New Magazine Covers on the Newstands

Just got these a few days ago... two new mag covers! Bravoski Magazine out of Japan and SportMagazin out of Austria. Always fun to see your work as the leading image for a magazine.

Big thanks to Tyler Ceccanti, the skier pictured in both shots. Pretty stoked to get him his first cover... let alone two in the same month.

Skateboard Shoot

More personal work that I thought I'd share with you all. I found this incredible location last month and I've been jonesing to shoot here ever since. Was finally able to make it happen a few days ago.

Here are a few quick shots from it. One to give you a taste for the action and the other to give you a behind the scenes look. (Thanks to my assistant Pat for standing in and being the lighting test subject here). Use your imagination and you'll have an idea what the final image will look like.

Stay tuned for the website re-launch in the very near future to see the finished images.

Thanks for checking in.

New Published Work: Atlas Snowshoes Website

Just got a chance to look at the new Atlas Snowshoes website. It's currently chalk full of the images I shot for them over the past 2 years. Really happy to see all the images as a collection that showcases their entire product line. I'm attaching a screen capture of their site below, but check out the site for yourself if you have a chance. The images are on a rotating display, so you'll get to see a lot more imagery there.

I'm excited to shoot for them again this year for their 2013 product line. Should be fun.

Track and Field Shoot

Been working on some personal projects lately and here's a few behind the scenes shots from my most recent one.

A little glimpse into how the shots were made.

I'm in the process of redoing my portfolio right now, so stay tuned to see the finished images from this shoot and many others.

ps. a little tip of my hat to Brad Trent for the idea of showing these pics. I was inspired by his "Artificial Portraits" series that showcased the behind the scenes of his shots, but with all the post processing done to them. Check out his site... pretty cool!

Contour

I've been working with Contour (makers of kick ass POV cameras) for over a year now and have had the opportunity to shoot what seems like every sport under the sun for them.

With the release of their new camera, the Roam, they just updated their website with a bunch of my work. Always fun to see.

And there's plenty more on their site, but I figured that 4 images was enough for the blog.

Stevens Pass Bike Park

I've been working up at Stevens Pass Resort for the last few days. We've been shooting in their new bike park for next years marketing collateral.

It's been an awesome few days of shooting and the weather has been perfect. Big thanks to Kyle Thomas and Billy Lewis from Diamondback Bikes for putting in the hard work. And to Chris Rudolph and the entire Stevens Pass Park Crew for making the shoot happen.

Will be posting more photos and video as I can release them. Stay tuned.

Stevens Pass Ad

Just got done working with Stevens Pass Resort on one of their print ads for this winter. Here's the original image and the finished layout of the ad which will be running in the Ski Journal this winter.

Brooks Running: Commercial

A little while ago I posted about the Brooks Running shoot we did for the release of their Gore Tex shoes (the Ghost and the Adrenaline). Well, we finally got the go ahead to release the video from this project. Really happy with how it turned out.

This was my first foray into being a Director. I'm usually the one behind the camera (which I was on this day, shooting all the stills for the campaign). But it was a nice and refreshing change to get away from the camera for the video half of this project and instead focus on the direction of the video. Really stoked to have had such great and talented people helping with the production for the shoot. Big thanks to my homie Riley who did all the shooting and editing and Pat for his kick ass work assisting. Thanks guys.

Enjoy!

Brooks Running: Ad Campaign

Last month I got a phone call from the people at Brooks Running asking me to shoot a new ad campaign for their new Gore-Tex shoes, the Ghost and Adrenaline.

Stand Alone 4 Panel Accordian Brochure

While I was stoked at the prospect of shooting for Brooks, I was a bit nervous. Not nervous about shooting for Brooks, but because we were going to be shooting a waterproof shoe campaign and here it was late July... not the best time of year for crummy weather in Seattle. So, as the shoot came together, we had all the contingency plans available and ready to put into action (buckets of water, garden sprayers, hoses, water truck... you name it). However, as the morning of the shoot arrived, we couldn't have been more blessed as a huge thunderstorm descended on Seattle. It poured rain (with thunder and lightening) all morning long, providing us with great cloudy backgrounds, huge natural puddles and an all around wet look to the shoot.

