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The 4x5 is a Toyo field camera with two lenses, fuji back, polaroid back, cable release, pelican case and is ready to use right out of the box. The shot of NYNY hotel in Vegas on my profile was shot with this camera.

The Nikonos V also has its own Pelican case, It too has two lenses a 28mm and 35mm. Lots of extras with the underwater camera. Extension tubes for macro, strobe, several viewers for use with dive masks.

Both units are used very little and are in excellent shape. With the new 1Ds MKIII they just don't get the use out of them any more so its time for someone else to create some art with them.

This week has been an interesting week in news, politics, and religion. The Vatican says its ok to believe in aliens. Governments start releasing data on UFO's. The fight between Obama and McCain is on fire.

So what does this political photographer think of it all? I think we are finally (and lets not hope too late) starting to get smarter about what's really going on out there.

As a Christian myself I am a firm believer in separation of church and state. We are not a Christian nation (even though we are in the majority) I believe we are just a nation. Simply put when you mix religion and politics all you get is politics. How can you vote for a candidate based on only one or two agendas like banning abortion or gay marriage?

Case in point, over the last eight years grand steps in political polling showed that people passionate about banning abortion and gay marriage can get people to the polls to vote, but where is your progress? Abortion is still legal, thank goodness for the woman's right to choose, and the golden boy to turn it over allows torture and inhumane treatment of other humans without trials and access to lawyers. I don't know about you but if I were voting on the basis of only banning abortion I would feel like an ass right now. I would have been totally duped for my vote.

What makes me feel better, even though it takes what seems to be forever, is voting on total human progress. This year has been a good one too because we are afforded more than the choice of two. Many have argued we need more than a two party system. I agree, however choice becomes really nice when the primary system gets flexed to full force when several candidates of strong caliber duke it out. Not all of us can live and vote in New Hampshire.

I am glad to see the evangelical crowd loosening its boundaries on the Republican party. For too long this political group has used the human feeling of hatred, bitterness, and downright gullibility of common christians to gain their advancement to offices of power to often times do just the opposite of what is humanly proper.

What I hope... I hope that all the money being used to combat abortion is used more to promote education about sex and reproduction. Lets face it we all don't abstain. It's in our evolution to breed, yes, I believe in evolution to the max. Scientific theory in my books trumps cold facts placed in a book written by man centuries ago. I can theorize that humans have evolved, at the same time I can theorize that religion has evolved too. Sam Pascoe I think said it best, "Christianity started in Palestine as a fellowship, moved to Greece and became a philosophy, moved to Rome (Italy) and became an institution, then moved to Europe and became a culture, it then moved to America and became an enterprise."

That's a cold evolution. Personally I like the philosophy of it all. Intelligence has evolved so much that I at this age can understand the past present and possible future of it all. I like the idea of a future of peace and progress. Not letting the passions of my beliefs get in the way of logical decisions for all of us makes me feel better in the long run. Trying to take away another human beings general happiness to choose to me is a form of hatred. Besides, does a gay couple getting married hinder a straight couples union in any way shape or form? I think before the die hards even speak up, the union of man and woman has been flawed for several decades since now there are more divorces than people spending the rest of their life with their life partner. On the flip side just because gay marriage is now becoming more accepted doesn't mean couples can go out and rebel and get hitched just cause they can. Marriage is still the same institution of difficulties regardless of the sexes. Getting hitched is hitched for life. Its like the birds that mate for life. You become one of those birds by taking your vows. That means its till you return to the earth.

So my request to you all that read this, thank you for taking the time to do so. If you are going to vote, do so logically. Think about progress for all of us and not just yourself. A gas tax rebate is a pant load that is only passionate to your wallet and leaves you an empty tank in the end and an empty heart. Please don't buy into the bullshit, it will force true progress for all of us. Some say that talk is cheap but I say when talk avoids a multibillion dollar war those some are also a pant load.

Happy voting and happy living.

... and those that made them... need to be fired.

You know, the superbowl used to be fun to watch for the entire broadcast. Great game, creative commercials, and everyone is watching them with friends and sharing in the humor, fun, and antics to make companies a buck or two. This year the game sucked only cause the worst draft dodging quarterback got a lucky (luck not skill) pass in the final minutes. Thats another blog but in my opinion the crown should go to San Diego as champions since thats the team that Eli snubbed.

Sorry I will keep this more about the lack of creative talent in the commercial department, than about the game itself. What would please me most would be a good round of swift firings, yes, firings, do not pass go do not collect $200 and I can care less about it hurting the economy or if these people even have families they are supporting. You're fired. My commitment to the deal... a 10 year boycott on any company that did an ad in the superbowl this year. Yes this includes everyone doing an ad. Best grade I gave to an ad this year was a C- so they are all in on the deal. None of my money goes to the companies that ran ads until all that are responsible are fired.

Seems harsh... you better believe it. There are people that think they are creative and slap together shit which is what we saw this year. There are those that are actually creative and maybe its perhaps that they are too overpriced for their work because the company wants to make .001 cents per share more on stock to its investors.

Now I am not starting a bandwagon here. I just want those that are not creative to go back to collecting trash, working in a call center (which I did for 4 years before I got creative), being a used car salesman, ditch digger, and many many other jobs that they should be doing that require sweat and make for bad body odor.

