End of RMSP :(

The end of summer is here and it is very sad. We've been super busy with all our projects and its made the last few weeks fly by. I have gotten a lot done though. I went to Glacier National park (finialy!) which was beautiful. It was pretty funny for me because I have never really done the great American national park camping trip. There were so many RV's and they were all fully loaded with every convenience. I'm not really sure what the point was for them to be out in the woods, it seems like they would've been happier in a vacation house. We only had a little tent and were very proud of ourselves when we got camp set up since we were not overly-experienced campers but we were a bit disappointed when some guy came up to us and informed us that our campsite was reserved and we had to leave. I never heard of such a thing! Guess we missed the reserved sign on our site, anyway we threw our tent poles (attached) into our car and by some stroke of luck found the last camp sight in the entire park! We packed up camp in no time and passed out. Did some hiking up to a lake surrounded by waterfalls and had a great day seeing the sights. Back home in Missoula, life was a bit more crazy, I was scrambling to get 5 different projects done while still going to class for 6-12 hours a day! In the end I got it all done and it turned out ok. I also got the film back from my holga (my cheap plastic camera) and got some pretty cool shots! I've been packing all day and have one left tomorrow to relax before coming home. Its been a fun, educational, stressful, quick, long, and memorable summer. As always I'm happy I did it and am ready for my next adventure. Hope you've all enjoyed this blog. Goodbye.

Two weeks left and lots to do!

I only have two weeks left and I am super busy! I have a good 4-5 finial projects I am working on including a business plan that is due tomorrow. (I'm on page 10 right now) I'm getting really excited to see everyone and I am racking my brain with ideas on how to make money with photography when I get home to start paying back some bills. I've gotten some pretty good ideas from my lighting class. We learned how to shoot portraits outside with harsh daylight and strobes. (Its probably the worst lighting you can have) Once again we had to pick a theme for the shoot so we went to goodwill for inspiration. I picked out a horrible late 80's nylon sweat suit and was gonna do for the Zack Morris look but when I showed Sue (one of my partners) she laughed and said I looked like one of her ex-husbands. I joked that we should do Sue with her ex-husbands which was funny...then we decided it wasn't a bad idea. (Sue is a really good sport!) The pics turned out great, take a look. Don't really have too many new photos though, been to busy + I have been shooting a lot of film and haven't gotten it developed yet...soon though. I did post some pics that I like but ner put up before so check them out, Later!

Studio, Fires, and Plastic Cameras.

Hey everyone, made it through another week. Hard to believe I only have a month left. We have a bunch of finial assignments to get done before the summer comes to an end so I was working on them all week long. I posted some pictures from studio class so you can all see what thats like. Our teacher, Allison Leech is amazing. She has been an editorial photographer in NYC for many years and has shot all kinds of celebrities. No one thought they would like editorial photography but it's turning out to be everyones favorite. (Just see the group shot, we had to pick a theme, ours was high fashion, lots of fun) We also learned product photography which kinda sucked but it was kinda cool that mine turned out looking like an iPod ad. Almost forgot to post the fire shots. Apparently since it's so dry here every summer they have a "fire season". Well I saw my fist fire (right on the hill next to town!) Kinda creepy but it was cool riding around chasing the fire to get some good shots. Also check out the square photos, they were taken with a cheap plastic film camera called a holga. It's a really fun crap camera but can make some really cool/weird images. I also went tubing! (they call it floating out here) It was awesome, we got a separate raft to hold our cooler of beers + food and it also made a great foot-rest. The water was freezing and to all of our surprise there was some decent sized rapids to traverse which gave us a good laugh. At the end of the day we met a cowboy fishing and he ended up showing us a cliff that people can jump off of. It was pretty high up and there were bare rocks directly beneath but he was crazy and went for it. I wasn't as crazy but after a beer and some convincing I jumped too. (REALLY far out from the cliff/rocks mind you) Lots of fun and totally worth it. Nothing like tubing all day, drinking some beers, talking to a cowboy, jumping off cliffs, and just taking in the scenery. I really felt like I was in Montana.

Slide Show

Hey everybody, just got done another week of school and it was a busy one! I ended up going to the pow wow last Saturday and it was pretty cool. It is great to see how the native americans still hold onto their traditions and way of life. The music and dancing was amazing, they had a lot of energy and life. It was kinda hard to photograph though, some indians see it as disrespectful so you always have to ask before snapping away. Even still I got pretty nervous when I was photographing a war dance and a big, weathered, old indian stood right next to me with his very real and very sharp war spear with it pointed just a little bit towards me. Just enough to kinda scare me! For the most part though all of the indians are very kind and are happy to pose for a picture. It was funny though to see how different it was than the rodeo. At the entrance of the reservation, they asked you to leave behind all alcohol, drugs, and fire arms. At the rodeo this was pretty much the name of the game! (well not so much the drugs part.) But still the cowboys and indians in Montana also have a lot in common. They both hold tradition sacred and have their way of celebrating them. (rodeo+pow wow) Both have funny cloths and love America. And I kept finding more and more similarities between the two even though they are traditionally enemies. That is why I decided to make this the theme of my slideshow. (a big project - pick a theme, take pictures based off this theme, pic the best 20-30 images, put them to in a slideshow to music that also fits the theme, and finally have the slideshow shown and critiqued in front of your classmates and teachers. Just a BIT nerve-racking!) So I pretty much worked on this the whole week along with classes. I posted my cowboy + indian pictures on facebook and I also loaded up the slide show so you can check it out here or on the link to the right. Oh, we also had studio class where we learned how to shoot groups and we had to pick a theme to dress up as and photograph. Ours was high fashion. Not my top choice but I ended up getting a killer costume for under 15 bucks! I got some great pics but I'll save that for next time...

Cowboys and Indians...

Hey everybody, I know the summer is already half over and I am just getting a blog up now but they keep us really busy out here! So far school is great, learning a lot and I get to take pictures everyday. My group of friends are really fun, we went storm chasing the other night tying to get some lightning shots. Mostly just got rained on but it was still a good time! Last weekend we went to a rodeo. (my first) Apparently getting drunk is as much a part of the show as riding horses because everyone was obliterated! There were 60 or 70 students there taking pictures and I guess the locals didn't really like that because I was being pelted with ice through the whole rodeo. But hey it was 90 degrees so I kinda liked that! On the way home from the rodeo we stopped on the side of the road and did a rain dance and I guess it worked because we had some pretty good thunderstorms the next day or two. (of course it didn't start raining until I started to ride my bike home though, never fails!) Yesterday was the 4th and had a bar-b-que and got some decent fireworks shots. And today I think I am going to a pow wow. (They are gonna do a dance called the "scalp" dance so I'm gonna be on my best behavior!) Miss you guys! Later!