frontier[photographer]

every time i shoot with film, i think of daniel boone....

i was told a story when i was a kid about daniel boone. when daniel was young and growing up in the american frontier, his father wanted to teach him how to shoot and hunt. to do this, he would only give his son one bullet per day, and send him out into the wild. with only one shot, young daniel would have to be very conscious of how he spent it. if he took a shot he couldn't make, the bullet was wasted, as well as the day. he learned quickly to wait until all the conditions were perfect before taking the shot.

here are a few shots from my "trigger happy" outing the other day.

the year in pictures [2009]

year five for the [year in pictures] post.

what a wild year 2009 ended up being. for the past three years, life has been fairly simple. get up, go to work, put 40 hours in, relax and enjoy the weekend. it's amazing how deleting one piece of that formula changes everything. like it did with a lot of people, the economy slapped me in the face this year. although slaps can hurt and sting a bit, they can also be an awakening. if 2008 was a very [internal] year for me, 2009 was the complete opposite. not only was i able to expand my view on the world by traveling more than i ever have, but by reading and studying, my thoughts on my professional and personal goals were questioned, explored, changed, and strengthened. here are a few pictures representing the "sting" and "awakening" during the past year.

up in the air_1.22.09

last january i attended the kansas aviation museum's open house. i took this shot because i liked the way the silhouette of the plane looked in the light. i would have never guessed this would have made the top ten photos of the year, but after going through my albums, reminiscing on the past, this photo, with it's setting sun mixed with the idea of travel seemed to be the perfect foreshadowing of the year to come.

shelved_3.31.09

last march a group of local photographers were allowed to photograph the inside of an old player piano building before it was cleared out. decades of piano repair had created five overstuffed stories of objects, gadgets, and things...basically a photographers dream. walking around, taking pictures, there was something exciting and depressing about the whole experience. a building that had served it's purpose for years, filled with it's tools of the trade, being cleared out for something new. change always brings about that feeling.

laidoff_4.1.09

the very next day, i was laid off. that exciting/depressing feeling hit me again. i boxed up my "tools of the trade" and headed home, unsure of what might lie ahead.

the artists_4.13.09

not long after i was laid off, i was enjoying a few drinks with friends. that night, a couple sat next to me. before too long we struck up a conversation. the couple ended up being mark and beth, traveling artists from wisconsin. they had booked their art in galleries across the mid-west, and were on the road, following their art, eventually to end up in austin. naturally we talked about art, and architecture, but that led to deeper discussions about following one's passion, no matter what the sacrifice. after last call, they left, and although we'll probably never cross paths again, the discussion we had was the most perfect and inspiring, i could have had at that point in my life, and gave me a new sense of direction. they will forever be my muses of 2009.

friends_5.25.09

in may i, along with most of my college friends, traveled up to portland to witness the wedding of one of our buddies. although most of us were unemployed, it didn't stop us from enjoying the city. the days were filled with late brunches, coffee, and beer. it had been three years since were were all in seaton hall, working late nights, and that weekend proved, nothing had changed.

hazards of love_5.27.09

what year wouldn't be complete without a decemberists concert. in may, i was able to see them play the entire "hazards of love" album non-stop, from beginning to end. always a wonderful and beautiful time.

vivienda moderna_5.28.09

for two months this year i worked construction in kansas city. my wonderful and gracious friends eric and lauren, offered me a job helping them finish one of their projects. although this did give me a chance to get out from behind the drafting desk and get my hands dirty, what i really enjoyed was strengthening my friendship with these two.....living and working with someone seven days a week for two months tends to do that.

real life fiction_6.2.09

this year i started reading "on the road", agian, but this time i was bound and determined to finish it. while in the process of reading it, i took a trip to denver. not only is denver mentioned several times in the book, but specific address are given. finding an online guide, i spent the better part of a day visiting a few places mentioned in the book. the above picture is of a bar neal cassody, the real life dean moriarty, use to frequent. soon after this trip, i finished the book.

study hall_7.14.09

wanting to use the free time i had been given with my unemployment wisely, i started studying for my architecture exams. along with a lot of reading and test taking came a lot of iced coffee which, through the course of the summer, i was able to perfect.

bubble girl_10.2.09

one of the last trips i took this year was to the austin city limits music festival. i was able to snap a picture of this girl mid way through one of her spins. her "hippy-ish" look adds to the delight of this photo, but i just really enjoyed her care free, no worries attitude, and i was glad to capture a bit of that feeling on film.

