Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Just ask Craig...Stories from Craigslist



So, I am doing a shoot this weekend that is inspired by mid-century modern aesthetics, and it's going to require a few things to bring a level of authenticity to the shoot. I am doing a commissioned portrait for some members of the Art Alliance of Pasadena, and the people I am shooting are a husband and wife with a small child. The woman's mother lives in a mid-century modern home in Pasadena, so I thought it would be fun to do an old style portrait with the house as part of the backdrop. It's very inspired by the fact that many old portraits that we see of families are always taken standing in front of their house and you can always see their car as well. Anyhow, since I am using the house as a background, I thought it would be really fun to have an old car in the shot as well. So I started thinking, how am I going to get the perfect car from the 50's to be in the shot? I looked for some rental places, but that didn't seem like a viable route. Then I looked to my trustee craigslist, when all else fails, ask Craig. Seriously, my whole house is furnished by craigslist, I even found my house of Craigslist. Anyway, enough about Craig. Basically, I thought, I will look on craigslist to see if anyone is selling an old car from that era. Low and behold, the perfect car is for sale. So I shoot the guy an email, telling him that I don't want to buy it, but I would like to rent it for a few hours for a photo shoot, and to contact me if he is interested. Well he is, and he's even going to drive it down for the shoot, and hang out until we are done. A miracle I tell you, a miracle!
The moral of the story is just ask Craig.

Shahi Baaja!!



The instrument Ravi Dhar is holding is an instrument called the Shai Baaja. I couldn't resist having it in the shot. The keys on the instrument are actually made out of old typewriter keys. Freaking amazing!!! I did this shoot last weekend, and it went super well, I love the range of colors in his house, and the cool props we used for the shoot. As you can see, much of my life is influenced by music, so I shoot a lot of musicians, and try to make interesting images that intersect with their style. For these shots I combined the use of available daylight with a shoot through umbrella to fill in where I needed. I'm really happy with the way they turned out!!

She's the King

This is Joseph Arthur and the Lonely Astronauts, the two ladies are dear friends of mine. Jennifer Turner and Sibyl Buck. Jennifer is the blond guitarist on the left, and Sibyl is in her amazing pink and green attire rocking on the bass. These two ladies are some of the most inspiring women I know!!! They make me wish I was the greatest!! Some people have called Jennifer "The Greatest Guitar Player in the World"! She's the person that I got the title of this blog from. It's something we used to say to each other when we thought something the other did was really awesome!