The only bummer about the days shoot was that the torrential rain destroyed one of my Nikon D3 bodies. After hours out in the rain, the poor thing just couldn't hang any longer. Fortunately, it's occasions like this that have led me to always carry back up bodies on a shoot. After swapping the old with the new, we were able to continue shooting without missing a beat.

Print Ad for Magazine

I'm really happy with how the campaign turned out. Something a little different than your typical running shoot, with a little bit of humor interjected.

Outtake from the day's shoot

We also shot a short video for this campaign and we'll be posting that on the blog shortly.

A huge thanks to Brooks for choosing me to shoot this campaign for them.

Specialized Catalog Shoot

I had the incredible opportunity earlier this summer to do a catalog shoot for Specialized Bicycles. This was a two day shoot in Portland that was aimed at garnering more attention for their Fitness/ Commuter bike series.

Working with the creative team from Popamatic Studios, we spent two long days traversing the city streets, coffee shops, back alleys, and country roads in and around the Portland area.

The resulting collateral that will utilize these images hasn't gone to print yet, but I was finally given the go ahead to release a few of these images for the blog.

A huge thanks to the folks at Specialized and Popamatic for turning to me to shoot this campaign. I've been a HUGE fan of Specialized bikes for years and I'm stoked to have had the opportunity to shoot this for them.

Photo of the Week on NationalGeographic.com

This just went live the other day and I wanted to share it on the blog before I forgot. National Geographic just chose one of my ski photos from last winter as their "Extreme Photo of the Week".

Never been published by National Geographic before, and I'm pretty stoked at this opportunity. I'm even more excited that they chose a photo that I really dig!

If you'd like to see the write up, click HERE. And if you'd like to see the photo a little larger, without the clutter and layout, it's attached below.

Cheers!

Meadow Lodge Shoot with Matchstick Productions and Powder Magazine: Part II

This is a short video that we just put together from the January shoot at Meadow Lodge, BC with Matchstick Productions and Powder Magazine. It's best to watch in full screen mode if you haven't watched it already... you'll be able to see the skier better on some of the more distant shots. In it are athletes Mark Abma (blue coat) and Erik Hjorleifson (orange coat) as well as cinematographers Murray Weiss and Dustin Lindgren (you can hear their voices in the background).

I'm constantly asked by friends, colleagues and other photographers as to what goes into creating the images I shoot. This video is a small attempt at showing some of what goes on behind the scenes of a ski shoot. More than anything, it's a look at the actual lines being skied (in real time) and the resulting photos that turn out. I'm not including any music in the edit. Instead, I prefer the raw sounds of everything going on around the camera.

And something to keep in mind about this particular shoot, everything skied here was accessed on skins. No helicoptors or snowmobiles here. As a result, every line skied took at least an hour to get on top of. Logistically, it makes for long days of shooting with lots of time spent wallowing through knee deep snow.

This video is very humble. It was shot on my Canon G9 point and shoot. Being deep in the backcountry, without an assistant, I was forced to make do with what I had on me to even create this. I used a 6" collapsable Manfrotto tripod to hold the camera while I was busy shooting stills. Someday I would love to lug a second camera and an assistant along with me to really document all that goes into a shoot like this. But unfortunately, that'll have to wait for another trip. Stay tuned though... it's on my hit list.

New Published Work: Atlas Snowshoes

I just got the first round of tearsheets from my recent work with Atlas Snowshoes this past winter. Below is one of my favorite shots from our shoot up at Mt Baker. I love the shot, but I also love the incredibly simple layout that allows the image to really shine through.

Thanks again to Atlas for working with me on their catalog for another year. I can't wait to see what we can do next winter.

It's Summertime... Release the Ski Movie Teasers

It might be 80 degrees here in Seattle today, but it's already starting to feel a lot like winter again. Why? Because Matchstick Productions (MSP) just released their official trailer for this Fall's movie, Attack of La Nina.

