Holga

A while back, before my website spent a month out of commission (thank you BluDomain, not), I purchased my first Holga camera. If you're not familiar with a Holga, it is basically a plastic toy camera which uses medium format film. Yes, film. Medium format is much larger than the old 35mm format you perhaps used back before digital. It makes for a nice big negative which results in much better enlargements, because you start with a larger negative. The Holga is a big clunky plastic camera with a plastic lens, manual focus, and that's about it. You really have no control of anything other than what film speed (ISO/ASA) you use and the amount of light you shoot in. It makes for some interesting images and a lot of wasted film learning how to use it.

Here are the shots that came out from my first couple rolls. These are digital scans of the film prints, with very little editing, just a bump of contrast and exposure adjustment for the most part.

The shots on the farm are from my friend Mike Steelman's property, shot with the assistance of his little boy Judah.

Edit: I should be sure to not take credit for all of these. They're all from my camera but the one of the pickup and the one of me walking down the street, I did not take. The others I did (with a little help from the tiny but mighty Judah as mentioned above).

Monterey Farmer's Market

Monterey Farmer's Market

Monterey Farmer's Market

Monterey

Steelman

Unknown location

Renzo, Guitar Virtuoso

Renzo, who I was in school with from about 7th grade, has been a phenomenal musician as long as I can remember. It runs in the family. His brother Gianni is a very talented keyboard player.

When we were in high school Renzo won a guitar solo competition sponsored by the big local guitar shop. After high school he went on to a formal music education at both the Musician's Institute of Technology and later the renowned Berklee College of Music in Boston, Mass. As if that weren't enough he went on to get his Master's in Latin American ethnomusicology at UC Santa Cruz.

If you've visited my portfolio website, you've heard Renzo's "El Ocho Vol. 1." The site selling his CD states, "Eclectic acoustic guitar music, jazz, South American styles, and some blues, all on an Eight-String acoustic guitar."

It had been many years since I had heard Renzo's music when I was looking for music for my site. I was very impressed with his talent. I had a brief stint in High School as a bass player, and because I sucked sooooo bad, I have even more appreciation for someone who can tear up twice as many strings as I could ever, not handle.

You can find renzo here:

MySpace

Amazon

His Site

Buy "El Ocho Vol 1"

Read the full bio here

Renzo gave me a couple CD's to give away. I was thinking that since I always love to find new and interesting music, why not have a little giveaway contest. So...

Go check out my portfolio site, take in a sample of Renzo's music, and leave some comments below for him. If you enjoy his music and would be interested in listening to the whole album, leave me some recommendations for new music in the comments below. I'm always on the prowl for new music and I'm open to just about anything. Whoever can turn me onto the best new music (in my opinion of course, and someone I've never heard of), I'll send you out a free CD of Renzo's "El Ocho Vol.1. I hope you enjoy his music as much as I do and if you are on the California Central Coast, go see one of his shows with Frequency Jones or Le Vice

Renzo and I did a session a few weeks ago (right before my site went down for over a month!!!). Here are a few samples. Enjoy, and give him a listen.

Lake McClure 2009

This past week my friends Greg and Steph Zelei were up at Lake McClure with their sweet Air Nautique boat. I joined them for a couple days which were also the last of ten days off. What a great way to end a vacation. As always my camera was in tow, so what a great opportunity to get on the boat and practice a bit of high speed water sports. The lake was as calm as could be at times and being the middle of the week it was pretty much just us and a couple other boats on the whole lake. It was a perfect couple days. Enjoy the Pics.

The lake was near perfection. Like butter

Steve

Greg was going pretty big, but you know, it's his boat.

The lighting was amazing out there.

Good times!

The water can't get much more silky than that.

Steph cuttin it up

I was having a little fun

A little mini air

Oh ya, that is hair on my head. Enjoy, it wont be there long.

Go Steph!

I remember thinking what a perfect day it was while I lay there.

Since Greg got so many great shots, I had to throw this in too.

My favorite series of the day. CANNONBALL!!!

Parks Family

I've been long over due for a post. It's not that I haven't been shooting, I've just had too many other things going on and the blog hasn't been high on the priority list lately. This will be the first of a few while I catch up. Man, it's been over about a month.

Elisa Parks and her great family were sent to me by Meghan DePalma who I shot with her family, the Comptons. Meghan was kind enough to sent the O'Brien family to me also, who I'll be posting soon.

I really enjoyed my session with the Parks family, as they were so welcoming and graciously brought me into their amazing home.

More posts coming soon, including some great wake boarding shots from a recent few days on Lake McClure.