This August, I had the chance to photograph some dear friends. I’ve known Chris since grade school, we both grew up outside of Princeton, New Jersey and went on all sorts of wild adventures in the surrounding areas. He met his partner Arleen here on the Princeton University campus one night while playing Pokemon Go! Deciding to pop the question, he called me up and my cameras got dusted off. We took some shots to preserve the day.
Barnwood
Another year has passed for me. When I turned 22, on my birthday, I was sneaking around an abandoned barn and in classic fashion, stepped on a gigantic rusty nail. Right through the shoe, had to pry the board off my foot. So, yeah, teatnaus shot later, I had a handful of decent black and white shots from my long gone Nikon F3. I decided to bring the memory back, shooting art as my birthday pastime. This year, I celebrated the day on Long Beach Island, NJ. A place I spent so much formative years on and truly, love. I enjoyed the emptiness that fall and winter brings to the…
Since my last post, things have changed. My life and family in Oregon are no longer family. I ended up back in New Jersey in the Summer of 2023 with my family. 20 Years in the wild west came to an end, now in the mild east, with a new metal leg after a much needed operation and a better health prospect. If I stayed out there, I’d be dead. I’m here now, and after reeling from all the turmoil, I’m getting back into art. I love photography, hence this blog for so many years. The passion to find the hidden forgotten is not dead. Some shots from yesterday.
It has been a seriously long time since I’ve done a band shoot. I am lucky enough to know these folks; Rad Max! After a brutal workday, the Canon 6D got dusted off, the 20mm and 50mm along with a couple cheap ass strobes (YongNuo 3’s) hit Portland’s Clinton Street Theater. What an awesome group to work with and a killer place to shoot. Naturally, one of those cheap ass strobes crapped out so single flash bounce was the option. Check out a couple pics
Taking I5 south from Portland to Eugene is a burn. Passing countless outlet malls, scenic wineries, the government seat and a very vintage theme park brings you to the crossing point. Highway 58 cuts east over the Cascades, past gorgeous forest lands that evolve from a thick Douglass Fir tangle along the water into an arid, Ponderosa Pine plateau shortly after crossing Willamette Pass at 5100′. We spent a couple days here, at Crescent Lake the first week after Labor Day. I packed my comfort meal, the Canon 6D, Sigma 50mm f1.4 lens, the EF 20mm f2.8. I pressed the shutter button a few times.
Recently I picked up a Fujifilm X-E1 digital camera on Craigslist here in PDX for a great price. I have been casually shooting the Sony NEX 3N for about 2 years and wanted a similar sized body but with the controls and styling that the X series was offering so this was my jumping point. Since the budget was dependent on unloading the Sony setup I decided to run with the 7Artisans 25mm f1.8. This manual focus lens is really competitively priced (under $100 USD) and is generally appealing feature wise. Knowing we were headed to the coast for a few days, this would be my kit and a solid…
It’s been almost a year since I’ve posted some content here and after some time away I’ve come back to this place. For a couple years, I’ve focused heavily on turning my blog into an information share about my thrifting and flipping endeavors and I’m over it. I’ve been selling old stuff at flea markets and online since I was a kid. The last two years have been a fun experiment in documenting my trials online however when it comes down to it nobody is coming here for that content and the idea of producing more content on the subject makes me mildly ill. I am sure the flipping community…
As promised, here are my results from the last month using Etsy’s promoted listings feature capped at 1 dollar per day. Sadly, I have no benchmark to run this against other than “likes” and actual sales. Sales were up for me just a tad bringing in 3 more than in the prior month. Likes were tremendous however, if you want people to “like” your products and you’re willing to pay for it; Etsy Promoted Listings is a must. I generally get 3-10 likes per day as opposed to less than that a week before this experiment. One odd thing did happen during this time period however that is worth noting….
Since March has been a sluggish sales month so far, I decided today to start a Promoted Listings campaign on Etsy. Check back in April for a monthly sales report and ROI on this new campaign!