I've had the privilege of working with MSP for 5 years now and it's always awesome collaborating with them. This year was no exception as I teamed up with them on 2 separate park shoots, 1 in Breckenridge and 1 at Stevens Pass. Both shoots went incredibly well and you can see a couple preview shots from those trips below.

So, while winter still might be 5 months away, it's feeling a little bit closer now.

Cheers!

Location Scouting: Weather

With wrapping up my winter work from the ski, snowboard and outdoor industry, I've been spending countless hours in front of the monitor editing and retouching. Unfortunately, that doesn't make for a lot of great blog posts.

However, this doesn't occupy all of our time. When we're not sorting through the work we've already shot, we're currently planning a series of new shoots in the coming weeks. So, in the name of getting some new info up, I've decided to do a series of posts on our photoshoot production. For this installment, we'll take a quick look at what we do regarding weather forecasting as well as share some of our favorite weather websites.

Nothing can ruin a shoot like bad weather. Be it rain, sun, heat, cold, wind... whatever you're hoping the weather gods will bring you on the day of your shoot, chances are, they'll bring the opposite.

Unfortunately, there's no magic bullet that will take care of everything. In the end it boils down to a lot of work and a little bit of luck. We usually spend several hours a day checking the different forecasts before a big shoot. You can't change the weather once you get a location, but it can help in your planning (wether that be the day you plan the shoot, or how you budget your time over the course of the day once you're already there). By keeping an obsessive vigil on the weather maps and taking an average of what you see, you can usually do a pretty good job of predicting what will be in store for the day of your next big shoot.

Following is a list of our favorite weather sites with a quick description of what each is good for.

Weather.com I know this site seems cliche given its popularity, but it's really pretty accurate

Weather Underground More detailed forecast than weather.com with some useful almanac info

NOAA If you're a weather dork, this is your holy grail. However, I've noticed their forecasts have been pretty inaccurate lately... not sure why.

Snow-Forecast For forecasting weather in the mountains, this is one of the best, by far. Great for predicting the strength of storms during the winter months.

Weather Spark This is a new site to me, but so far I'm really enjoying the graphing features and the overall layout. Time will tell how accurate it is though.

New Google Image Search Options

In case you hadn't heard, Google just launched a new image searching tool. This was just brought to my attention a couple of days ago and I finally had a chance to dig into and run a few tests. In short, google users can now upload a photo and search the web to see where it's being used. For photographers, this is a great way to see if your photos are being pirated, stolen or otherwise mis-used. Getty Images has had this technology for a few years, but it's now available to everyone... finally.


I did a couple of tests with photos of mine that have been heavily used and was amazed at how quickly it came up with results. In some cases it even came up with the names of people pictured in the photos.



Similar search engines such as Tin Eye offer similar search engines (and have been around for much longer). However, I tested numerous images on both platforms, and Google won hands down every time.

It's definitely worth looking into if you're a photographer. Policing your images just got a lot easier.

A big thanks to Erik Seo for giving me the heads up about this. Much appreciated buddy.

Behind the Scenes Article in Jack Magazine: Italy

This is something that I've been working on for the past couple of months, and alas, now I can finally talk about. I went to my mailbox yesterday and opened it to find a box full of the newest Jack Magazine from Italy.

After my 3D Kayak shoot with Tao Berman last summer for Red Bull, I was contacted by the editors of Jack. They wanted to run an article on the technology and behind the scenes details of the shoot.

Jack Magazine is Italy's largest popular technology magazine. (Think Maxim blended with Popular Mechanics). And while I might not be able to read Italian, I'm super stoked on the tremendous exposure from this. If you'd like to read the general logistics of the article, visist the write up on the Red Bull Illume website HERE.

(Cover of Jack Magazine that the article appears in)

Thanks to everyone at Jack Magazine and Red Bull for working with me on this. I'm tremendously honored.