[lounge]time is here

wishing anyone and everyone that may stop by this page a wonderful holiday season and a happy new year!

a [downtown] christmas story

i'm not exactly sure how many times you have to repeat an event in order for it to become a tradition, but i feel i may be on the verge of one. last week the orpheum theater had a showing of one of my all time favorite christmas movies "a christmas story". now, i know very well that come christmas, i'll have my fill of this movie when tbs runs it's annual "24 hours of a christmas story", but there was something exciting about seeing this classic on the big screen, i couldn't pass up. so, just like last year, my friends and i gathered to enjoy a cup of coffee before hand and than walked to the theater. leaving the frigid temperature of the sidewalk behind us we entered the lobby and found it decorated for the holidays. making our way into the theater we found the place filled with people! not finding enough seats on the floor to accommodate all of us, we headed to the balcony. as the movie played it was obvious most of the audience had seen this movie no less than 2,000 times before, as most of the funny parts got laughs before they happened. however i'd like to think there were a few "newbies" in the crowd, a few lucky individuals seeing it for the first time on the big screen.

this movie is wonderful on so many levels, which is no doubt the reason it' s a classic. first of all, since it came out in the early 80's, it's always been a staple in my christmas experience. i remember discussing the "frozen pole" scene with friends during recess, wondering if one's tongue really would get stuck. i also had "that" christmas during my youth, when all i wanted was a b.b gun, hearing the famous "you'll shoot your eye out" line over and over. being older i now appreciate different aspects of the film. how the very simple story line developed into such a full story with the use of creative and rich narration. how the fairy tale, norman rockwell-esque setting plays backdrop to the more familiar family settings we all know, such as a father cussing at a broken furnace, but most of all, i enjoy how the movie captures the timeless feeling of what it's like to be a kid during christmas.

leaving the theater with my friends that night, and walking the streets of downtown, i couldn't help but get a little sentimental norman rockwell-esque christmas feeling myself. spontaneously running into, and catching up with some other friends, who had come out to enjoy the movie as well, on the street, only enhanced this feeling.

so, this whole, downtown-christmas-coffee-movie-at-the-orpheum-thing, may not be a tradition yet, but i'm thinking it needs to be. maybe next year, i'll make it official.

[buying] under the influence

i'd like to send a warning out to anyone reading this. please, please, do not, under any circumstance, peruse craigslist while under the influence of nyquil.

last week i came down with a little 24 hour bug/flu/cold. feeling it coming on, i left work early, went home and immediately took a shot of that sweet, sweet green nectar of the "get some rest so you can feel better" gods, named nyquil, and fell asleep. waking later that evening, before the full effects of the nyquil had worn off, i decided to surf the interwebs for a bit. i made the usual rounds... local news, flickr, facebook, blogs, hulu...but eventually wondered into, what i feel is, the "garage sale" neighborhood of the internet...craigslist. not nearly as classy or cute as the artsy neighborhood of etsy. no, here in craigslist you got to be careful. lots of weird characters around these parts. you gotta keep your wits about you, this is not a place to enter "hopped up" on anything...let alone nyquil.

the problem, i quickly discovered, is that everything looks amazing! everything's a deal. i had no idea what i would do with "a beautiful poem in a frame" but it sounds nice, and it's free! fill dirt? i don't' even have a yard, but there's three free dump trucks of it just waiting to be nabbed! how could you turn that down. luckily i had some sense about me, that is until i came across the listing of a "mid-century modern couch" before seeing the picture, i was in love. reading the description only made me fall deeper. thoughts like "you already have a couch", "how will you get it in your apartment?", and "what are you going to do with your old couch?" never entered my head. how could they? my mind was busy entertaining visions of me chatting it up with betty draper on my newly acquired couch, during the chirstmas party she would no doubt want to host in my apartment this year. i e-mailed the seller, said i would take it, and went to bed.

i awoke the next morning feeling much better. i checked my e-mail and found a letter from someone i didn't know, telling me what time i could pick up a couch.

"what!"

reading further down, and finding my original letter, i began to remember a few fuzzy details from the night before. i decided to go look at it, but only after a friend said he could go with me. craigslist can be a scary place to exchange anything, and i wanted back up. luckily for me the sellers were incredibly nice, and the couch was in great shape. they turned out to be a young couple who were huge "mid-century" fans, and are constantly finding and selling pieces. we loaded the couch in the truck, and hauled it into the apartment.

now, although everything worked out fine, and i'm thrilled about the amazing deal i was able to land, what scares me is the realization that i was one, sniffling, sneezing, coughing, aching, fever, nyquil-dazed e-mail away from having 3 tons of fill dirt in my living room.

be careful out there kids.