Back out visiting restaurants around Albuquerque, New Mexico for UberEats took me to local chain Pizza 9 for a professional food photography photoshoot using the natural light techniques required by the client. A good dark, contrasting table was available to shoot on by good window light as well. I setup my Sony a7R IV on my tripod with amazing new Sigma 50mm f/1.4 ART lens and proceeded to photograph pizza, calzones, and cheese crust bites! The food photo shoot was not the end of it for me, as I was allowed to take home the entire veggie pizza and cheese crust bites too! Thank you Pizza 9!
For the second year in a row, the day we went to the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta, was the one day there was no mass ascension. This is actually the third time overall in a row trying to go to Balloon Fiesta that resulted in no access or no mass ascension. So I do not have a collection of spectacular photos showing a sky full of hot air balloons. What I can share at the detail shots from very first light, through day break. The one new special shape balloon I did get to see was of a Smurf, who I think is Jokey Smurf in particular.
Commercial Product Photography in ABQ done the fun way!
Who would have thought photographing liquid nitrogen tanks for BioLife Solutions would have been so fun! This was due mostly to the circumstances of the shoot, which involved a lot of moving parts from the aforementioned tanks, to multiple lighting setups and lens changes, to dogs being carried around! Just check out the BTS shots below to see what really was in before me as I was trying to make these photographs. The final results show a very sterile and uncluttered photo. Kylie was a lot of fun to work with as she had to work herself being the hand model for the products. Jessica helped out by keeping Artie out the way in his new sling, and adjusting lighting so I could stay focused behind the camera. It was a total team effort to make these photos!
As soon as I saw the above old corral, I knew what shot I wanted to make once the sun went down a little more. I was out on a rural land photography shoot, very, very far off the beaten path, some 16 miles down dirt road, in an already remote area to begin with near Ramah, New Mexico. I like to wonder when I come across these abandoned things far from anyone things like, “when was this last actually used?” What do you think when you look at these photos? Let me know in the comments below. If you would like to have this view every day, prints on canvas, metal, or framed are available to bring the remote high desert to your home.
I was contacted by an Arizona based company to make headshots for two employees here in Albuquerque, New Mexico following a very specific setup. Well, my usual lighting and shooting style matched the sample they sent exactly, save for the specific Westcott gray background they wanted. I ordered the gray background, which to my surprise felt more like freeze rather than the usual cotton material other foldable backgrounds are made out of. I really liked it as it was virtually wrinkle free right out of the box! The clients paid for and took the background with them, but I may order one for myself. This style gray background looks fantastic to me. It is bold and full of contrast. It also helps when Naomi and Noelle were on point in front of the lens.
I have been waiting a long time to get a photograph of a roadrunner, the New Mexico state bird. In Florida, I regularly photographed birds. There are far fewer birds in easy sight in New Mexico, but in my new neighborhood in central ABQ, I regularly see, I believe, this particular roadrunner when out walking my dog. I do not tote around a 70-200mm lens on those walks usually, so I never get a chance to photograph this roadrunner.
If anyone asks me how did I learn photography, I tell them, by walking the streets of Tokyo for hundreds of hours with my very first DSLR camera, a Nikon D80. What is great about living in a city with wide spread public transportation is you can take a train to one area, walk randomly to where your eyes take you, then just hop on another train and get back home without having to worry about returning to where your car is parked. This is how I went about finding one of my more famous photos, at least in Japan, which I titled, “Last Green Leaves Before Autumn.” I submitted it to Metropolis Magazine (the largest weekly English magazine in Japan) and they featured it in the Photo of the Week section. Picking up a copy of the magazine the Friday afternoon it came out and seeing my photo featured inside, I was stunned and even stopped strangers passing by to say (in English), “that’s my photo!” It was a moment of exhileration I have rarely ever felt again.
