Trinity Boston Foundation

Over the past year i've been lucky to do some work for the Trinity Boston Foundation and have been exposed to a wide array of people I would have never had the chance to meet. Located in Trinity Church in copley sq, the foundation seeks to bring together groups such as schools, NPO's, corporations and individuals; pooling its resources to create programs that enrich and benefit the community as a whole. I've met hilarious middle schoolers, "court involved" MC's and the formerly homeless all through the work i've done for the foundation. It truly is amazing.
Earlier this summer they had me come in to shoot candids and portraits of kids in the TEEP program.
Elaine Chow, my friend and the associate director of the foundation, sums it up better than I can: "TEEP is a free, out-of-school time program for Boston Public middle and high school students. It includes an intensive summer program and year-round activities, and it strikes a balance of focus between academics and leadership development. TEEP commits to its students for the long-term, often working with them from 7th grade through to high school graduation, and it has helped many students go on to colleges throughout the region."

exactly, amazing.

to find out more about TEEP and the other programs the Trinity Boston Foundation is involved in please visit here.

Here is some of the recent work I shot there:

Red One

A lot of my "free" time this summer was spent helping Adam shoot his thesis film, Drawn. It was a really great experience that allowed me to meet some wonderful people, apply some knowledge and learn some cool stuff at the same time.
We shot the movie with a panasonic HD cam that was pretty sweet, a big leap from the last student film i worked on that was shot on 16mm film stock. It was very cool to see an HD video workflow and just how much easier it is than film. Nonlinear editing and no need for clumsy old steenbeck tables anymore! Technology really does grow by leaps and bounds and while you always hear about it and its various buzzwords its so cool to have firsthand experience with things that blow your mind.
During the filming I had read about a HD camera entering the market that was developed by a new camera company, Red Digital Cinema. A little research showed that the company was launched by Jim Jannard, the billionare founder of Oakley sunglasses. I'd always been impressed with Jim's story and the fact he's a photographer, but he became a hero when I learned that he came up with the concept of Red and put his own millions into the R&D and backing of the company.
The reason this camera had me so excited is that it promised to deliver full HD video rendering at a fraction of the cost of current HD studio cameras and in a package that was small and handholdable. Their first camera, Red One, uses a 12 megapixel CMOS sensor that is capable of recording data in a 4096 x 2304 pixel area. To put that in perspective, my go to camera, the Canon 5D, has a 12.8 megapixel CMOS sensor that captures data at a resolution of 4368 x 2912 pixels. Confusing numbers aside, what this means is that this is an HD movie camera capable of shooting video at nearly the same resolution as my still camera. Thats to say, if you plucked one frame from several seconds of video shot by the Red One it would have nearly the same image quality as one RAW file capured with a 5D.
That is just insane.
I just learned that this camera is out and what i've seen of it is mindblowing. I'm going to stop writing and acting like i know what i'm talking about and let the pictures speak for themselves. If you'd like to see more and learn more about the Red One you can view movies shot with it here. (check out the short "Crossing the Line" directed by Peter Jackson who filmed the movie on two of the Red prototypes.) Theres also the mention of the film "Guerilla" which is Steven Soderbergs biopic of Che Guevara , staring Bencio Del Toro (amazing)
If you don't want to sit through downloading any of those HD torents this video is just a test of random footage shot on the Red One by a filmaker in Paris. I don't know whats going on in it, but the footage is just beautiful.

Back on the scene, crispy and clean

I'm not sure if anyone's noticed but I've been "on hiatus" for most of the summer. Part of this was because I've been really busy and have been trying to spend as little time as possible in front of the computron while not working. The other part of it was I made a conscious decision to stop blogging. When i started doing this it was because I thought it was a good idea to help expand my business and give people a better idea about who I was, what motivated me, etc. The problem was that after a while I felt like the blog was turning into a vanity project and I became annoyed with it. I think thats an inherent pitfall with blogging in general; you forget who your audience is and you start doing it for yourself. thats what gournals are for, not internets.

