Midnight burn

Well, not really. But a fun way to end the holidays. A few days back I got a last minute notice of a clandestine, late night bonfire on the beach comprised of a collection of Christmas trees set to be collected by the city the following morning. The dried trees were promised to go up in a flash. It seemed too fun not to witness, so we made an extra effort not to fall asleep on the sofa after having attended happy hour earlier in the evening and headed out to the water. When we arrived we were the only ones there, despite showing up ten minutes later than the announced burn time. We gave it a few minutes though, and just as we were about to pack it up spotted a line of people emerging like mice from the shadows, each with a tree in tow. Scurrying through the dark they dragged the trees out across the sand and beyond the berm, piling them out of site of anyone not already out on the beach and just feet from the water’s reach. Beneath the full moon, someone reached in with a lighter, igniting the needles of one of the trees. Within seconds the entire pile was ablaze, shooting sparks 20 feet into the sky as a group of 15 or so gathered around. As promised, the pile burned quickly and brightly and in a matter of minutes had nearly exhausted its fuel supply. By the morning the waves would wash away the ashes. It was a beautiful moment shared by only a few and was definitely worth waiting up for. Content, tired and smelling of campfire we decided to make the short trek home, stopping along the way to photograph our dancing shadows as they reached out to meet the surf. A fun way to officially end the holiday season. (More photos after the jump).

A gift I think

View from Mt. Lemmon

The Salton Sea

Erinn and I had a great trip to Tucson for the Thanksgiving holiday. Along the way I took numerous photos that had a rather quiet tone to them. Thought I’d pull them together for this post. While in Tucson, Erinn and I had a great time feasting with my sister and friends, trying out local breweries and visiting some pretty amazing locations, such as Ted De Grazia’s Gallery in the Sun and Mt. Lemmon. On the drive home we cut north on Rte. 86 for a very brief visit to the Salton Sea, which neither of us had visited in our three years living here. Only having seen images of decrepit trailers and short clips from the film Plagues and Pleasures on the Salton Sea, I was surprised to see how many people lived there, primarily in the town of Salton City. We drove up the north shore looking for interesting sites and came across an interesting mix of abandoned furniture, dead fish and numerous birds. The chair I’d seen photographed before in different locations. It must be moved around as needed by the numerous photographers who have visited the site. The dead fish, it turns out, are a result of the ever increasing saline percentages in the water, which are making it harder and harder for the fish populations to survive. We had to stay on schedule to make it home by a certain time that evening for the arrival of some house guests, but I’d like to look into this area more. In addition to the eccentric people who live in the area, there are apparently some significant ecological issues going on there.

More photos after the jump!

Shade - Tucson, Ariz.

Salton Sea

Salton Sea

Jumping ship

Relaxing on the trampoline

A moment of guilt passes through my mind as I think that while we were out doing this, the majority of the country’s population was still in the path of, or trying to recover from, Hurricane Irene. But when things are perfect in your neck of the woods you’ve got to take advantage. And we did.

Last Sunday we got an invite from our friend, Roger, to join him and others on a sail out of Marina Del Rey. A heatwave that pushed the mercury over 100 degrees in the Valley coaxed the coastal temperatures into a much more tolerable mid-80s. Couple that with low winds and it was a perfect day for smooth sailing.

And we enjoyed every minute of it; relaxing, swimming and laughing with a great group of new friends made up of an impressive assortment of performers, entrepreneurs, adventurers and even a writer from the Daily Show (!). Normally I hate when those guys go on vacation, but when I get to hang out with them on a boat, I’m happy to make an exception. In the evening, several of us made our way over to Michael and Don’s place on the Venice Canals and kept the party going with some great grilling and beverages. If only every Sunday could be this perfect. As that’s unlikely, I took it upon myself to memorialize this one.

More photos after the jump!

Napping on the trampoline

Swimming under the Catamaran

Swimming

Erinn relaxes

Desalinization

Me! (Photo by Erinn D.)

