Break Up

I saw this guy with his girlfriend at Sunset Beach the other day. I was there taking some pictures of the kids and noticed an argument between them. They started something pretty fierce with his girlfriend ( I think it was a girlfriend) yelling some profanity at him while he walked away. Ofcourse everyone else minded their own business and ofcourse I kept shooting. A little while later as I was taking a picture of the kids I noticed this guy in the background. He had his head tucked away between his arms and legs. He would every so often lookup and I could tell he was welling up in his eyes. I was 200mm away and it was quite obvious he wasn't happy.

I am always intrigued with people. I have found that you don't necessarily have to pose people to get the shots that evokes who they really are or what they are really feeling at a given moment. I guess this is why I love taking candid pictures. They're real and to the heart.

In this case I decided to take a picture of the poor guy not because I thought it would be a good picture but because it reached in and reminded me of how sad anyone could be at any given time. Just an hour ago this poor guy probably decided to go to the beach with his girlfriend to watch the sunset. They were happy and for some reason their world flipped upside down.

There's a story behind every person.

Shutter: 1/500.............F-stop: 2.8
Flash not fired.............Matrix Metering
ISO: 400.....................Aperture Priority
200 mm

Happy Birthday Brooke!

The dynamic duo as we were going out of Toys R Us.

Brooke: You can't buy one cuz it's not your Birthday! Na Na!

Skylar: Are you gonna do something about this girl Daddy, she's on my nerves!

Going To The Heat

I'll be leaving for Phoenix tomorrow morning to meet up with Inpulse, our call center. My understanding is that it's 105 degrees with humidity at 16 degrees. Pretty hot man. I'd be interested in bringing my clubs for a round but I think I would be stupid to play in that kinda heat just for the fun of it. Anyways, afterwards we have a meeting with someone quite influential in the world of international business. If you need to meet someone or get an idea accepted in say...China, he can do it. Speaking of China we are looking to bring a few of the companies we have over there. Hey they've got the worlds largest population! If it hits it will hit big there.

I'll catch everyone later on.

Haven't gotten around to finishing the Papparazi blog. I've been trying to get these pictures finally fully processed and getting these nutty ideas out of my head and on to paper.

BBQ...Gas or Charcoal?

Yes I know, people nowadays would prefer a gas grill for convenience and efficiency. But do you remember the days when your Dad (or Mom) would struggle to start a fire with charcoal and lighter fluid? They would work on making the heat just right by fanning the briquets with a piece of cardboard ripped from a box. It was quite some work but for some reason I do recall that the food my Dad cooked back then was always better than the food I cook over a gas grill today.

Maybe it's just me being a bit nostalgic. But I seem to miss the times where you had to "work on" starting a BBQ as opposed to just flipping a switch or pressing a button for fire. Just the mere facet of having to wait for 10-15 minutes just to see if the charcoal is that nice color would be fun to do again. Sure you can run into the problems of running out of charcoal in the middle of BBQ'n. And the mess afterwards??? Charcoal grilling is definately a lot more work....but the taste!

I am sure the debate over which method of grillin will yield better taste will prove that it's a draw and that the comparisons would even indicate that in some cases grillin over gas would taste better. Why they say? Because it has nothing to do with the fire but the juices and spices from the meat that is being grilled they say. The argument for charcoal grilling is that you can get a much more intense and hotter fire. Which by the way stimulates the juices and spices in the meat. The hotter the fire the better tasting...so they say. There is also the traditional arguments such as gas can't replicate the "smoke" flavor that can be found in charcoal grillin.

Whatever the arguments I am conviced that my Dad's BBQ was better than mine is today. Not that he's better at BBQ'n but because he had a charcoal grill. I also remeber that food at the park seem to taste better as well. Rarely have I ever attended a park function where either it was a pot luck or food off the grill. The grilled food was a lot better than your conventional gas grilled food I recall.

Why this blog? I figured I would go out and get me a grill. Do I stay within the confines of efficiency and the one click start? Or do I get dirty and go the route that would yield me the taste that I remembered when I was kid?

Benefits of Gas and Charcoal Grills

Gas

Push button convenience
No messy charcoal to deal with
Easy to start
Control temperature with a dial
Control temperatures for longer periods of time
Can still use wood for smoky flavor
Wind is not a factor

Charcoal

More heat
Hotter grill
Flavor from charcoal
More intense smells
More hands-on experience

The Adventures Of Ching and Chong Continue

Here they are, hamming it up for the camera once again. Click on the picture to see their movie.

Megan and John (Engagement)

I am still working on more of your shots but for now here is a slideshow with 9 or so images I have worked on. Some you're familiar with already. Sorry it's so short. I'll put more up shortly. See you guys soon! Click here to see their slideshow.

Joy and Clifford

Hi guys, I know you have been waiting for the album design. Unfortunately I have been in the midst of launching 2 new corporations and wasn't able to get what I needed to get done. What I did do, however, is created a slideshow of some minorly peocessed images. I hope you enjoy the show! I'll alert you as to when the album will make its way here. Click here to see their slideshow.

Joy and Clifford Collage

Their wedding was fun to shoot. It was a bit on the hot side with a few people taking a chair to regain energy. But overall it was fun. Their MC was very good and kept the crowd going and Joy and Clifford themselves did a wonderful job at what they were supposed to do...have fun. You can see by the look of their pictures that they did well.

Stay tuned for their album slideshow coming in the next few days.

Megan and John

First of all, sorry I cut your foot off, John. Second, this image was way underexposed and I had to do alot to get some of the image back. I liked this image alot that's why I decided to work on it. I noticed it didn't make the cut in their "favorites" folder. With the exception of Megan and John, the entire image was wrong. I knew the guy in the background would blow (notice white t-shirt) if I exposed correctly but I wanted to hold the background. Give and take. Cut off the feet (accident) and original was way underexposed (again, had to do it to hold the background). What was right? Megan and John. More Megan than John. She has a cool look to her in this shot. Makes the picture I think.

Joy and Clifford

I haven't posted in a long while. Quite a bit going on. In between everything I was able to shoot Joy and Clifford for their engagement session. I only am able to post one picture now but stay tuned and I will post some more. The shoot was in Huntington Beach and the two did a great job!

This image was underexposed a bit and I had to do a bit in Photoshop with Curves. Why was it underexposed? I knew the white sea foam would give me some trouble if I exposed for them correctly. And I want some sea foam in the shot. So I underexposed to hold the sea foam knowing that I could bring Joy and Clifford back in post. Why not use flash? Next time when I don't have a million things on my mind while shooting.

Update: for those of you who have monitors which are not calibrated then you probably won't visually see what I mean. A friend of mine said, "you didn't hold the background, it blew". It didn't blow his monitor was set with too much contrast. Anyways I thought I would share.