A little break.

Michael and I spend about 99.99% of our time working. The other day we needed a break and drove around looking for things to shoot. We ended up at one of our favorite spots here in SF.... Here is one of the shots we got out of our little excursion.

PSwha?

I used to love Photoshop. I could sit and do it without flinching for hours on end and STARE, drooling all over my keyboard. You know how it is. You start to tilt your head to one side or the other, simultaneously moving closer to the giant, oversized screen before you. Burning eyes. Ocular migraines. It's a big pool of weird glowing fun.

News flash. I hate Photoshop. WE hate Photoshop. We're on a one way track to Photoshop burnout-dom. That's right. At least today... at least today.

As if there weren't enough conflict in the battle for artistic equilibrium already, you have to take into consideration the moral standpoint, too. "Well, they're fat. Do I push their jowl line in to here? or to hhhhhhhere..."

Just because you can doesn't mean you should.

"... and liiiike, do you think you could take out this winkle in my face. In my jacket. In my dress. Do you do lives as well?"

::sigh:: Despite all this, I still love it... sometimes. Just not today.

Something...

... new.

... Part 2

Of the Jim Dunlop series.

Apparently it's out there pokin' around . . .

and yeah, we still know what you're thinkin'.

"wtf, product?"

Inspiration

So, once again cleaning out the old Lacie and I found another one of my favorite shots. For some reason, my favorite shots always seem to be on film and square. I think maybe I am telling myself something there. Michael will agree with me on that square format is his favorite as well. I find it funny that we hardly ever shoot our Hassi's (we each have our own because in this case we cannot share). So, added to the top of my million things to do list is: shoot more film in my Hasselblad... starting tomorrow.

Down with...

Webhero. They are at the absolute bottom of the list. It seems impossible for them to forward on a web link, and even more so to successfully keep one's email account intact. I guess that's why so many people go with that Mountain somethin'ernother company... I bet this garbage doesn't happen with them.

Super Scary House

That we shot... this place was haunted for sure. Some old man lived there for a long time, all alone.

Huh?

Wo wo whoa?

Yeah, bet you weren't expecting that either. But it's true, when there is something small and shiny that needs some love, we love to love... Keep an eye out for El Grande... he's floatin' around out there, too. . .

... oh yes, and don't forget some creative direction from Graham Shaw...

Who the hell is...

keeney + law?

answer: we are.

new name. new rep (Rhoni Epstein). new work...

stay tuned.

LA Holgie Shots

I love my Holga. It is the easiest and least worried about camera you could ever own. I throw it in my purse with a variety of 120 film like provia or velvia 50 (depending on how I feel), fp4 and portra nc and off I go. You can shoot it without even looking through the viewfinder and there is a high chance you'll get a cool image. At least in my own personal experience.

I was down in LA a month or so ago with a friend of mine when I took these. We were walking in a industrial neighborhood going to a sample sale and we saw smoke emanating from this building and whaddaya know.... my Holga is in my bag. So I snapped a couple and I was confident that I had a least one that I would like and to my surprise I liked all three. So here they are.... Can you guess what film I used? Michael? Wanye? I am pretty sure they are the only two who actually read this blog...

Back. .kcaB

Ah yes, home sweet home. Did everyone miss their dose of "Narcissistic Blog About Absolutely Nothing" while we were gone? ::eyes rolling in a condescending manner:: I can see you doing that, by the way...

In any event, our super sweet journey was super sweet. Saw some monkeys, did ssssssstuff, snapped a pic or two. Standard sweet stuff. Sweeeeeet. Sssstuff.

Bummer is, we came home, and my monitor started flickering like an old neon light in an adult bookstore. I took her down to Apple and kissed her goodbye for 7-10 working days, and now here I stay with my little laptop, without new pictures, without sweet songs in my itunes, with only internet. Like I fucking want internet.

It's time to grapple with Apple.

Like you were all really awaiting the next installment of NBAN anyway (you can call it BAN for short... I mean, hey, express yourself). Well, it'll be here. In the meantime we are trying to get stuff together on Jasmine's computer for our At Edge webpage. Who woulda thought... us, At Edge (click on narcissistic link to a place where we do not yet exist, At Edge).

Somebody give me a life.

Please.

Antes de que nos vayamos. . .

One more pic from the Ranch a few weeks back. . .

Clearly our scanner is a piece 'o crap, but this ain't for the quality, folks...