Kip Garre 1973-2011

The ski world was rocked again this past week with the tragic passing of Kip Garre and his girlfriend Allison Kreutzen. I unfortunately never got the chance to meet Allison. However, I was blessed to be able to hang out, travel and ski with Kip over the years. He was an incredible person who's stoke for life was contagious and will be greatly missed.

To take a line from the blog of fellow ski photographer Alex O'Brien, "I'm starting to feel like this blog is an obituary page to friends that I have lost." As I look at my own blog now, I have to say that mine is starting to resemble the same. While that's not what I was hoping to acomplish when I first stated this blog, I still feel it necessary to pay tribute to my friends that have passed while chasing their dreams.

Rather than post a blog entry about what happened to Kip and Allison or my feelings on the subject, I'm going to keep this simple. Here are some of my favorite photos I got to take of Kip over the years.

If you'd like to read a more detailed account of things, please check out the link to the article by Powder Magazine HERE.

Kip, I'm gonna miss you buddy.

Sorry, I've Been Busy! But Here's a Sneak Peak at What I've Been Up To

Sorry for the lack of correspondence recently on the blog. I've been busier than a one legged man in an ass kicking contest lately. Lot's of shooting and time spent in production mode over the last two and a half weeks. But these are great things and I'm excited with the work that we've been working on and what we've got slated for the very near future.

While I can't yet share the final images from these shoots, I can share some of the out-takes from this past Saturday's shoot of the AMA SuperCross at Qwest Field. A nice and muddy shoot to say the least. I'll be chipping dirt out of my camera for some time to come.

Photos above are of Red Bull athlete James Stewart exiting a corner during qualifiers and a discarded goggle tear off laying on the muddy track.

Enjoy!

Backcountry Ski Shoot in the Cascades

A few weeks ago I went out to do a shoot with skiers Bryce Phillips in the North Cascade Backcountry. I've worked with Bryce for years and it was great getting a chance to go shooting with him again. On this occasion, we were headed out into a zone I've grown to love recently. Beautiful scenery, steep terrain, lots of features... it's perfect. And things looked great on this day. It had snowed about a foot the night before, we had a few great friends along with us for the day and it was completely clear and blue as we left the car.

However, three things that we hadn't counted.

1: the snow was far deeper than we had anticipated. It took us a full two hours to get to the zone, when under normal conditions, it's about a half hour.

2: the snowpack was a little on the unstable size. The spines would be relatively safe, but anything in the open was going to be out of the question. We'd triggered a couple of sympathetic slides (avalanches that occur at a point away from your location, but that are caused by your weight on the snowpack) on the hike out. So, we'd have to be extra careful.

And 3: as we continued our trudge out to the zone, the clouds were beginning to roll in... fast.

However, after all the work, it totally paid off. The resulting shot of Bryce dropping in on spine is one of my favorite shots of the year. While I can't currently share that image with you, I am at liberty to share the video clip from Bryce's Contour POV camera that he was wearing. I'll post the image on the blog as soon as the embargo has lapsed... but I'm sure you'll like it.

A side note, you may ask why we were skiing on a day where we knew the avalanche conditions were less than favorable. To answer that question... because you occasionally have to deal with less than favorable conditions when shooting. That's not to say we were being reckless or taking unnecessary risks. Far from it. On this day, we checked the avy forecast, we hiked along ridge lines and along tree groves, we had all of our backcountry gear with us and we stationed 2 people running safety from protected vantage points to watch over the others at any time skiing was taking place. While you can't take all the risk out of traveling in the backcountry, there are steps you can take to minimize that risk. Be safe out there.

Shooting with Nimbus Independent

Last week I was out shooting with production company Nimbus Independent at Crystal Mountain. With skiers Eric Pollard and Bryce Phillips, we spent 3 days compiling footage for their next years movie.

All in all the shoot went great... although the weather wasn't super cooperative. While we had a few tiny windows of blue, most all of our time was spent in grey, stormy weather. Not a big problem though, as we were able to hug to the trees and pillow zones and still come out with some great footage.

Here are a few of the out-takes from those days. Enjoy!