The Doris Bardon Community Cultural Center

I went searching for features and was so happy to find that the Doris Bardon Community Cultural Center was hosting art classes for children and adults. When I arrived, the kids were creating foam prints. They would carve out drawings and then paint on the foam. Once painted, paper is placed on the foam and a painting is made!

It was great to see so many kids actually making art and not playing video games or watching TV. It was wonderful. The class is six weeks long and held on Tuesday nights. The entire series is $50. Children's artwork is featured on artsonia.com. Check it out!

Martin Luther King, Jr. March

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

I had the pleasure of shooting the MLK march a few weeks ago. It was truly a pleasure to see so many people coming together in one place and celebrating a day of unity and acceptance.

A silhouette in the dark

So the same night Ben and I decided to make crazy bathroom portraits, we also decided to use some flash outdoors with an umbrella. We got the idea from a wedding photo and had so much fun with it. Again, we collaborated and I think we made some pretty awesome images. Really happy with how they turned out. It feels so great to be exercising our creativity!!

A collaboration in light

Last night, my great friend, writer and photog, Ben Brasch and I were looking through photo blogs and feeling a bit discouraged. We saw these awesome lit portraits and basically started drooling. But then we realized, hey! We can make awesome lit portraits!

Ben is a part of a lighting class which I took a couple of years ago. Basically it teaches you how to use off camera flash using softboxes, umbrellas, etc. So he has weekly assignments due. This week he had to use off camera flash in some way. So we decided to make some crazy portraits and the idea evolved like crazy. 

We went through Ben's closet looking for props and the like. And we found an old army jacket that he got at Salvation Army for $5, an old bandana and a bottle of Jim Beam. We decided we would do a double exposure. So using a flash, a trigger and some major quick changes, we made a portrait! 

It was definitely a learning experience. We had to mess with the lighting so much. Sometimes I was too faded and sometimes I didn't show up at all. We tried diffusing light with toilet paper (fancy), changing the aperture, changing the power on the flash, using a snoot (actually an old toilet paper roll, again, fancy) and using ambient light. I honestly can't remember what we ended up doing for the finished product, but I do know that I think it turned out pretty cool. Most importantly we learned that while experimenting, it's probably best to write things down so you know how you got that image 20 frames ago. 

It wouldn't be complete if I didn't share the bloopers. 

So needless to say, we had a blast and learned a lot. Here's the finished product once more.

Yellow beanies and golden suns

Okay, so I've decided that this isn't going to just be a photojournalism blog, but my photo blog in general, with a heavy concentration in journalism. It's my blog and I can do what I want! ;) So here's a little modeling!

When I got my new camera, I took the day off of work because I knew I was going to want to play all day long. So I dragged my best friend out to Payne's Prairie, dressed her up as a cute "hipster" and made fun pictures :) I got in front of the lens a bit myself. So here goes! Warning photojournalists!!!: heavy editing to follow!