After many years I have decided to dust the camera off and start taking photos I can be proud of. Not that the years of photos I have stored on hard-drives taken with phones similar devices are something to be ashamed of but I want to return to the art. Photography to me is a grand hobby and by snapping away with my phone I lowered its status to that of mundane daily task. I am thankful for the resourcefulness and convenience of always having a smart camera phone by my side for impromptu photographic opportunities but now I want to return to the arena of deliberate photo creations. You may understand it differently and debate the values of camera phone photos. But the emotions I experience whilst holding my camera cannot be replicated.

~I_am_Shem 

Homecoming Parade 2010

Homecoming Parade photos are here. It's difficult narrowing down over 400 photos to find the best 30 or so photos. But I finally managed it. Here is the link the album.

Since Berlin . . .

I have been working on creating a Web site. www.staphotography.com The hardest part of having a Web site work as your portfolio is choosing the proper photos to represent you. I am currently trying to link this blog, the site and a photo-sharing site like Picasa, for larger albums covering events. So check out the Web site and the Mudfest album.

Here is a Preview:

Berlin's Street Art

Street art can be cumbersome. The excessive tagging overlapping each other on almost every wall can drive a person insane. But between all that unnecessary spray painted text you find a small gem. These are only a few.

One for the kiddies. Located inside a playground.

aI have not the slightest clue who Tobi is, but this was the sixth one in the Kreuzberg neighborhood. And after kneeling on the wet sidewalk to get this shot, I agree that he should be freed.

This is actually about five stories high. In Berlin you can actually learn, as in go to school, to become a professional.

And last the East Side Gallery. A section of the wall dedicated as a memorial. Commissioned artist from around the world created works of art expressing their feelings about the wall.

Gedenkstatte, Museen. The Day My Heart Cried.

I have seen the movies, read the stories, saw the pictures and studied the history, still I did feel.

 Saturday, May 22, 2010 I visited you.

I walked where you walked, sat where you sat and stood where you stood.

I saw where you died.

I could not begin to understand, the anguish you felt, the suffering you withstood.  .  .

.  .  .the horror you accepted as a way of life.

I promised with a heavy heart to remember.

My throat aflame, I stared with blurred vision at your testimonies.

 

I left in anger. The faces of your tormentors burned forever in my mind. It was you who was burned, who was beaten, who was gassed.

But I assure you it will be I who will carry all I saw, all I felt, until forever.

Project Complete. . . well almost.

On Tuesday I went with Jessi to find subjects for our project. I had a tip from Carissa, own bike tour guide, that a New Orleans themed restaurant had just opened up on Görlitzer Straße 42 in Kreutzberg.
I taught it was interesting because I would never have imagined that such a place could exist in Berlin. Well lucky for me it did. I met and spoke to the owner and manager Andrew Preble and he agreed to alone me to use him and his establishment for my project.
I went on Wednesday and shot and interviewed Preble and New Orleans Haus. It's a nice place.

Seen from the bar. An old radio help add to the decor.

The spirit of New Orleans is being introduced to Berlin.

Andrew Preble, owner/manager.

Tours, tours and tours forever more

We finally had free time in the morning and afternoon after spending most of them touring with professor Freeman, Khristen with her walking tour and Carissa from Fat Tire bike tours. The professor’s tours took us to some really cool places that wasn’t really tourist places. Places like the church which the death strip went around. There is now very little of it standing. It blocked the view of patrolling soldiers. Another cool place was Tacheles. Probably the most famous squat in all of Europe. A place where artist gather working together to defend their seven story home and workspace. Graffiti covered the walls, floor and ceiling but among the sprayed paint was art. Paintings, sculptures large and small hand made jewelry. The walking tours took us to historic Berlin. Museums and historical sight was our priority while on that tour. And finally the bike tour. We made up that tour as we went along. We saw monuments dedicated to the wall era. We also visited the really alternative and punk neighborhood of Kreuzberg and one ethnic neighborhood in Berlin while biking. In all we spent 5 hours walking with Khristen, biked about 8 miles with Carissa and I’m willing to bet that Freeman’s tours are not over.
Here is what I have from those.

