People are what motivate me to take photographs. The interactions. The conversations. The unique qualities that make us all valuable and interesting. But… I do occasionally take pictures of things, as well. Many times my thing pictures are for lighting tests, but I usually do have something going through my head as I take the shot. I’ll share a few here, and I’ll share a little about what they make me feel/remember. Just something different.
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I took this during a session with a senior, and I recall thinking to myself with a sense of nostalgia, “I remember the warm summer air as a high school student. 3 months felt like 20.” Now, having been out of high school for about 17 years, my summers go by in a flash… and they feel more or less the same as the winters, from my cubicle. 
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I do love people. As I mentioned, people are the main motivation for my photography. I was with my friend, Jared, shooting for fun on a sunny June evening in 2007 when I took this. Jared is a huge reason I am a photographer right now. I learned a lot from him, and we even shot my first wedding together. It was intentional. This shot, I mean. I saw this carved into the bench we were sitting and chatting on, and I knew I had to take a picture of the carving and put it on my website to explain why I do what I do. So I did.
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Shooting on the campus of the University of Oregon. I never went to college, and I regret that.
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Stay in the lines. That’s what they tell you when you learn to color.
If you are lucky enough to become an artist, you get to decide where the lines go.
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This was taken as I was waiting for a senior to go back to their car and change into a new outfit. It felt alien to me, like a shot from the moon. I hadn’t changed the white balance from the custom kelvin setting I had done for an earlier idea, and the blues made the rocks seem more interesting on the LCD than they really were. At that very moment, sitting on the riverbank, pushing rocks around with my chaco’d feet, I realized how much camera settings can affect the mood of a picture.
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I’m a sucker for B&W images. I shoot about 20 images a session, from the hip, without composing, with the sole purpose of converting them to B&W, just for fun.
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Taken at a Christian camp in Eugene. Each one of these stakes represents a changed life. No extra points were given for placement, angle, height, or depth into the earth. No deductions were made, either.
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“I’ll shoot my own textures… I don’t have to buy them from someone else… and maybe people will buy them from me. Unless it’s a fad, then no one will care…”
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I was disappointed that I didn’t get the waves centered on this shot, and that I had almost blown the highlights in the sky. I really liked the image, but wished I would have paid attention to the histogram and composition. I chuckled to myself a bit about how much of a photo dork I had become. The confused looks on the faces of the clients I was shooting told me the chuckle wasn’t internal. This one reminds me to shoot for fun when I can, not worrying about “perfection.”
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Diptychs and Triptychs make me happy. I’m not great at them, and I think they are an art-form all to themselves.
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I took this long before the final image (which contained a bride and groom). I always pay attention during weddings for interesting locations and inspiration. I’m not a big shot planner, I like to be spontaneous, but I most definitely keep my eyes open.
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My wife and I have taken our little boy to see a Christmas parade in the little town of Coburg the past two years. This is a 30 second, handheld shot at F/14, turning and swirling the camera.
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I am so melancholy. Even at a beautiful fall wedding, with warm air, lots of laughter, amazing food, and the sounds of birds and river… I am taking lonely shots of the water for a desktop wallpaper. Geez – there really is no “off switch” to it for me. I’m not unhappy – I have a great life. I wonder what the disconnect is?
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by jayeads
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