View from the cabin

I agree

Broken Fire Hydrant, Venice Beach, Calif.

Broken Fire Hydrant, Venice Beach, Calif.

Forget fireworks. This year the big Fourth of July spectacular in Venice Beach turned out to come in the form of a broken fire hydrant spewing water four stories in the air at the corner of Speedway and Clubhouse Avenues. What else to do but throw off your clothes and dance beneath the downpour until the authorities arrive? Or, if you’re me, take pictures. In many ways it was a welcome relief the disappointment we experienced from the cancellation of major fireworks shows in Santa Monica and Marina Del Rey. We were still able to see distant shows to the north in Malibu and to the south in Manhattan Beach, but nothing that was in-your-face. On our way back from the beach after fireworks we came across this scene and, like everyone else, ran toward it. There, for 15 minutes or so, crowds of people cheered as people took turns dashing into the downpour until the authorities arrived, unwittingly making the show patriotic with flashes of red, white and blue light. After a few minutes they cleared out the scene and got to work capping the geyser. Apparently, the culprit was a car that ran into the hydrant, knocking it off its base. I haven’t heard that anyone was hurt and hopefully no one experienced too much flooding from the 4-inch deep river that formed in the alleys. Definitely a memorable cap to an otherwise great Fourth, despite the meager fireworks displays.

Check out more photos after the jump!

Broken Fire Hydrant, Venice Beach, Calif.

Broken Fire Hydrant, Venice Beach, Calif.

Broken Fire Hydrant, Venice Beach, Calif.

Broken Fire Hydrant, Venice Beach, Calif.

Broken Fire Hydrant, Venice Beach, Calif.

Broken Fire Hydrant, Venice Beach, Calif.

It’s a little known fact that both Erinn and I are accomplished sumo wrestlers. Believe it. In fact, both of us hold silver medals from an officially sanctioned California Sumo Association tournament. While this is old news to us, I figured it’s about time I shared this tidbit with the rest of you, before it’s ancient history.

During the fall of ’09, Erinn and I set out to attend the Shuubun (fall equinox) sumo tournament at the “Dohyo of Dreams” in Garden Grove. We’d been invited by U.S. Heavyweight Sumo Champion Dan “Sumo Dan” Kalbfleisch after I’d asked him to sit for a portrait shortly after meeting him at a sumo demonstration at Venice Beach. He happened to be participating in this tournament the following week and thought it would be a great place to shoot, as well as to get some photos of the wrestlers in action. (You can see the portrait here.) Of course, I thought this was a brilliant idea, but at the time had no idea what I was getting us into. My first goal was to get a portrait that I liked, plus Erinn and I also thought we could collaborate on a story on the sport. When we got there, I set about lighting the portrait against the backdrop of a garage, which was decorated with Japanese script that I’m told translates to “Dohyo of Dreams.” The dohyo is located in Jim Lowerre’s backyard, behind his suburban Garden Grove home and, I believe, owes much of its name to the Kevin Costner classic, “Field of Dreams.” “Build it and they will come,” was the famous line, and it appears they have. Not in droves, but enough that the venue hosts annual spring and fall equinox tournaments as well as practice sessions. At least it did. An old link I had showing the dohyo is no longer active.

After the shoot they realized that there was only one female participant present – a 10-year-old girl – and turned to Erinn to see if she would be willing to participate in the tournament in order to give the girl a competitor. Caught a little off guard, she agreed. Saying no would of course send the little girl packing, so what choice did she have? Besides, how hard could it be for an adult woman to wrestle a 10-year-old girl? They went about signing her up, weighing her in and fitting her with a mawashi, the standard loin cloth worn by wrestlers.

