tearsheet: cover to cover

It's been an epic and busy few months, but I can't think of a better way to wind down the year.

When I got my first assignment for Fader back in late '08, I never dreamed I'd get to shoot a cover feature, much less two in a row! I had the pleasure of running around LA with Zola Jesus (and, for a minute, with the lovely writer/editor Amber Bravo), then back to SF for an impromptu hike in a torrential downpour with Cass McCombs (you should read Daniel Arnold's story here, it's beautiful. Honestly.). Every shoot is a new adventure, and I'm forever grateful to JFP and the gang for giving me such an epic entrée into segments of the music world I'd never otherwise have thought to explore.

So, in the interest of keeping things short and sweet, here's a couple galleries of some of my favorites from each shoot.

tearsheet: wsj, solaria

January has been a crazy month, both personally and professionally. Which is why I haven't been updating the blog with all the awesome assignments and personal work I've been stashing quietly on my little hard drive. I promised myself that this year, 2011, would be different: more posts, more writing, and hopefully more input from everyone following along out there.

So here's some outtakes from an assignment I did a couple of weeks ago for the Wall Street Journal. I had the pleasure of meeting and photographing Steve Andersen, a former employee at the Nummi auto plant in Fremont, CA (This American Life did an awesome piece about the closing of the plant; if you missed it, you can listen here), who now works for Solaria, a clean-energy plant that produces solar panels. Steve was incredibly welcoming, talking about getting hired by Solaria after only a few months of unemployment, and going to work at the old site across the street from Nummi.

If you want to read the article, you can see it online here, or click on the clip above.

2010

Every year since I've become a freelancer, I've tried to make a post with my favorite photos from the last 365 days. I was fortunate enough to travel across the country a few times, to get in a few good road trips, to see old friends and make new ones, to shoot some amazing assignments for talented editors, and perhaps most importantly I learned to step back and remember that sometimes life just needs to be lived and not constantly photographed. Although you probably couldn't tell that by looking at the pictures below. Ha.

Looking through thousands of photos from stories, assignments, and my own life... it's daunting, but it always reminds me that I'm surrounded by incredible people and incredible situations. It helps me remember I'm not alone in this.

So here's a selection of my favorite photos from 2010. Better late than never.

tear sheet - fader 68

Just wanted to share some clips from the latest issue of Fader. I was really excited to go down to Los Angeles to photograph Active Child and Freddie Gibbs. It was especially rad to meet up with Gibbs again, since I'd photographed him at SXSW for Oh Dang! Magazine and he was a pleasure to work with. I got to go with him and his crew to Venice Beach to get burgers and walk his super-sweet pit bull puppy. Photographing Active Child was like a blast from the past once we realized we'd gone to high school down the street from each other. We traded stories from living in LA, and for the first time in a while, I felt at home in my home town.

Here are a few outtakes that I liked from each of the shoots. Enjoy!

tear sheet: wired.com

I was really excited to work with Wired.com on a shoot with Ex-Hacker Adrian Lamo just outside of Sacramento. It was a fun shoot, and definitely a little challenging to try to take interesting and dynamic portraits in a single office-room in the middle of the day, but I think overall it went really well. Here's a couple screenshots of how the photos ran, and if you click on them you can see the whole story. It's an interesting read, for sure, and Adrian is definitely an interesting guy with a wild backstory.

And to close it out, here's an outtake from the shoot that I especially liked. Enjoy!