Skate Free Or Die

The Lee and Joe Jamail Skatepark nestles up to the Houston skyline over near Sabine and Memorial Drive. A state-of-the-art 30,000 square foot in-ground public facility, it’s pretty spectacular to see and, being free, a great entertainment opportunity for skaters and observers on any given day. It’s also well lit and open till 10pm so you come late and beat the heat.

My friend Groovehouse had been posting some pics to his Flickr site and I thought I might go try my hand.

Fortunately when I arrived at the park Groovehouse happened to be there. You can see him working his craft in these two photos:

I really like this place. The lighting, the people, the layout of the park. It’s fun to just watch and it’s really fun to shoot.

Groove helped me out with some tips and was especially helpful in pointing out who the particularly good skaters were so I could be ready to shoot when they “dropped in.”

This is Ben Raybourn

And this is Charlie Urquhart:

Obviously, I’ve got a lot to learn about shooting this kind of stuff.

I have some additional photos here.

Photography Field Trip

On Sunday I met up with over 70 of my fellow Houston area photographers and Flickr users at The Houston Museum Of Natural Science for a rare photographic opportunity. My good friend Laurie (aka Laanba) had arranged with Erin Blatzer, Assistant Director of Public Relations at Houston Museum of Natural Science, to have us all gain FREE access to the museum after closing time to shoot pictures. We had access to photograph things that you normally don’t get to take pictures of. This, combined with the ability setup tripods and avoid the crowd made for some rather unique results which can be seen in the Assigment: Houston Flickr pool.

Assigment: Houston is a fantastic Houston photography group that brings Houston area photographers together with a theme each month and this month it was the museum. In previous months it’s been Galveston, Discovery Green, Downtown and so forth. It’s cool to see all the different takes the members come up with.

I really enjoyed this meetup and look forward to the next one.

This is (in my opinion) the best shot I got of the evening (click to see the larger version):

Here are a few of my other favorites

I didn’t end up shooting as many pictures as I could have, mostly due to jabber jawing with people I have never met in person or simply just don’t see often enough. The rest of my puny collection reside in my Flickr gallery

The Thrill That’ll Getcha When You Getch Yo Pictcha

I was contacted by Elmore Magazine about purchasing the rights to one of my photos for their web site and for the cover of their monthly magazine.

With a circulation only in the tens of thousands it’s no Rolling Stone Magazine, but still pretty cool if you ask me. There’s just something about print media that makes it seems more “real” even though more people are likely to see it on the web.

So shiny!

*Photo of Jay Lee courtesy of Cynthia

Rock Baby Rock It 8

Three days of rockabilly and hot rods at the Houston Continental Club. A great chance to hear some good music and see some awesome cars. Since I was unable to attend during daylight hours I was forced to shoot at night on the oddly lit side street.

These are all shot handheld and without a flash utilizing only available light. There is no color correction or manipulation. The only post processing is a slight bump in “lightness” and a small bit of sharpening.

Please click image to see a larger version

Additional images in the Rock Baby Rock It gallery.

Happy (Early) Bastille Day!

Every Saturday we have breakfast at our regular spot and all the staff there know us on sight. We really like it there and they treat us well. It’s one of those places where you place your order and sit down. When your order’s ready they call your name and you come up to the counter and get it.

They’ve taken to calling me “Don Pelon” and it’s always good for a chuckle…

One Saturday we got a late start and by the time we got to the restaurant the line was out the door. We didn’t really want to wait around so we went to the nearby La Madeleine.

The next week we went back to our regular restaurant and the manager asked us where we were the week before. We explained that we went to La Madeleine and he got all huffy (in a playful way) and on that morning when our order was ready, rather than call out “Don Pelon” over the P.A. I hear “Francois, your order is ready” in a very bad French accent.

He’s been calling me Francois for some time now so Cynthia and I came up with the idea of sending a Bastille Day card to the restaurant and the work above is the result.

We even had a few extras made up and sent them out to a few friends and family while we were at it. We figure most people won’t get it, but it sure made us laugh! Now we’re sold on the idea of sending out offbeat holiday cards as a matter of course and avoiding the “standard” holidays altogether.

Too bad St. Swithun’s Day falls so close to Bastille Day….

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