Sunday, September 25, 2011

This photo actually doesn't look real. Yes, Photoshopping happened, but truthfully not that much. I'll tell ya, the Williamsburg Waterfront's view of the sun rising and setting are unbeatable in the urban category. Working a show whilst the sun sets behind the city? One of my favorite seasonal gigs.


This photo was shot from our stage, pre-Widespread Panic load-in, pretty much in the same place as the below, but with a longer focal length.

8:00 a.m. at the Williamsburg Waterfront/Brooklyn, NY/9.17.11

Saturday, September 24, 2011

Center stage at 8:00 a.m, just prior to the start of load-in for Widespread Panic.


Williamsburg Waterfront/Brooklyn, NY/9.17.11

Friday, September 23, 2011


The sun setting prior to the start of the Andrea Bocelli concert in Central Park on 9.15.11.

Sadly, I didn't have a wide enough lens on me to do this sky justice.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011


Sometimes Serbian tennis champions propose marriage to you atop iconic skyscrapers... annnd sometimes you just take their photograph.


Sorry, Dad, this time it was the latter.

Call me crazy, but I will say, however, that these photos mark the first time I went to a press event for fun and not for work.

Thanks, Matt McCullough!

Empire State Building/9.13.11

Tuesday, September 20, 2011


Fashion Week is one of the most bizarre weeks on the planet. Months and months of planning and meticulous preparation involving hundreds of people for a four-minute fashion show.


All of us that take part are crazy.

This show, however, was awesome because I was reunited with one of my favorite Madison Square Garden buddies, Ms. Jessy Qussar, who now works in marketing for Vita Coco Coconut Water. I pretty much took the job so I could hang out with my long-lost friend and support her company's delicious product, of course!

Backstage at the Ohne Titel show at Milk Studios.

9.12.11

Monday, September 19, 2011



Annnd back to work and to New York for Fashion's Night Out, the Christmas Eve of September's Fashion Week.


Stuart Weitzman's boutique/9.8.11

Sunday, September 18, 2011

Energy, neither created, nor destroyed.


2011 has brought a lot of reflection on life and on death. The more people who pass, the less I find myself comforted by the practices of religion. Not that I've ever been devoted to any particular faith, but it seems counterintuitive, doesn't it? The more I think about death, the more I rely on science, as I'm infinitely more at ease with the idea that our energies breakdown and shift to create other forms of life. That energy has to come somewhere, doesn't it?

When someone dies, where does their light go? You know, the light - the thing that makes their eyes bright and their smile warm. The thing that is delicately detectable when that person walks into a room. Where does that go? And for that matter, what sort of chemistry makes that reaction to a single soul possible?

When you see that person void of their light, void of their motion, lying still in a serenely pretty box, the word "gone" takes on a whole new perspective. I have never been more sure in my life that the body has very little to do with the soul. A wonderful union, yes, but very separate.

Saturday, September 17, 2011

Final frame.


9.6.11

Friday, September 16, 2011

9.5.11

Thursday, September 15, 2011

This was the first year that I'd ever been out to New York's annual electronic music festival on Randall's Island known to electronic music fans everywhere as the Electric Zoo. I don't know if I was in a terrible mood, or simply just didn't have the patience for a crowd, but it definitely wasn't my cup of tea. However, it was great for people-watching. Definitely can recommend the people-watching.


9.4.11

Wednesday, September 14, 2011


Following our day at the U.S. Open, Mr. Merritt and I took a stroll to Flushing Meadows Corona Park's World's Fair Marina. I begin to frame the above shot when the below shot happened!


9.1.11

Tuesday, September 13, 2011



I've been really into my 85mm lens lately, but sometimes it just doesn't do the trick. I knew it was the wrong lens for the U.S. Open, but I wasn't really sure what the camera policy was, so I figured, if anything, they'd allow that into the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. As it was my first time at the Open, the wrong lens was definitely better than no lens.


Thanks again to John Merritt for taking me to my first U.S. Open!

Top: Updating the tournament board
Middle: City behind Arthur Ashe Stadium
Bottom: Roger Federer being interviewed after defeating an early opponent.

9.1.11

Monday, September 12, 2011

Lower Manhattan from Brooklyn Bridge Park.


8.28.11


Manhattan Bridge from the Brooklyn Bridge.

8.28.11

Sunday, September 11, 2011


Post-hurricane sunset in the West Village on Sunday evening.


8.28.11

Saturday, September 10, 2011


Mom: So if you were in Battery Park in the evening, you didn't evacuate?
Me: No, I did. I brought my stuff uptown around 10 a.m.
Mom: So... you went back downtown?
Dad: Clearly she doesn't understand what it means to be evacuated.

Walking from 76th and 2nd to Union Square, Megan and I decided to cab it from 14th to Battery Park in interest of time. Again, for as long as we waited, things were pretty calm, much to the dismay of our journalistic intent.

8.27.11

Friday, September 09, 2011





Penn Station, pre-Irene. All subway, LIRR and Amtrak trains canceled or suspended.


8.27.11

Thursday, September 08, 2011



Times Square, pre-Irene.


Lines at all the drugstores, people using sandbags as benches and of course, closed subway stations.

8.27.11

Wednesday, September 07, 2011



Bryant Park, pre-Irene.


8.27.11

Manhattan evacuations and free subway entry due to hurricane was something I never expected to see. Ever. Granted, the free rides only applied to stations in evacuation zones (my neighborhood included), but still! $2.25 goes a long way, man. Thanks, Irene/Bloomberg for allowing me to see almost a 48-hour period in New York without a functioning subway system.


8.27.11

Bloomingdale's? Boarded up? You'd think there was going to be a hurricane in Manhattan or something...

8.27.11

Friday, September 02, 2011

For the first time, my anxiety about not having a camera in-hand, from start to finish, did not get the better of me. For the first time, I was able to hand over my camera and, cautiously at first, completely participate in my surroundings. One small step, as they say.

Photographers, if you will, are professional observers. Because you are oft an outsider, your experience is secondary. While Hondros would argue the contrary and this may seem like a bad thing, for the craft, it's quite a valuable skill. Not only do you have control of your specific action, but of the documentation of a multitude of actions with no direct influence on the situation, other than angle and light.

In that respect, journalism goes from basic reportage to art form, in that you, of course, are creating a true-to-life situation purely from your perspective as an observer. Key word being: create. The difference between taking a photo and making a photo.

The tricky thing, however, is knowing when to give that up... to put down the camera and to just be where you are. While racing this sailboat, it happened. I was nervous about it, but it happened.

I watched boats sail in and out of my frame of sight, painted with the rich tones of a setting sun. Truly a photographer's dream leisure scenario. I would take my eye off the spinnaker for a second to glance at the frames I was missing... at one point, handing Achille the camera to try and direct him to shoot what I was seeing (Thanks, Achille!). Still, it wasn't the same.

By the time the wind had changed enough to release me from my duties, it was nearly dark. This was the first, last and only frame I took during that race.

And I like it.