... and lastly... There's been a lot of talk about what a blog should be used for, especially over at APE (Is it shameless narcissistic self promotion or actually a useful tool to help spread the word about everything under the sun?). When we sat in on an APA panel with Rob Haggart (and Zana Woods, among others), he was very insistent that a blog be used seriously and not as a light hearted toy.. that you can't just put any piece 'o crap up on the internet-- your post must have substance and mean something because "the whole world is going to see it." While I see where Rob is coming from, we sure as hell don't have any meaning to our posts other than to share work among friends. We don't sit around hoping that somebody sees Jasmine's latest Holga shot and wants to offer us the next big campaign. We do this to make fun of ourselves... and why not, our friends, too. C'mon! We couldn't possibly take ourselves that seriously. . . you should know that by now.

Here's Governor. This time upright...

The Ranch part Deux

Was back up at the Ranch again last weekend for another boys adventure. This time I left the digitron at home and rocked the Hassy instead. We chased multi thousand acre fires on ATV's, poked things with sticks, and played HORSE by throwing rocks at natural landmarks. It was a weekend where we could be whoever we wanted, and pretend that the outside world was non existent.

Here's Bret, day one. Straight scan. Oak tree shirt with oak tree background. Warm afternoon light.

Otra

Here's another shot from my trip awhile back to the Patagonia. I'm not super crazy about the composition... the tangenting bothers me, but the boat was so small, the only way to get the angle would have been from the other boat, which was filled with people, and they weren't going to let me on, and you get the point... phew! Regardless, here it is... proof I was "working."

Goucho Verdadero

Hace tiempo que escribimos, pero bueno...

aqui esta una foto que saque mientras un viaje al sur de Chile... a la tierra preciosa de la Patagonia. Es de un goucho verdadero, un hombre que realmente vive de la tierra, usandola como herramienta para sobrevivir...

The patagonia is so special, in fact, that I would go as far as saying it is the final frontier, the last plot of land to be touched by the paws of man. That is only because one could not live in Antarctica, of course...

Right now they are trying to scar this frontier with power lines and dams, carrying power to all the people in all the cities, just like you and me.

Que disfruteis...

I was going through one of my hard drives with a lot of old work in it and I came across these photos from the best class at Brooks.... Zone with Chris Broughton. I tried posting some digital photos from that trip that weren't showing up. Now that I think about it... it really doesn't make sense to post images shot with my 5D representing a black and white fine art film trip. Retarded, I know.

Grainy Days Sunshine

I used to get physically nauseated by the debate that goes on between the film and digital freaks. It's an overplayed series of diatribes that I had heard enough of. Something like this...

"Shampoo is better. I go on first and clean the hair. No, conditioner is better. I go on and leave the hair silky and smooth. Oh really fool?" Yes. Really, fool.

and SURE, I'll effing admit it. We shoot digital for all our jobs. Despite learning with film, jus' like in tha good 'ol days, we use the digitron because it's fast. It pleases the clients. It washes my car for me and takes out the trash! Alright. It definitely does not do either of these things. But it does save us shitloads of time.

I always told myself I'd never enter the cringe-inducing film vs. digital debate arena. Why? Because, "It's liiike, totally played out, man." I bet you are vomiting just from reading this crap already ("Great, this asshole again? Quit biting other peoples rants and discuss something original"). Well feel free ta take a step down from the grumpy train little fella, 'cause this is our personal little epiphany, and you're along for the ride. Now get in the little car and hold on, because I'm about to announce the said unoriginal, boring, epiphany in 3... 2... 1....

Digital really doesn't stand up to film. There. I said it. In fact, digital b-l-o-w-s. I don't give two shits if you're shooting a Hasselblad 89,000 megapixel HD3 with training wheels and histograms. It tethers and the client loves it and you rock, man! In the end your shadows are never going to look like those that you'd find on a roll of Portra, or VC or UC or whateverC. C me. I'll tell ya. The truth is, photo sleuth, film rocks, and you know it.

Look at a couple'a people who shoot and love film... special attention to the... you guessed it. shadows. ... for example:

Michelle Laurita
Irving Penn
Patrick Hoelck
Seliger

just to name a few... Did you notice? Yeah, their shadows rock. They are rich and deep and superdopaliciousyouwishyouhadthemocious. So there.

It's funny. I was talking the other day with a buddy we went to school with (who also assisted Seliger). I remember when he got his first digital, a 20D, he was so quick to push film to the side. Digital, it seemed, could save the world. I laughed out loud yesterday when he ended his description of a shoot with "...and screw my Canon! I'm over crappy digital cameras. Next time I'm shooting film."

Me too. And we will.

drew.

some oldies...

New work...

New cover out for SCENE mag...

Check it.

Bay Bridge

The Bay Bridge on a slightly foggy day last month.