This was pretty funny, I thought, watching her get ready. I didn’t expect that a minute later they would be convincing me to do the same. Uh oh. With my background in photojournalism, I usually try not to get involved in what I’m shooting. Often times that’s for ethical reasons, but it can also be for the simple fact that it can prevent me from doing my job. But, despite a moment’s hesitation, I couldn’t pass this up. We weren’t there working for anyone and when would I ever have this chance again. Suit me up.

Seeing as I didn’t bring my own, they were kind enough to lend me a pair of shorts to wear under the mawashi they lent me. How do you make a man in a mawashi look more ridiculous? Make him wear pink shorts underneath. After we were both fitted we went through a training session, first outside the ring with the referee, and then in the ring with Sumo Dan himself. You don’t realize what you’re really up against until you find yourself face to face with a 300+ professional, who, by effortlessly leaning into you causes you to buckle as you simply try to hold your ground.

Fortunately, neither of us had to actually wrestle Dan. After our training, which included a routine of tossing salt into the ring to purify it, squatting, stomping, clapping your hands and then raising them to show you are unarmed, we stepped out of the ring and waited to compete. While not competing, I was of course shooting while Erinn took notes and interviewed wrestlers. Then it was time to wrestle.

Erinn was up first. Her competitor nearly equaled her in size. The daughter of one of the male competitors, this was not her first time in the ring, and she quickly took Erinn in the first bout. Erinn stepped up and was able to push her out of the ring on the second bout, but lost again in the third. A valiant effort and enough to earn her second place.

Then it was my turn. Erinn grabbed my camera and I stepped into the dohyo. There were just enough men that we could have two weight divisions. Myself, another man in his 50s and a third approaching 80 comprised the lightweight division. My first competitor was the younger of the two, who effortlessly knocked me off balance by grabbing my belt and lifting as he pushed me backwards out of the ring. One of the keys to sumo, I learned, was keeping a low center of gravity. This I do not have, and lifting on my belt was enough to completely take away any chance that I could push back. But I had my revenge. Not on him, but on the 80-year-old. I shouldn’t be proud of that, but I am. You gotta take the victories where you can. We squared off and, using my reach and the fact that I was more than a foot taller than him, I overpowered him forced him out of the ring. Despite his overwhelming defeat, he was all smiles.

Following the sanctioned competition, I wrestled one more guy just for fun. Despite looking like a sumo wrestler, he was actually rather new to the sport and had traveled with his sister from New Mexico to compete. Someone volunteered me as someone with whom he could get another round of practice. I was given some tips on how to use his inexperience to his disadvantage, but my own lack of experience combined with his mass were enough to assure him of the win.

As this was an official event, a ceremony was held at the end of competition, and medals were awarded. Both of us proudly took our silvers and posed for a photo with our weight divisions and again with the whole group.

I did get some photos from the event that I liked, but it’s fair to say that my work did suffer from participating. But screw it. We medaled in a sumo tournament! I’ve had conflicts that have prevented me from going to some recent sumo events, but I’m hoping we can pick this up again and publish a piece at some point. I’ll be sure to share when we do.

Santa Monica Pier

Yesterday I rode my bike up the beach to shoot the Santa Monica Pier Paddleboard Race and then met up with my friend Eric who was in town from New York to visit his cousin. Still working on those photos, but here’s one that I shot on the Pier while waiting for the race to begin.

Venice Boardwalk

Kids try to avoid falling into the "lava" on the Venice Boardwalk

Yesterday I spent a couple hours shooting on the Venice Boardwalk. I’m sometimes reluctant to shoot there these days as it’s such an obvious, go-to spot for some easy street photography, but sometimes I can’t resist. It was a pretty day and – other than a run-in with an angry tattoo artist – I had a good time and got some shots I like. Although that was kind of enjoyable too. Anyway, here’s my take on a breezy Sunday on the Boardwalk.

Venice Beach Boardwalk

Venice Skatepark

Venice Boardwalk

Defying gravity

Prisoners

I recently happened to find myself a child’s first birthday party. Thought this was a cute scene. I believe the tykes were eventually let out on good behavior.

