play with the settings and see what I can come up with before I make teh final call though.

Opportunity Lost

I went to the Walking with Dinosaurs event at the Mellon Arena here in Pittsburgh today as a Photographer on behalf of Lux Magazine, a small locally distributed mag. I would like to say that the show was incredible. The dinosaurs moved independently, with the exception of the smaller ones that had human actors dressed in an awesomely looking suit.

But this post is not about the show. Its about the photos I took there. When I arrived at the check in, I was presented with a bunch of rules I had to follow. Don't disturb the paitrons. Don't use flash. Don't move about the arena. Don't take photos after the first act. Don't leave the sight of security. There where three photographers at the event. Plus the local news channel. They all new each other. I was the odd one out. at about 6:30 pm, we headed out to the desginated area for photos. It was about halfway up the stands, a good 50 or so feet away from the stage. Not to mention it was al of us cramped in this little corner at the top of a row of seats. I immediatly broke out the D80 and equiped my telescopic lens thinking I want to get some shots that look like it was right ontop of the action. This may have been my first mistake. I then adjusted my Fstop for some quick shots, knowing this would produce a dark image. Of course I tried adjusting the white balance to compensate for this. the show starts. I start snapping images. Lowered my Fstop a little, and ended up with blurry shots... 460 shots later and the first half is over, time to pack up and head out. Locked my camera up with security and enjoyed the rest of the show. We then left, and returned home.

Once home I imported the images and found that out of all 460 I only had 1 usable image, and t was of the actor, not a dinosuar. What a dissapointment. I should call the beautiful and talented Beth Hensel that hooked me up with this deal. But I won't its 12 am now and I have 1 usable image. I feel like I blew it big time. Perhaps making something from nothing is harder than I thought it would be. I knew it would be hard, but imagined that after 2 months of owning and using a camera I should be able to use it right. Perhaps I need to rethink my strategy. Never fear though. I will not give up.

The Esentials

Lets talk about the tools of the trade for a bit. As a starting photographer, I have purchased a Nikkon D80, that came with a standard Lens with a 18-55mm optical zoom This lens allows me to place the Telephoto Lens and the Wide Angle Macro lens additions onto it, as well as one of the three light filters. I also received a Telescopic 70-300mm optical zoom lens with the camera. We'll talk about these later. As far as cinematography goes, I received my new Cannon GL2 in the mail yesterday. I have not had a chance to power it up and test this one yet.

The Nikkon series, as far as I can tell from reading many articles, is a very high valued camera. Many photographers use this brand, and start with one of the low numbers like the D80 or D70, and move onto the D300 or higher. This I feel is because of financial issues. Its much easier to drop around $800 for a camera than it is to drop a couple grand. The difference between a double digit and a triple digit really boils down to the settings and options that the camera allows you to control. With the D80 I can set my focus, use an optical zoom, which is a big thing in photography. As well as use many settings like an ISO for photo noise or clarity, and allow for metered readings through the camera. The D300 does all of this, but just does it slightly better. Has a faster response time, and uses a many media options for storage. Other than that they are the same cameras.

I want to take a moment to touch on digital zoom versus optical zoom. Digital zooming uses an on board chip set to act like a computer and zooms in on the already "taken" image. I use this wording because I mean that the image is being processed before you press the red take picture button. While this allows you to get a closer zoom, it also lowers the image quality. This happens because the camera is set to use say 10 mega pixels per image. That's tens of thousands of pixels placed where the image is. Then you start to zoom, and effectively you are cropping the image and blowing it up right there in your hand. This process can lower image quality because it cuts off the amount of pixels shown versus the total pixels used. A good example of this would be opening a picture in paint and then using the magnifying glass tool to zoom in a few clicks, you'll noticed the image starts to get slightly blocky, and the farther in you get the worse the image looks. The optical zoom actually keeps the image at the same size at all times, but uses lens distance to bring the image closer to you and does not sacrifice pixels during this process, this makes for a crisp clean image every time. the only way I could explain this with an example would be to close one eye, focus on an objects and then just move up to it and look at it. The object looks the same, but is closer.

