For Your Viewing Pleasure.

This is Todd Raviotta of Natural Science Productions. He’s worn a bunch of different hats in Richmond over the last ten years. He’s been a filmmaker. He’s been a director. He’s been teaching at the Governor’s School and VCU. He’s been the mentor to a number of aspiring filmmakers who call Richmond home. And that’s the thing. When you wear so many hats, it’s easy to forget what you want to do, what you love.

This summer, Todd’s assembled a crew to work on a new film. He’s directing again. This weekend at Gallery5, he and his crew are holding auditions for their newest project, Every Guy Ever. It promises to be a good time, as all of his other films have been to date.

If you’ve got a heart that wants to act, come out to the auditions on Sunday. If not, you’ll just have to wait.

Recently.

This is actually a shot of me shooting done by a buddy of mine, Nia, while we were shooting Thadd. It seemed like a good image to get the blog rolling again.
Happy Friday, everyone.
Have a good weekend!

We Now Rejoin Bullitt, Already in Progress…

That’s actually a line from this movie, but it’s fitting here.
‘Cause this post is about a different movie.

My buddy Jai Jamison is working on a new film with some of his classmates and buddies from American University where they’re in the graduate film program. They were doing some of their principal photography here in Richmond near the Lee Monument and asked me to swing by to shoot a few frames so they’d have some behind the scenes images.

I came down for a bit and hung out. It’s interesting to see the similarities between still and motion photography. They think about light so much more than the causal observer of a motion picture might think. Moreover, it was kinda cool to stand around during a movie shoot. Folks slow their cars down, they walk by a little slower. They’re curious. They wonder if someone famous is around all that fancy looking equipment.

Anyway, these are a couple of what I got. I can’t wait to see the finished product.

Amiss.

I just realized that this is the first week is a LONG time that I haven’t had at least 3 posts.
Please forgive.

Anyway, here’s the new TLR I was telling you about. I’m hoping to do some stuff with it in the next week or so that I can share. Fingers crossed.

Testing, Testing…

I got a new camera the other day. It’s a replacement Yashica TLR for one that I have that doesn’t work.

The neat thing about it is the glow that the lens creates around figures in the image. Its previous owner hated this, which is why I have it. I figured the dreaminess was neat. I was right.

The first roll I ran through was to test the camera. The images haven’t had any real post processing done to them because I recently upgraded my work computer and I haven’t had a chance to install CS4 yet. But for those of you who’re curious, the film here is expired Kodak Ektachrome 160T, overexposed a stop. I can’t wait to try this with models!

The Farmers’ Market.

Fall.

The Beginning of His Troubles.

And by “his” I mean Lucas. My buddy, Tim and his wife Jessica just recently had this little bundle of joy and well before Lucas’ arrival, Tim asked if I’d be his second shooter on a final excursion with his wife.

I wasn’t sure I’d gotten anything but when I looked back at this shot and the couple of others near it from the shoot, I realized poor Lucas is gonna have his picture taken all the time. For the rest of his life. His dad is a photographer and is never gonna let him go.

“My God, it’ll be beautiful.”

On Set.

Hung out with Scobey over at Brainchild Collective on a video shoot. It was a switch ’cause I’m not usually the assistant. Watching someone who knows how to do motion pictures is really intriguing when you’re accustomed to capturing your world a few hundredths of a second at a time. I had to be quiet and pay attention to where the light went the whole time. I’m convinced that managing flashes is easier.

I can only hope I was useful.

About Being a Photographer.

Andrea came to Martha’s Darkoom, the Darkroom I used to run, as an undergraduate student in Art Education. She was striking. I asked her if she’d let me and Jim take her picture sometime. Before long, not only was she interested, she looked forward to the days that we got together. Admittedly, Jim shot more of her than I ever did, but she just had a way with the camera.

This was one of the last times we got to shoot before she graduated from VCU and skipped town to teach art to the children. That camera she’s holding is an old Polaroid that I’d gotten at a thrift store for ten bucks. It was subsequently stolen from the Darkroom and cost me an additional $500 for a replacement door.

At least I like the picture. (grin)

And Now For Something Completely Different.

Honestly, I don’t know how new this is, but it’s very fun to consider. It’s a digital version of the classic Rolleiflex TLRs of yesteryear. It’s only got a 5MP sensor, so it’s not gonna replace your big digital camera. Despite that, it might be good for vacation snapshots.

The first medium format camera I ever got was a Yashica TLR and I loved it. The simplicity of the mechanism, coupled with its looks meant that when people saw me using it, there was no doubt I was taking pictures. I’d think that a digital thing like this would be a great new twist.

Find the Rollei here.

Thanks for J.P. for the info!