I’m jumping on beds again! This time at the Valley View Motel in Mill Creek, West Virginia. I was up there for an Education Week assignment last week.

Wait? What? You don’t remember the first time? 

And believe it or not, there’s some relatively advanced technical know how used to make these photos. No no no. I’m not talking about my swan like form. I mean I used my camera and strobe’s ‘s high-speed sync function. …some of you might know it as “FP,” or “focal plane” mode. If I relied on my camera’s normal 1/250th sync speed, I’d be blurring rather than levitating. So, to fix I used my D700′s & SB-900′s  high speed capabilities and bounced the flash off the mirror.

What in the world is FP mode? Check out this really good & easy to understand tutorial put together by the good folks over at Pocket Wizard (which, for some reason, I did not use for these photos).

Here’s my exposure info:

Lens: 28mm at f/3.2

Shutter: 1/4000th

Strobe: Nikon Sb-900, on camera, head tilted backwards, zoomed out to somewhere between 50mm & 200mm (I forgot), and max 1/1 power.

Nick DiFabbio (formerly Borkowicz) aka Ghostfreehood brought over some props to Elizabeth Cline’s photoshoot a few weeks ago. …you know, the usual stuff, swords and masks. He got super giddy when I told him I wanted to make a scary portrait of him in the same fashion of this self portrait.  I’m super- stoked it turned out as scary as it did.

My initial idea was to light up his glasses, in a sinister film noir comic book kinda way, but they have the anti-glare coating on them. I still wanna make that image, though.

We definitely didn’t stop with the scary pic, though. Below you’ll see how we utilized a sword and the mask. I’m really stoked about these photos! Anyone else want a scary portrait? Gimme a call. seriously. 

For more of Nick, check out my photoshelter gallery.

There are some beautiful, wacky, and …uh, heroic? photos of Elizabeth Cline’s shoot here.

And I’d be a jerk if I didn’t point you in the direction of Elizabeth in a mask murdering Nick with a sword, right? Blam!

Brooklyn-based Author Elizabeth Cline is writing a socio-economic book about fashion, Overdressed: The Shockingly High Price of Cheap Fashion. From what she tells me, it’s kinda like Fast Food Nation, but for H&M, Target, & Old Navy.

She was a great subject. We even played with swords. My friend Nick came over with some swords and a mask & we had a pretty rockin’ good time. See, Elizabeth isn’t just a beautiful and talented writer. She’s also the guitar player & singer in Mortals, an all female metal band.

So… the rest of these photos kinda make sense. 

For more photos of Elizabeth, check out this Photoshelter gallery.

For more photos of Elizabeth and Nick in a fight to the death, go to this gallery.

And if you wanna see some dark photos of Nick, BLAM!

Brooklyn Photographer Joe Buglewicz released HOTLOADING a quirky memoir/promo book chronicling nearly a year driving a bus in Alaska. The 60 page "book" is printed on full color newsprint and the images were made with a Contax film point & shoot.

My buddy Joe Buglewicz — that’s him, a cigarette, & his “taco meat” up top —  just released a rad new promo book, “Hotloading.” Well, it’s actually a newspaper. Check his tumblr here! or, maybe you prefer just the straight up images on his website?

He used Newspaper Club to print this 60 page, full color, book. I TOTALLY wanna use this company for promo books in the future.

So, what’s “Hotloading” about? It’s a photographic memoir of nearly a year driving a tourist bus in Alaska. It’s really good & it’s super quirky. All the photos in the newspaper were made with a film point & shoot (It’s either a Contax T2, or T3, for all you film gear nerds. Joe? help me out here).

Michael sent me a fast drawing of his idea: …which I LOVE!

The idea is to make a white seamless portrait of several Social Security recipients and explain their situations with written vignettes.

This is Michael’s idea put to work. It’s the promo piece for the story.

The story section looks a little different. You can see it here.

I photographed one recipient from Baltimore, Dr. Timothy Modlin. Here’s his vignette.

I was told to make a mugshot, too.  – which I kinda like.And of course what kind of a friend would I be if I didn’t show the outtakes from the mock-up shoot in Denver?Cheers!

It didn’t take too long for me to understand I react the same way to photographs.

And as you know, light controls most of the mood of a photo. Sure, so does body language, but when the two meet…

So, these are test shots. I was working on super controlled, film noirish lighting. Like the first Scary Self Portrait post I wanted the eyes to go entirely black, with the exception of two small, piercing, catch lights, made, this time, with an underpowered, tightly gridded monolight. The key light in the above photo is pointed down, off my right shoulder.This picture only uses one gridded mono light, positioned directly underneath my camera & pointed up. The grid is so tight & focused none of the shadow hits the wall.This one is the combination of the two. and as a bonus, here’s me in a luchador mask.

You know how some photographers LOVE shooting weddings while others shoot them every so often to make some extra money? Well, I came to a decision earlier this year that I don’t shoot weddings. I don’t advertise as a wedding photographer. So, I only get referrals from friends. None of my friends can afford my rates ($3200-$5400), and neither can their relatives. So, I never really book weddings. It’s okay. I like having my weekends free.

Another way photographers make extra money are family/kid/baby/and pet portraits. That’s a bit more my speed and interest level. But I don’t really wanna make cheesy glamour shot/Olan Mills pictures, either. I like funny.

So, I got an idea.

Messy Kid Portraits!

Heck! if someone wants a portrait of them and their spouse playing in the mud I’ll shoot that too.

…seriously. I’LL SHOOT THAT! call me.

So, This shoot features Margot Ludwig. When I made these photos (Wednesday, August 31, 2011) she was almost two.  I approached her mom Kendall — who owns Curly Red Designs — with the idea. Obviously, Kendall was in.

I made this wacky wacky photo shoot for a fun story the New York Times did on Extreme Cleaners.

Sally’s a regular germ-slayer!“Blue is for the loo. Pink is for the sink.”Aside from a minimal amount of bleach, she uses all green products, like toilet paper made from recycled material and Seventh Generation cleaner.

This photo even made it onto the New York Time’s home page for a bit!