Drinking Fountain - Burton Chase Park

Marina del Rey kayakers

A sea lion at home in Marina del Rey, Calif.

I spent some time walking around Marina del Rey the other day and grabbed a few frames. Not too much to say about these, but I think I might make a life-sized enlargement of the drinking fountain and put it on a wall, right around drinking fountain height. The sea lion is from a family of them that calls one of the inlets home. This one appears to be quite happy there!

One of many sunken canoes on the Venice Canals after many, many days of rain. Bad weather can make slow times seem even slower.

Anyone who’s a freelancer is probably all too familiar with the deadening silence coming from your telephone during the month of December. Or maybe it’s just me? Between the extended weekends following Thanksgiving and the weeks leading up to Christmas and New Years, there’s not a lot of time where any new business actually gets done in the twelfth month of the year. One thing that’s easy to do is to sit around waiting for phone to ring, growing increasingly depressed as the month drags on and your bank account goes down. Another is to whore yourself out (so to speak) for a quick buck so you at least feel like you’re working. This year’s unusual rainy season has made the first option the easy one this slow season. The second is a bad idea for numerous reasons, including that you’d be undercutting your industry and your time could be better spent. I’ve tried both approaches and neither does much good. A worthwhile alternative is to use your head and try to make the most of your so called “free” time. With that in mind, I decided to put together a “Top Ten” list of useful ways to help your business and yourself when things get slow around the holidays. Other than enjoy yourself and the time you get to spend with friends and family that is! I also realize December’s almost over, but rather than wait until next year I thought I’d put this out there while it’s fresh in my mind. Something to put away for next year perhaps. So, in no particular order, here are the…

Top Ten (or Twelve) Things To Do When Your Photography (or Other Creative) Business is Slow

1. Read and/or watch movies – Books, magazines and films are great places to find inspiration and activate your imagination. We just checked out Daren Aronofsky’s Black Swan the other day. He’s someone I enjoy for both his storytelling and cinematography. I’m also reading The Complete Joy of Home Brewing and rereading The Catcher in the Rye, which I picked up on vacation early this month. Perhaps the latter in honor of J.D. Salinger’s passing earlier this year. I’d forgotten how much I enjoyed it! Highly recommended, just don’t start collecting copies. I’ve heard that’s a bad sign.

2. Street photography – Get out and shoot! Even if it’s raining! Forget trying to find a subject ahead of time. Just grab your gear and go shoot what you see.

3. Update website or design and print a book – Go through your images from the last several months and see what you can bring into your portfolio (and, while you’re at it, take out!). Or print a portfolio book or a book focusing on a recent project. Blurb books have become particularly popular or print your own and put it in a Pina Zangaro or Lost Luggage binding. Both are more expensive, but look great as long as your prints are good. Blurb and others often have proprietary design software you can download for free. I prefer to use Aperture, which allows you to work from within your archive and can output in formats acceptable to most printers. In preparation for a trip to New York next month I’m printing one on Hahnemuhle Fine Art Pearl and binding it in a frost style Pina Zangaro jacket. Looking good so far!

Keep reading after the jump!

4. Set up personal project shoots – If you already have ideas you’ve been sitting on, now’s the time to either shoot them or at least recruit subjects so you can hit the ground running in January.

5. Balance Books – I’m constantly putting this off, though my accountant says I’m not as bad as others. Not gonna lie, doing your bookkeeping sucks. But now’s as good a time as any. Better, actually, as you can catch and hopefully resolve any problems before the end of the tax year, which could save you a lot of time come tax season. Like homework, the hardest part about this for me is actually sitting down and doing it. Once started, I guess it’s not that bad. For something that fundamentally sucks eggs, that is.

6. Work on SEO – Do something (like writing a really wordy blog post related to your industry) to improve your Search Engine Optimization and hopefully drive more traffic to your website or blog. Updating your site, creating new content, getting other sites to link to yours and going through old posts to see what can be improved are great ways to improve your SEO and one of the cheapest ways to bring in new traffic and, hopefully, new clients.