Marcela Suter, 20, looks at the a chocolate replica of the famous bombed-out church in the window of  Fassbender & Rausch in Berlin.

 Men playing a game similar to the game Find-your-card.

Actors in front Brandenberg gate.

Graffiti inside Tacheles. The inside of the building is covered with similar forms of artwork.

  Monkey sculpted out of scraps of metal in the back of Tacheles. Just one of about seven animal sculptures in the yard.

Berlin's First Days

May 16 was a great day for pictures. Not only did the Sun finally make an appearance but the adventure we had opened the doors for great photography. Our day started with a tour of the museums and a few somewhat significant  historical places. East German architecture, unlike that of the west, is full of life and drama. It stands out from among the massive but plain west German architecture. We saw more of the city that we would have just by walking around on our own up to this point. We met characters that lend to the essence of what the true Berlin is and used photography to capture images like no other has before us. So far Berlin, Germany has been fun and after the time and trouble I had getting here I feel entitled to be rewarded. And the ferry ride later in the evening was just the sort of reward I had in mind.

 

Going to Berlin

     Spring 2010 is finally over. Graduation season has come to a close. Finally I have time to do some long overdue editing. Also after a very busy graduation season I am at the end of my editing, processing, E-mailing and mailing photos of now gator Alumni.
     In an attempt to gain more experience on my endeavor to becoming a photojournalist I will be studying aboard in Berlin, Germany. My first time in Germany and I will be going to one of the most historical significant cities in the world. I have studied the history, a small amount of the language and viewed, via the internet, its culture. I do believe this is the most exciting trip I have taken yet.
   

For A Newsletter/Magazine

Fashion Forward of Gainesville Inc. was asked by the University of Florida's Association of Black Communicators to model for a spread in their magazine. Luckily, I know the president quite well and as the sole photographer of Fashion Forward I was selected to direct and shoot the pictures for the spread.

On a unseasonably cold Saturday morning, Feb. 13 to be exact, I dragged about nine models out to Lake Alice on UF's campus and got these shots.

Fashion Foward 2

 

Finished editing all the photos from this shoot just before the Christmas break. Now as the official staff photographer of Fashion Forward Inc. Gainesville Chapter I hope to be doing more of these.

Fashion Forward.

 

This Photo shoot was fun. It was also the defining shoot for me to see if I can become Fashion Forward's official photographer (a try-out of sorts) and with the head of Gainesville's Fashion Forward there the pressure was on. See, I had never done work for fashion before. But she liked  them so I got the position.

Shot in colour with my D60. low ISO

Beach

I always dread going to the beach with friends and my camera. I am almost always dragged into taking crappy group photos. You know, the ones where everyone is jumping at the same time or the look-what-I-have-written-in-the-sand pictures and the lets-all-put-our-feet-together shoots. And during a very sunny day, like on Sat. 7th 2009 at Clearwater, Fla., creating art is much harder than at dawn or using the red glow of dusk.

So I looked for rare moments and stole them :-D

 Used: Nikon D60. NIKKOR 55-200mm lens. ISO-100 @ 1/100 sec. Focused at 150mm

 

Used: Nikon D60. NIKKOR 55-200mm lens. ISO-100 @ 1/400 sec. Focused at 62mm

The Beatitudes Video

The Beatitudes

A mid term project done in studio with specialized lighting. These pictures are from the shoot and the video will be in the next post.

 

 

The bellydancer Video

If you saw my earlier entry of this shoot you know the true quality of the photos. This is the final project for which I used the photos for. Again the picture quality doesn't do her justice. But I have decided that if I will be using this method to create videos I will have to shoot stills in RAW format.

UF Scuba video

So I finally settled on putting the soundslide project to Quicktime format. I know it reduces the quality but I figure it a price to pay.

My Friend

One of the many photos I need to upload from Soul Fest . . . Over two weeks ago. Busy Busy.