Posted By craig on April 3, 2012

Last week we packed up the mobile studio and traveled…

…about 3 blocks from home to document some of the racers for the 2012 Red Hook Crit. It was such an interesting evening as we witnessed an unsanctioned fixed gear bike race featuring a diverse mix of athletes from all over the globe. We were lucky enough to get a few moments each from about 30 different riders. This guy is someone we had singled out before the race and asked to drop by. He was such fun and gracious person and after just a few frames he had to move on and I knew we had gotten just what I was looking for. Thanks Matteo, I hope you made it back to Italy safe and sound.

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Posted By craig on March 28, 2012

Here is the opener of the latest shoot I did for Overflow Magazine. I had some fun getting portraits of a few of the home brew suppliers on the Brooklyn scene.

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Posted By craig on March 19, 2012

Last month I did a feature for Overflow Magazine about home brewing. This was one of the outtakes that I was particularly keen on…

Keep an eye out for the story in this quarters issue.

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Posted By craig on February 20, 2012

I’ve had questions on my lighting and given compliments on it on occasion. I’ve helped light sets using mixed lighting types with sometimes over 10 sources. Those can be fun to do and I learn I little bit every time. I’ve tended to use a 7 light set up on much of my current rig, but sometimes the K.I.S.S. approach just works the best. Lot’s of the time on small projects it’s just me, my gear, a subject, and a less than ideal location. I have to be able to move quickly and I’ve learned to appreciate the simpleness of some approaches, they can be just as effective, if not more so, in the end. I mean, a nice piece of meat* just needs some salt and pepper, some quick heat, and it tastes great. Simple, right?

Here is one of my all time favorite set ups when I’m traveling… it’s one light.

*not that my subjects are meat (unless they are) or that I’ve tasted them (unless I do (only when the first part of this statement is true does the second part come into play))

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Posted By craig on February 8, 2012

The contest deadlines are approaching rapidly. In fact I just noticed that today is the last day to enter the American Photography annual contest. Are these contests worth it? This question comes up around this time of year every year.
The short answer is…. I don’t know. If you enter a few images, the costs can skyrocket very quickly. But if you think of it as a part of your advertising than it’s not so bad (save all the receipts for your taxes you self employed fool!!!).
You may say: “But Craig, if you aren’t chosen than how is it advertising?” and I’ll respond with the fact that most of your postcards and emails etc. don’t ever get looked at either. At least that’s the consensus I’ve heard from one corner of the argument. Nothing is guaranteed so just keep doing work that makes you happy and proud and keep trying to get it out in front of people that matter. It’s all some sort of mysterious alchemy. So get out all your ingredients and your crazy scientist outfit and see if you don’t come up with gold…

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Posted By craig on January 13, 2012

After much delay, I’m back from traveling and blogfailing. I swear that things stack up and stack up and then, what the hell, it’s been over 2 months since I’ve updated this thing I’ve promised to update weekly. Anyway, while I was away I found out that a really cool shoot I did before wandering away from the east coast for a bit was published by OVERFLOW magazine. You can read the whole story here (it’s the winter 2012 issue). We had so much fun shooting this talented ukulele builder and I think it shows. Here are the two images that ran:

So, best to you all in the year of 2012 (the year of destruction??? LOL, silly Mayans, we have been destroyed for decades and traveling through space in our imaginary something something).

-Craig

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Posted By craig on October 24, 2011

I just want to give a thank you to the students in Susie Cushner’s class at the International Center for Photography. She had me in a couple of weeks ago to have a talk with her class about my experiences working in this business. I half jokingly wanted to give a lecture titled “How to Stay Broke for Ten Years in Photography and other Adventures” but instead had a great Q&A session with a roomful of fellow shooters. Susie has a great take on creativity and the process of finding yourself in your work. I was glad to be able to throw my dish on the table at the pot luck of that classroom.

Cheers.

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Posted By craig on October 21, 2011

I just mailed out the first batch of fall promo cards. I had planned on doing these in September, but September and the first half of October turned out to be very busy with several productions and a couple of travel jobs.

Plus, this promo was WAY more time consuming to assemble than I had originally planned. In the end it’s a simple looking trifold, but because I’m picky I chose to adhere prints back to back using Scotch 666 (awesome to work with, I used a similar technique to build my portfolio pages as well) vs using any of the double side paper available. I have been loving Hahnemuhle Fine Art Pearl for the past 3 years and have not found a duel sided paper that matches it’s feel. It feels like an ilford glossy fiber gelatin paper, but has a brightish white base that shows color really well with my printer.

The problem with doing back to back paper that is thick to begin with (285gsm) is the surface on the outside of a fold breaks when folding the card. To get around this I actually cut the outside of the trifold into three separate panels and then used a bone to get the inside of my fold to be neat (I used a sheet of acetate between the bone and the print to not scratch through the surface). After getting the folds in I did a final edge trim on the ends with a rotary cutter and did a top and bottom cut with an exacto and a tear bar.

On the first inside image I adhered a business card with removable mono adhesive. I had actually planned the exact spot for it and the image has a red outline where the card lays. The outline perfectly frames one of the subjects in that image.

I’m very happy with the final outcome.

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Posted By craig on August 19, 2011

Earlier I mentioned that I’ve spent a bit of time over the past couple of years working with the Roger Grey production group. Just before wrapping up a long job in Santa Barbara, John decided to treat himself to a good old fashioned straight razor. Look closely at the etching on the blade. This guy was quite the character.

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Posted By craig on August 9, 2011

ya know?

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