With that being said, I'm back, and while I can't make any promises about if this will not suck I've developed a renewed sense of purpose lately so figure what they hey, lets get back to blogging.

Part of the "renewed sense of purpose" I referred to 5 seconds ago has to do with whats been consuming most of my free TV watching hours, the presidential race and the Democratic and Republican National conventions. I'm biting my tongue and will not be launching into any political missives or diatribes, but I need to bring this up briefly. What is currently unfolding is a really big deal (no kidding!), but the difference with this election and all the others I've participated in or witnessed in my 30 years of life is that I'm actually fired up about this one. I can honestly say I have never been more compelled and motivated about national politics at any other point in my life. I could point out that I'm at an age when these things start to really matter because you feel their effects firsthand, but beyond that I feel so involved because I am just so outraged about so much that has gone down in our country since its past two elections. I'm scared, actually terrified, as to how things may play out if we continue on our current trajectory and I've really never felt more of a need for change ever before.
Tonight John McCain gave a speech that was pretty friggin boring and played on his usual shpeel (sp?) of being a war hero and how that qualifies him to be president. I'm not going to get into it, but I will say that while 99% of his acceptance speech was largely forgettable there was one thing he said that did resonate with me. The notion of feeling no greater sense of purpose than serving a cause greater than yourself is not something McCain came up with, but when he brought it up tonight I stopped and thought about it for a minute.
It wasn't until being a parent that I ever felt a true sense of purpose in my life. For a lot of people this is the first time you're faced with truly putting your needs and wants secondary to that of another person. Being a parent is one of the most challenging things you can do in your life, but I'd argue that it is potentially the most rewarding as well. It wasn't until I was a parent that I really did realize my own mortality and while that in itself is particularly sobering, it's also pretty damn amazing as well. It was the first time I've ever really felt like a fire had been lit under me and has motivated me to do so much in what is a relatively short amount of time that we're given here. While this is all daunting and exciting and challenging and rewarding I've just never felt more motivated on so many levels. I'm doing my best to instill beliefs and knowledge in my son that can prepare him to move forward and succeed in what is currently a very messed up world. Still, I'm pretty upset about the possibility of things not getting better, but worse, for him and future generations. There are a lot of things I worry about, but one of my greatest fears is that my child and many others will suffer all because we didn't try hard enough to make this world a better place and we let things just slip and slide out of control. Last week when Barrack Obama gave his speech I felt something I've never felt before when hearing a politician speak. He gave a sense of optimism and promise of hope that filled me with the amazing feeling. I now think that progress and change truly are possible and things don't need to get worse before they become better. For the first time in my life I'm feeling like I'm advocating a cause that is greater than myself and it's pretty friggin amazing.

All this political talk reminded me of some pictures I made awhile back when I first really started to become angry about our political system and became motivated for change.


I really don't want 4 more years of nightmares like these.

Even though its almost summer and i figured i'd be less busy than usual things have been pretty crazy over the past week or so. Not just with work, but with opportunities to do things that aren't around other times of the year, so i've been jumping at the chances i get.

It started last friday afternoon. I knew i was going to Maine with Jack and Adam's family on saturday and knew Adam wouldn't be free until later in the day saturday, so on a whim i took up abby's offer to go meet her and lindsay at abby's place on marthas vineyard. I had just talked to the stealership about extending my cars extended warranty and after talking it over with my mechanic that it just didn't make sense to sink any more money into my car after it hit 100k miles i figured she should go out with bang. so i hopped in my car before the traffic got rough and made a ferry that got me to the island with some daylight left.
the ride over was really, really nice.

