A break from work for a moment. I don’t smoke, so instead of going out to inhale, I’m taking a moment to exhale. Work has been extremely busy for the past few months. Well, make that years. It’s all relative though.

I need to update my portfolios on my website. I have so many new photos to put up there. I’d like to do some web updates too to increase the speed.

I’m trying to stop updating with posts about things that are coming soon, because “soon” is never soon enough.

I entered this portrait into the Coastal Carolina Fair this year. I didn’t get any ribbons, but it did get accepted and scored pretty well. I got a 19 out of a possible 22 which translates to something like 86%…maybe a B+. I knew when I entered the photo that it wouldn’t be a ribbon winner. It’s not photo journalistic, nor is it a member of Charleston’s seagull or pelican population. However, for me it was an accomplishment. It was taken around 10PM I think. Either way, it was pitch black. Jay was helping me scout locations for a bridal shoot I had coming up. Jay Nelson is an aspiring writer. You can read his blog here. His “pen” cascades vocabulary that can come close to lingering on pretense at times but always has scars that twitch with reality, humor, and honesty. Just enough to subdue any judgments of a writer loving the internal sound of his superior vocabulary. Jay, if you’re reading this I don’t mean it in the negative at all. It’s kind of like when you think the dip you’re about to try will taste like crap because it looks like crap, then you take a bite and it becomes your new favorite snack. Jay’s style is poetically digestible.

So Jay and I are tracking along Brittlebank Park on the way back to the car, and I say “hey Jay, check out that playground…that alphabet is pretty cool”. He sits on the platform. I set up two SB-600s shooting through 41″ umbrellas on some light stands, my tripod, and my camera. It’s too dark to find a focus through the lens, so I break out my trusty pen light and shine it on Jay for a few seconds until I can get the focus ring to the right spot. I set a decent depth of field and start banging away. It’s blinding to go from pitch black to lightning. Jay’s a trooper though and appreciates the effort put into a nice portrait. We pack up and head home quickly as there are some shady folks in the immediate perimeter. Late nights in dark parks with expensive gear aren’t that great of a mix. I get home and upload the shots and there they are. Photos that don’t say anything. They’re just portraits of a writer.

-JG