Or am I asking too much?

You know, I love what I do. I get to travel the world for people that want my art and are willing to pay for it. It pays well in my opinion. I am pretty simple and I don't need fancy cars or huge irresponsible houses but I am happy with the dollar value I charge.

What has been getting me lately is the paparazzi and their antics especially with Miss Spears. Now I understand the need for journalism. My favorite photographer, student, assistant and one of my best friends is a great photo journalist. It pains me to see how much more people pay attention to BS news stories about someone's life falling apart with crappy ass very unartistic shots of someone buying a pregnancy test at a pharmacy than her work which is very talented documenting entire cultures of people falling apart or rebuilding their lives.

So do me this favor, pat the artists on the back, give them the kudos, compliments, prayers, sympathy, money, attention, and other such positive reinforcement that they need instead of paying heed to the pigs in the mud who call themselves photographers. Hell if I worked my own camera store I would reserve the right to refuse selling a camera to such an individual as a paparazzi. Sub standard human being if you ask me.

On that note, Check out Esther's site www.estherhavens.com she could sure use the reinforcement. Cause what she does needs donations and such cause what she does doesn't pay $75,000 for a shot of Ben and J-Lo or a million dollars for first pics of a celebrity baby and it most certainly isn't art. Put the positive back into art and take back the dignity of being a photographer.

Paparazzi need not reply, go to Arizona, there is a hole there waiting for you... Jump in.

I don't do them very often but Esther was doing this for a Sunglasses company. I tagged along and snapped a few. These were my visions which don't hold candle one to hers. Twist her arm some and she might post a blog too.

I did two different lenses on these, same model. The reflected image is with the 85mm f 1.2 and the bedroom image was with the 45mm TS-E with a full vertical tilt to the lens.

What you thought I was done? I just didn't have time to put all of them in the last blog.

I was able to work in some black and whites too.

Enjoy.

What a great trip, there was a little fear and frustration over the weather but in the end it worked out. San Fran was beautiful. That is where we really dodged the weather bullet. The day we were shooting everyone was saying how nice it was to have a nice day... finally.

So here is the art from the Redwoods to San Fransisco.























I also did a second round with my handy new iPhone which was a great birthday present. Its a sweet camera in a pinch. The files though are kinda noisy, these I did a contrast boost and a little lift in saturation so they aren't exactly out of the can.

It was great to be able to shoot out of plane windows too for a change. It was also a great way to document what the other camera is doing. We also did some great windows for TheWindowChannel.com with the HD camera. We set up a great time lapse through the redwoods and the front windshield.

Enjoy...

Less than a week left and I am off to California which will be a really nice blog of pics. This week has been fun, I shot some cool fashion images... However I can't show those... Yet.

So here is some stuff I have been working on. A great house, an office building, and a great time with friends out at Enchanted Rock.

Enchanged Rock was fun, a little cloudy and really hazy for pictures.

We had fun figuring out poster titles for this one...I mean, what else do you do with a dead frog in the front grill of a VW. I had to get a picture.

A great house to shoot. Very well built and well designed. My camera and I were happy.

Gotta love Plano... This place had amazing landscaping.

Anyway... Enjoy. Hope everyone had a great weekend.

Today was a fun and creative day. Summer is winding down as is the temperatures... Thank god too.

It turned out to be a great day to shoot an up and coming band here in the Austin area. I don't get to shoot a lot of bands and when I do I am usually assisting Esther while SHE shoots bands. Today I flexed my portrait muscles and relaxed my architecture background. I have to say it felt soooooo good.

I think it was also partially due to the ease of the work. What a great bunch of guys to work with. I had a lot of help too from great friends Kristy and Tim as assistants. They were the ones that also introduced me to the band as well.

With great locations with knocked these shots out in less than three hours. Portable lights helped as well. All of these are shot with Canon 580 and 550 ex flash units on remote.

Anyway... enjoy. love to hear your comments especially since this is a new avenue for me.

While archiving and storing some older shots. So since some of them were edited through Photoshop 6.5 I thought I would give some the CS 3 treatment.

Some of these are so old they were not even digital capture... whoa! Imagine that... scanned film...

That should not be a big issue since I shoot 4x5 film on a fairly regular basis. Some of these shots are shot with Canon D60, D30, 20D and 1DsmkII, and of course one film shot.

Two views from Austin, the daylight version is from my D60 which still works!

I like to shoot ALL kinds of architecture. This was in the yard of one of the houses I was shooting several years back.

Some studio fun, also shot with the D60

Moody Texas, once again also D60.

Shot in New Mexico, this one is an oldie back from 2001. I shot this with my Canon D30. and a nice B+W polarizer.

I know! Some of you that don't know me that well now know I am a rabid George Bush fan. Those of you that do know me know that i am kidding and that I actually work for Democrats with some of my photography services.

This is an oldie, one of my oldest. I first picked up a camera in May of 1999. This was shot in November of that same year. I shot this with an EOS 3 and a 100-400mm lens. I think I was using a 800 speed Kodak print film at the time.

Honolulu in the early morning. 1Ds MKII.

Thanks for lookin'.