It was perfect to have some alone time on the ferry and think about stuff. One of the things i thought about was how i was sad that the reality was i'd need to sell my car, which after driving for the past 6 years and 100,000 miles i had formed a surprisingly strong emotional attachment to. Thinking about all i'd seen and done in that car, it was crazy to think i'd soon be getting rid of it. This may sound nuts, but whatever, i love my car.
So, it was kinda weird and ironic that Abby picked me up in my old, old car, a 1995 Jeep grand cherokee. I had sold the jeep to abbys dad right before i bought my current car 6 years ago. After abby drove it for a little while it was then relegated to duty on the vineyard so i hadn't seen it since. When Abby and lindsay picked me up at the ferry in it i was really, really excited. So much so that i think they were wondering what was wrong with me. Just seeing some of the stickers that were still on the car, even the stereo , brought back so many memories from college. It was like getting in a time machine. After a few minutes of reminiscing i then realized i was in marthas vineyard and it was beautiful so i best pay attention.

We got to abby's place with enough time to cook dinner and run outside to watch the sunset.

It was soon after this that we realized the water pump to the house had failed and we had no running water. All this meant to me was that i had to pee outside, which was fine!

I was up early the next morning and it was a beautiful day. We hung out with abby's brother and his friends while the plumber tried to figure out what was going on. One of Josh's friends wasn't a stranger to the camera and was gracious enough to let me take a few quick portraits.

I had to make a 2:30 ferry back, so we went for a drive, stopping at the village where Jaws was filmed, grabbing a quick lobster roll and starting my trip back to boston and then on to Maine.
I picked up Jack at home and then picked up Adam. Since we were leaving later in the day traffic wasn't bad and the drive was largely uneventful, but there was a slight milestone that happened on the way.

Crazy.

We got to bed early and woke early with jack eager to hit the beach as soon as possible. He and i first went for a little hike along the shore (seeing Mt Washington some 90 miles away because it was so clear) , then meeting up with everyone back at the house to head to the beach.
It was really great to see adams family and his neice (who just turned one). Great people and great times.

Tuesday I had an editorial shoot at the record label of one of my favorite bands, which was pretty exciting. After that i was back home for a little while to pack and then on the road to NYC for some more work. As soon as i got on the highway it started pouring. A straight up deluge. I thought about getting off the next exit and going first thing in the morning, but then i saw this and was strangely inspired to keep driving even though there were storms and rush hour traffic ahead of me.

I made it to NYC with enough time to watch the sun set behind the city (this seems to happen often) and go out for dinner and a few drinks with ethan. As usual my trip there was too short, but a lot of fun. I'm finding that i am enjoying the times i visit NYC more than I was enjoying my time when i was last living there.

Thursday i headed to CT to meet Jack and my mom and visit with my grandfather.

Friday, i was back in boston for a last minute editorial shoot and then to meet up with some friends and watch the Celtics advance to the NBA finals.

Saturday i slept in and loved it.

spring is green

I'm a happy man when i walk outside in the morning and this is the first thing i see. Sure, it could be warmer, but thats for summer. Now its spring and everything is green.

The other evening when it started raining i sat on the steps for a few minutes just breathing and watching and listening, getting the amazing feeling.


I've been busy over the past week, showing my book around to agencies, shooting more editorial, fixing my car (repeatedly) hanging with friends and being with jack all the live long day.

I've been downing this stuff by the imperial gallon.

A bunch of us surprised Andrew at fenway for his 30th last saturday which was great.

It couldn't have been a nicer day to watch a ballgame.

Yesterday I had an editorial shoot mid afternoon and then was due over at Adams to meet the team that i'll be working with for his film to scout locations. When I mapped directions I thought it was a happy coincidence the assignment was literally around the corner from his place.

Driving there i had a huge grin on my face because it was so sunny and warm out and because i was jamming the Crystal Castles album Ethan just turned me on to. (amazing)
I was even more fired up and kinda bugged out when the owner of the location i was shooting started playing Crystal Castles on his computer as i started setting up.
yay coincidences.
After the shoot i met the crew at Adams and we began scouting locations. It was fun and got us excited to shoot his film. The last location was at Emily and Dan's place in the North end.

Just as we wrapped the rain stopped and we headed to the roof with pizzas and a 12 pack to watch the sunset. amazing.