New Mexico State Senate Candidate on location photo shoot
I always really, really appreciate returning clients to Jason Collin Photography, and especially when the photos I make for them are as important as they are for New Mexico State Senate candidate Athena Christodoulou. Our first photo shoot was here at the JCP Home Studio for headshots. During this time of the coronavirus pandemic social distancing is a must, and for this on location shoot we were always more than 6 feet from each other and no one else was around. Jessica and I both wore masks during the entire shoot as well. It was a fun challenge to shoot in these conditions! Thank you fo Jessica for climbing a wall to get the diffuser in just the right place and to Athena for continuing to choose me as the photographer for her campaign.
Basically by accident I ended up at Sandia Crest for the first time in 3+ years of living in Albuquerque, New Mexico. I have previously shared on Jason Collin Photography views from South Sandia Peak, which I earned by hiking all the way up there. For these views from North Sandia Peak, I have no sweat equity invested as I took the M3 up there. I was actually intending to go somewhere else in the East Mountains area, but found out it required a dirt road to reach that place, so I just continued along the paved road I was on and found it led right to the top the Sandia Mountains! This was also the first time I ever went to the top of a mountain without earning it by hiking up there. It was an odd feeling to enjoy a view that should have come after hours of effort. However, it was still a nice surprise and fortunately it was a clear day.
Conchas Lake visits require bringing your own supplies
In an area dozens of miles from any gas station, grocery store, or restaurant, Conchas Lake in New Mexico is about as remote of a place you will find that has an active community living around it. This makes it a unique lake community unlike the others I have featured on Jason Collin Photography before in Navajo Dam Lake and Elephant Butte Lake. This lake also has a dam that you can drive along the top of, which is a pretty cool experience. Enjoy the drone views of the lake and dam in this series of drone aerial photos and drone video.
Continuing the new series of video features on Jason Collin Photography, this video features a top photo tip regarding another piece of inexpensive photography gear, the diffuser. For only about $40, you can get a 42” diffuser (and most are also reflectors too). In the video you can see me make the two photos below, which are unedited, the only change is one is made in direct sunlight and the other is made with the diffuser over the flower. The diffuser works its magic not just on flowers of course, also people and anything else you want to photograph in direct sunlight.
My work as a rural land real estate photographer takes me to some very, very out of the way places in New Mexico. You may have seen many of these photos on Jason Collin Photography before. On one such recent trip, it took me past Trementina, New Mexico, which like many tiny towns in name only, the one thing they have is a post office. Next to the post office I saw this ancient, abandoned gas station. I have a long history of photographing abandoned things, which I learned to be called haikyo, from my time first exploring them in Japan in the 00s. I even had an exhibition featuring those photographs. Let me know in the comments below what year you think that gas pump last filled up a car? Or maybe just a tractor??
My work for Hemingway Land Company takes me to many well off the beaten path places in New Mexico and I share those photos here on Jason Collin Photography regularly.. The town of Belen is itself a small town about 40 minutes south of Albuquerque, but when you add in 8 miles of dirt road, one finds oneself in places only cows usually venture. Thus, on the drive back from a property shoot in this remote area cows were blocking the dirt road. Now there are thousands of acres out there, and maybe the width of the road takes up 0.000001% of it, yet nearly every time I come and go in the spring time in this area, I have to slow down and wait for cows to get out of the road. This time I thought, “ok, if you are going to make me stop, I am going to make you pose for photos!” Then one cow wanted to perhaps come home with me (see the last photo), but I do not think the amount of grass I have in my backyard would sustain a growing calf!
Cold Winter Sunrise at the South Rim of the Grand Canyon
The first day in the Grand Canyon was mostly covered in clouds overhead and fog within the canyon. Up early the next day for the sunrise I was worried it would be for nought, but the canyon was clear of fog and the clouds opened up to let some light in to highlight this natural wonder. It was very, very cold standing on the snow of the South Rime despite sunset coming relatively late after 7am on December 28th. I could not see the actual sunrise directly from this point on the South Rim, but I was still pleased to have several vantage points of the canyon and the opportunity to use foreground tree framing and clear shots into the canyon itself.