7. Exercise outdoors – I try to work this into my regular schedule, but there are times when I put it off for awhile. I’ve always found that going out for a run is a great way to get your mind off things, which in turn often leads to daydreaming, which leads to new (hopefully good) ideas. If nothing else it just feels good to get out and get some fresh air and can stave off feelings of depression. It just dawned on me that not everyone lives in Southern California or Florida and running in mid-December might not be quite as easy as it is here. Still though, as long as there’s not ice on the road or temperatures so cold that your face’ll fall off, a winter’s run can be quite nice. So dress accordingly and get out there!

8. Spend an afternoon perusing photo books at a book store – This would have been an especially good thing to do here in LA this past week, as it’s been raining for the past 6 days! Barnes & Noble and Border’s both have decent selections of photo books by some very accomplished photographers in various genres. Local bookstores (if they still exist) – such as Arcana Books in Santa Monica, which specializes in books on art, design, architecture and photography – can be even better, though they might not have a coffee shop. Either way, photo books are one of my favorite ways to get inspiration and favorite things to collect. My most recent addition is Sam Abell’s The Life of a Photograph, which he signed when I met him after a presentation he put on with the ASMP earlier this month. A most cherished addition to my collection, as he’s one of my all time favorites.

National Geographic legend and Canon Explorer of Light Sam Abell! Fun guy to have a drink with.

(Here’s an iPhone photo I took while joining him, the other ASMP board members and the great folks from Julia Dean Workshops at Finn McCool’s in Santa Monica!)

Moving on…

9. Send out a creative holiday greeting – I’m bad about this, but maybe I’ll give it a try this year (I didn’t). Sending out a creative card that uses your own photographs is a great way to keep in touch with friends, families and clients. A friend of mine just sent out a great one featuring a studio shot he recently did of his son doing a jump kick in the air, around which he photoshopped in a Christmas tree and a Merry Christmas message. Simple, but memorable. Another I recall was by a coworker at the St. Petersburg Times, that showed himself and his girlfriend in the clutches of King Kong donning a Santa hat. Memory might be a little fuzzy on that one, but it was something like that. His cards were always a hit around the office.

10. Organize office or workspace – I tend to get organized and unorganized in waves. I typically start out with things in order. Then, over a few weeks, my surroundings slowly devolve into a space more resembling a pig pen than an office. At some point I just can’t take it anymore and spend a whole afternoon frantically putting everything back in order, thus starting the cycle over again. What with Christmas shopping and the onslaught of holidays this time of year I find myself nearing the tipping point yet again. Getting everything in order now though will be a great way to kick off the new year.

11. Go to the post office – If you’re just looking to kill time, go to the post office! The Venice post office is notoriously slow and with the holidays here and no apparent attempt to increase, if only temporarily, the already cut staff, the lines are absolutely snaking. Whether you’ve got presents to send or just need stamps for your holiday cards you can easily kill an hour or two waiting in line. While you’re there you can play fun games like trying to guess which frazzled person carrying boxes up to their eyeballs is going to blow first. Assuming it’s not you. That would be cheating.

12. Cook – Cooking a meal you don’t normally have time for is a great way to spend a day. Between finding a recipe, going out to the grocery store jam packed with holiday shoppers, cooking, eating and doing dishes you’ve pretty much spent your whole day. And your Whole Paycheck, if that’s where you like to shop. But cooking’s fun and eating is better, so why not? OR, brew beer! Erinn and I spent all of yesterday doing just that. It’s a great hobby that fits perfectly with my other hobby, drinking beer. Also a great time killer, though I won’t give it a spot on the Top 10 or 12 list. Trying to provide only productive tips here.

So there you have it. Feel free to add your own suggestions in the comments section. Bring on 2011!