Monday, April 20, 2009

Testing...is this thing on?





OK, SOOO

I have very much realized and come to the conclusion that I truly suck at blogging.

I don't think it is really because I am lazy, but I think, I feel like I need to have something important to write, but that can't really be the case because I have done some things that were important to my career in the last couple weeks and I am just now setting down and blogging about it.

When I decided to start this new blog page my goal was to set down no matter what every Monday morning and do a blog update. Well, I missed a couple Mondays, but I am here signed in to blog at about 11:54 Monday Morning 4-20.....2009.

Yeah, it is 420, so all you stoners blaze it up today. It is your holiday, so enjoy it to the max.

Now, to what I have been working on. I have had a couple really great shoots this month. One for my really good friend Razor Rob McCullough http://www.razorrob.tv/

I've known Razor ever since I moved to California and use to actually be roomies with him and Ken Pavia in Huntington Beach. They let me room have their spare bedroom for a few months until I could get settled in, in California.

So, Rob called me up out of the blue the other morning and said he needed some images for one of his major sponsors. I said sure no problem dude, I'm on it. I had no idea what sponsor we would be shooting for, but I was stoked to find out the images would be for Famous Stars & Straps.

Shooting for clothing lines is one of my favorite and higher profile clothing lines is icing on the cake when trying to market yourself in the Dog eat Dog world of commercial photography.

I was even more pleasantly surprised when he told me he was filming for a reality show on VH1 and they wanted to film me doing the whole shoot. That is the kind of marketing that kills it.
So, I broke all my lights and equipment down in the studio, packed everything up and headed to the gym and shoot location in Huntington Beach. The shoot location was the Huntington Beach Ultimate Training Center http://hbutc.com/ which is one of the premier Mixed Martial Arts gyms in Southern California.

I've personally been in the gym when Tito, Rampage, Razor, and a whole list of other top mma stars are there training. I arrived at the gym, and had my assistant Dave do the unloading while I did all the set up. Razor wasn't there yet, so we had plenty of time.

I got everything set up and Razor and his girl Lexxi Tyler rolled in with the VH1 film Crew. I met all the shows producers, camera guy's, and got mic'ed up for the show. Everything was being filmed from them driving into the gym to them getting out of the car and walking in, so I had to just roll with that.

I have to admit it was cool to see how everything is broken down and done for the filming of these reality shows. We proceeded with the set up of all the clothing, and then I thought I would have some cue as to when they would start filming me and getting ready to film the shoot. You know like... OK guys lets get ready ACTION!

NOT!

I wasn't even quite completely set up and BAM they just start rolling, so I had that second of panic, but then was like wtf I know they can edit, so I just jumped into my groove, finished tweeking my lighting, and started doing what I do best. Activating the shutter.The entire shoot lasted for a couple hours. I blew out about 300 images, and in all and all it was a total success. We wrapped the shoot.



Razor let me know they were having a party at Beachfront that night that the VH1 crew would be there filming.I already had plans and some where I needed to be that night, but me being an ego maniac I quickly cancelled my plans, wiped my slate and made plans to attend the party.

I went home and got ready and then headed back to HB, arrived about 10pm. I rode my Harley, so I just decided to park it at Razor's house. He lived in downtown Huntington so everything is just right there to walk too. I parked, walked around to the front of the house to see they were filming one of the interview parts, so I just hung outside and waited for them to wrap. Then proceeded into the house and we all rolled out to Beachfront. The place was packed...we had the VIP area back in the corner, and one there I saw Ryan Locco, and Jason Mayhem Miller who is the host on the new number one show on MTV (Bully Beatdown) was already there.


They had a crazy pink fisheye camera that they were taking some crazy images with.





The night was a blast and I had a really good time. I think I rolled into my house about 4am, so I will end this novel by saying. I had fun


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