Category Archives: street

This weekend I met and photographed New Jersey-based recording artist Ant Grant and his producer, Tomas Ramos. Thanks to Akintayo Adewole, one of my closest friends and Creative Director of Akande Music, for making the introduction. Ant is a phenomenal subject and an even better guy.  After the first couple shots, it was obvious he had done it before. In addition to being a recording artist, Ant is an actor, and was immediately comfortable in front of the camera.   I could write a lot…a whole lot…about what I learned on this shoot. I experimented with shooting into the sun with high speed sync, was saved a couple of times by my new Lastolite diffusers/reflectors, pushed my flashes to the limit on a rooftop in 90-degree weather, stood on the ledge of a 5-story building to gey an intersection into the background, wished I had brought water (several times), pined for a Hoodman Loupe so that I could see my LCD in the blazing sun, fell even more in love with my 24-foot ETTL cable, and was VERY thankful that I bought the third set of 4 rechargeable AA’s.  Actually, there’s a lot more that I learned on the photography side, but the best part of the day was meeting Ant, Thomas, and their manager, Darren.  Yesterday was a timely reminder of how good it feels to be surrounded by like-minded Black males who are as passionate about their art as I feel I am about photography.  A fantastic day.  I’m looking forward to doing it again.  And Ant does smile…I have pictures to prove it.

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  • Akintayo Adewole

    HOTNESS!

  • Darren (Chum) Lewis

    Wow, the photos turned out great man.

  • Ant Grant

    Great work bro you are truly awesome man it was a lot of fun working with you. The time will come when we will be doing this on a major level and we’ll get back together like it’s nothing man all fun and jokes while creating a master piece…

  • Karen/Chookooloonks

    That sun flare, third image down?

    OOF.

    BEAUTIFUL work.

    K.

People who have seen my work before know that I love to experiment with stitching.  And HDR.  And split-toning.  So why not all three at once?  For this image, I used a Canon 16-35mm lens.  The final image is actually a stitch of 6 images taken while swinging the camera in a rainbow arc to create the severe distortion (pausing for each exposure, of course).  Trinity Church stands in stark contrast to its  much taller lower Manhattan neighbors.  Its also surprisingly peaceful, despite its proximity to Wall Street; just entering the courtyard felt insulating.  I worked a few blocks away in the late ’90s, but never set foot inside until this year.

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Last weekend I met Dr. Vanessa Perez.  Vanessa is a NYC-based professor of 19th and early 20th Caribbean Literature.  The moment she said that my mind started racing to see whether I could come up with some author that might fit into that category.  Not even close, so I kept my mouth shut and kept shooting.  Vanessa wanted some headshots to gear up for (and maybe include in) her upcoming book: Hispanic Caribbean Literature of Migration: Narratives of Displacement. It turned out to be a glorious day in the park, so I shot way more than a few images.  Vanessa was a fantastic subject and was even thoughtful enough to  bring bottles of water for the shoot, which would have been a really nice touch for the photographer to have taken care of.  Hmm.  I can’t say that I learned much about Caribbean Lit, though.  Maybe I’ll have to pick up a copy of the book when it debuts later this year.  Congratulations, Vanessa.  And of course a special shout out to Serene, my very capable assistant, for helping me with lighting, gear, and entertaining the talent.

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