Archive for March, 2010

Oscar Party

Tuesday, March 30th, 2010

Alright it’s been a little while since my last post I’d like to say I’ve been too busy but really I’ve just been lazy. Plus it hasn’t helped that I picked up a Nexus One. The amount of time I can spend personalizing a new gadget, setting up new apps, tweaking things, making it mine is a little ridiculous. This is especially bad when I’m replacing a gadget that has been so integral in my life for three years, the iPhone. Sadly I’d just had enough of the iPhone and of Apple, I needed something new and fun. I’m really enjoying the new phone, better screen, more open architecture and apps and it has a much better camera, not sure how much use it will get still. So cool, just need to find replacements for all those iPhone apps, most of the games can’t be replaced.

So anyway back to the photography thing. I was approached about doing an Oscar viewing party. It was sponsored by Moet, the official drink of the Oscars. It was a new concept, one that truthfully I wasn’t sure could be pulled off.  (Alright, up until this point I typed the whole thing on the phone, trying out Swype the keyboard from that commercial about setting the record for the fastest text message ever, I’m not that fast with it still, time for a real keyboard)  The concept was to have a red carpet outside and have some photographers out there shooting photos like crazy, flashes going off, etc, give it that red carpet feel. The problem, I was supposed to figure out how to make that work. Luckily I had two friends willing to come out and help and even more luckily one of them had his own SLR to shoot some photos with.

Once inside people would stand in front of the Moet / Academy Awards wall and get their photo taken. I’d work inside and take some photos of people enjoying themselves and some of the surroundings. Still I wasn’t sure two people would be enough to give it that “red carpet” feel.

Luckily the response was great, two cameras / cameramen were enough to give people that wow feel. While my two buddies worked the crowd outside I offered up photos to all that wanted them inside. During down times I walked around and snapped some more photos of people and once the party was really started I got to kick back, relax, drink some Moet and Belvedere and eat some delicious food. After some relaxing, back out there to shoot a few more photos. All in all it was a really fun party, branding wasn’t as easy to come by as the 42Below event which meant the photos and angles weren’t nearly as easy to come by. Here are some of the results:

Bottle of Moet on Ice

A nice chilled bottle of champagne... mmm, headache here I come

More photos and final thoughts after the fold…

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Joslyn Chace

Monday, March 15th, 2010

Baby photos… babies are like dogs, they don’t like to cooperate for photos.  ”Look this way,” “Open your eyes,” and the ever so hard “Smile!”  Babies are also not quite like dogs for many reasons (one I noticed is that they can’t run away from photos, depending on age) that I’m sure many parents could tell you about, that’s not my role.

I now have two close friends that have had kids, I must be getting old.  My friends TJ and Kathy invited me up to Longmont to take some photos of their newborn.  I went up within a few days of Joslyn’s birth and got some photos in the hospital and then went up that first weekend for a more intimate photo shoot at home. The wonderful thing about baby photos is they have such a more significant meaning than a lot of other photos, at least for a few people.  They will be photos that end up in albums, and Christmas cards.  They are a capture of that moment in life, which I guess is what all photos are, but we aren’t all growing at a ridiculously high rate looking different every day.

Pretty much with no idea what to expect I took every lens I have. 5DmkII, 24-70mm 2.8 L, 70-200mm 2.8 is L, 50mm 1.4, 100mm 2.8, and the 580EX II.  I’d like to share some of the photos with the world.

Baby and dad at the hospital

More photos and final thoughts after the fold…

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Avalanche Game

Thursday, March 11th, 2010

So sports photography is something I don’t have a lot of experience with, the timing and quickness at which the photographer must react to what’s going on is absurd.  Especially with hockey, planning ahead is very limited.  At least with baseball you know not much is going to happen until the pitcher starts his motion.

I don’t really have the camera for sports photography, the 1D series are the superior sports cameras but I’m not about to drop $6K on a camera (but seriously 8-10 photos per second, crazy! it sounds like a machine gun).

The other day I landed some tickets to the Av’s game, first level behind the net.  I took the 5Dmk2 along with my 24-70 2.8 L and 70-200 2.8 IS L and tried to get some photos.

Just before the Av's take to the ice against the Vancouver Canucks

More photos and conclusions after the fold…

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42Below World Cup Denver Competition

Saturday, March 6th, 2010

So out for happy hour I met a guy (his name was Justin too) who represents several brands including 42Below vodka. We got to talking and he started about an upcoming event he had, the Denver 42Below Cocktail World Cup 2010. A local band the Swayback would be performing and about 15 local bartenders would be mixing their own unique cocktails for a panel of judges to review. The top two winners would then get to go to the nationals in New York City. The top 2-3 winners there go to compete at the World Cup in New Zealand.

Anyway, just so happens that no photographer had been booked for the event. I pulled up FrittsPhoto.com on the iPhone and gave him a business card.  A few days later I had officially booked the event. Justin wanted photos of everything, the decorations, the promo girls, the bartenders, the judges, the cocktails, everything.  It was going to be a long night. The event went off without a hitch though although it did run a little long.

I carried two bodies, my 5DmkII, 40D, 24-70mm 2.8 L, 70-200mm 2.8 IS L, 50mm 1.8 and my 580EX II as my extra light and a monopod.

Photo of a 42Below bottle with someones bartender kit with 42Below in lights on the wall behind.

42Below bottle, bar tending kit and 42Below wall projection

More photos and final thoughts after the fold…

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Hello world!

Thursday, March 4th, 2010

Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!

*Edit: This my my shoutout to WordPress. I can’t believe something like this is free. What a great program. I’ll be leaving this default post here.