Now, zooming in on objects isn't always the way to get a good image, but it helps you get closer to things that aren't always accessible. The best way to take an image that I have found is to zoom all the way out and place the lens on the camera right on the subject. Sometimes even this isn't enough, and that's where Telephoto and Macro lenses come into play, these add-ons allow you to take an image of something from point blank, but the lens brings out a richer or wider shot, allowing for texture and color to bleed through allot better. Of course this all takes practice to master, and even the best photographers take the same image with several camera settings, and several lens types.

I mentioned f/stop earlier. I don't know exactly what it means, but I know that its a metered expression of light. If my camera says that my subject has f/1.8 light on it, then the suggested f/stop to use would be that number or close to that number. What does this do to an image? It simply controls the lens shutter speed to allow more or less light onto the lens. This will help you get a crisp image that isn't to white or to dark. However there are many other things to consider. I.e. The subject is moving and you can't afford to have the lens open for 1 second, because that will cause a blur. That's why the camera comes with white balance, and EV settings that allow you to saturate the image with a little more light through digital enhancements made during the click of the camera.

As for the Cannon GL2, I chose this camera to be my first based on the multiple awesome reviews it had on Amazon.com. I originally was going to buy the Cannon XL2 which is a more professional camera that allows you to change the lens aperture, and control almost every aspect of the camera i.e. the f/stop. However the XL2 is $3K and the GL2 is 1K, and when trying to make something from nothing, you don't have allot of money to play around with so I had to go to my second choice.

Making Something from Nothing

Ok, so I lied a bit there, I have received a small amount of float cash due a family death about a year ago. But the principle is still the same. I am trying to launch a small business or carrier from almost nothing. I started out by purchasing a very nice and professional camera, one that allows for great optical zooming, and allows me to add and change lenses as needed. Along with this camera I got a standard 55mm lens, a 700mm telescopic and a few add-on lenses (Telephoto macro and Widescreen). Bought one of those books that help you learn the in and out for this specific camera and am ready to go. Now I do have a little background work as an amateur cinematographer, and editing work that I have done for friends in the past. I find this type of work fun and rewarding. Granted I don’t have the backdrops that most photographers use, nor do I have umbrella light kits, but I do at least have a thousand lights that we purchased a year ago for demand satisfaction productions. I think they should be adequate to start with. The only thing I am missing is a subject.

Now, photography is an art. You can take images of landscapes and make them breathtaking, a flower and highlight its detail, and if you are lucky a humming bird hovering inches above a pool of water casting a prefect reflection. These are all the types of photos that I am trying to do right now. Which are easily obtained through patience and practice. However, there is one type that I cannot obtain, and that is of a model subject. Whether it is male or female, no one is willing to work with an armature photographer, especially the first time they are doing a photo shoot. I don’t blame them. I wouldn’t want to have to go to some guy’s house, and take a large number of photos change my clothes and take more for a few hours.

I had hoped to be able to get a License, Car, and launch my photography business by January 1^st 2009. I don’t think this will happen. The only Images I do have are from the Pittsburgh Zoo, and I didn’t have the camera in my hands that day, I let a good friend of mine Beth takes the pictures. Now I am not saying she did a bad job, just saying I didn’t do anything and can’t really say it was my work. So now I have a little less than a month and a half to achieve my goals and still have had absolutely no practice. Let’s see how well I do under pressure.

Why am I writing this? Am I complaining to try and get someone to feel bad? Absolutely not. I am writing this because when I do succeed, I want to look back and see how I did it. When I do succeed, I want anyone that is looking for information to find what worked for me. Think of this as a guide for not only me, but anyone out there that is trying to get into photography or cinematography. And yes, I am doing some cinematography work later this year as well.