With Catherine Ross

Occasionally, I’m reminded that the best part of being a photographer is the fact that I have a ready-made excuse to talk to anyone on the simple grounds that they pique my interest. This time, I happened to meet a certain Ms. Catherine Ross flying back to Portland from Colorado after Christmas. She and I were on the same flight from Salt Lake, and her bright red hair and striking features were hard to miss. I thought to myself “ohey, a redhead. That piques my interest. I should probably introduce myself” and then totally bailed on introducing myself.

But when we wound up standing next to each other at the passenger pickup zone, I figured Providence might be involved. So needless to say, bucking up was done, introductions were made, emails were exchanged, tea was served.

Incidentally, this is why a photographer should invest in a great business card. Nothing says “I swear I’m not a murderer” like letterpress.

In any case, Cat and I have actually shot together a few times now. The photos below are from a test we did a few weeks back. I can honestly say that a few of these have found their way onto my “favorite portraits I’ve yet taken” list. Nice.

With Greylag

Andrew and Dan are some of my closest friends, and I’m almost as fond of the music they make as I am of them. I spent a pretty sizable portion of 2011 following these guys around the continent with a camera and until now I’ve sat on the vast majority of the resulting photos at a loss as to how I was going to properly share them.

Well no longer!

To kick things off, I submit the following modest set of five images. These promo shots were taken to mark the auspicious occasion of Greylag signing to San Francisco-based label Ninth Street Opus, and just happen to be some of my favorites of the boys to date. I am especially fond of the first in the set. I think it’s the mountains that get me. Also, speaking of being signed, the band has a set of singles due out in only a few short weeks, so make a note of things in iCal.

So yeah. Expect to see the faces below frequenting my blog. I think we can all agree that it will be a blessing — like an unexpected-but-welcome mental back massage after a long and rewarding hard day’s work.

Oh, and if you aren’t already listening to their music yet, you should fix that. I think it’d be only fitting.

With La Grande and Laura Gibson

It’s January 24th! It’s a big day. Today, Laura Gibson’s new album La Grande is available to all the ears in the entire world. Lots of you may have already given the album a hear-see a few weeks back when NPR Music threw down their exclusive first listen, but a thing this nice deserves a many more run-throughs. Be sure to make it happen. You can, of course, grab the album off of iTunes, but it is offered by Barsuk on vinyl too (and CD as well if that’s still your thing).

I had the privilege a few months ago of shooting some promo photos with Ms. Gibson for La Grande, and so to mark this occasion, here are a few that have almost never been seen before. Look at them, and then realize how much you’d love to listen to Laura Gibson right about now.

I know I would.

With Lana Nyman

Lana and I have gotten together a few times now to take photos and it’s always pretty enjoyable. She resembles a younger, more easily-gotten-ahold-of Amanda Seyfried, which is braggable. And like so many of my recent personal shoots, having convened, we decided to throw a few old blankets into the truck and head down the river into the Columbia Gorge. I should mention it was freezing outside. I should also mention that I may have gotten a speeding ticket (but it was a set up, I swear). So yeah, it’s a good thing that the shots ended up turning out, or else it would have been a bit hard to swallow my Christmas present from the Gresham PD.

Speaking of which, I was hoping to have posted these before Christmas, what with the heavy green and red color palette, but time and life had other plans, so you’re only just seeing now. Sorry about that. Merry late Christmas (or early, however you wanna see things).

In all seriousness, though, Lana is a real beauty and it’s always a great experience taking photos with her. One or two of the photos from our outing turned out to be some of my all-time favorites for 2011 (this and this and this are her too). I can’t wait until the next time!

 

With Karsyn DeGast

I know I’m supposed to post some sort of big “The Year in Repose” blog, but fact is that I am either too busy or too lazy to undertake a post like that in sufficient manner. I will say, though, that 2011, despite all its horrible flaws (the Japanese hold a special place in my prayers), was a year of personal growth and much, much change – most of which was for the better. So I guess it was pretty much a successful year, right?

And thus, in the place of an extensive end-of-the-last-year, beginning-of-the-new-one type-post, here are a few pictures that I’m pretty fond of. I was able to meet Karsyn DeGast somewhat randomly during my recent trip to New York thanks to Nicole Loher and Twitter. We spent an afternoon drinking coffee and taking pictures. Not much more else to say (except maybe that Karsyn bears a pretty uncanny resemblance to This Person).

I hope you all had a really great and memorable New Years. Now, upwards and onwards. Excelsior!

With Snow-covered Colorado From the Air

Real quick, I must say that the best thing about Colorado is snow. Or maybe mountains. Snowy mountains. In any case, I was real glad to see snow and mountains on my trip back home over Christmas – we don’t get much of that stuff in Portland. Here are a few quick snapshots from there and back again (that last one may actually be Wyoming):

With Amy Merrick

At the Portland Bazaar, I had the distinct pleasure of being introduced to a certain Amy Merrick. She was attending the event as Design*Sponge’s resident floral expert and wreath instructor, and it just so happened to be the girl’s first time in Portland. Ever.

So of course I had no other alternative but to show her around the local sights.

Since she was staying at the Ace Hotel which has a Stumptown attached to the lobby, and is located a mere block away from Powell’s bookstore, I decided to just skip the city and bring Amy to where the real awesomeness is around Portland: the Columbia Gorge.

First stop was a super secret location and one of my favorite places in the entire state. It’s deceptively trixy to get to even though it is about a stone’s throw from the highway. The undisclosed island boasts a diverse set of quintessentially northwestern landscapes (All Earth Was Once Sky was shot there too) and a fantastic view of the river in one little compact area, which made it a great place to give Amy a sweeping impression of all that is Oregon.

After a brief tour of things, though, we were forced to start back towards Portland, but not without a stop by Multnomah Falls.

All in all, an exceedingly pleasant adventure. Ms. Merrick is a bona fide sweetheart, and that’s the truth.

Oh, and fyi – Amy also runs her own bit of internet called An Apple a Day, so go say hi.

With Nicole Loher

Nicole Loher is a distinctly impressive lady. If you’ve spent any time trolling fashion tumblrs, you’ve probably stumbled across her blog – The // Style // Student. Basically, the girl is still a baby by most standards (not quite yet 19), but she’s accomplished an ever-increasing amount for her age.

I first met Nicole over Facebook, where we became fairly decent friends (as far as internet friends go, I guess). She’d been a fan of my photos, and I was a fan of her face. But by around September of this year, I felt like I was coming across her name everywhere. This was due in part to the fact that she had been asked by Tumblr to blog coverage of NYFW for them, which is considerably awesome.

Fast forward to the end of November, though. I had been meaning to get to New York to visit the Outside the Lines exhibition at the Impossible Project in order to get a chance to check out their space before they changed shows in January. Such an trip would, of course, also create an opportunity for me to touch base with my NYC friends. It almost goes without saying that I was pretty dead set on the idea that Nicole would one of them.

No matter how many times I end up meeting people in person who I’d first befriended online, the occasion always brings with it a certain kind of excitement. This time was no exception. I was luckily able to have a night and a day with Ms. Loher (it was right before finals time for her, even) and the photos below are the product of our get-together.

In short, I advise you keep an eye on this lady. Girl be goin places.

Oh, btw – Flannel is GANT. Cape is American Apparel. Jeans are Bullhead for Pac Sun. Scarf is LOFT Ann Taylor. Shoes are Ugg.

With Jarrod Renaud and Carrie Davis in the Woods

A few weeks ago, while home over Thanksgiving, I was able to run around with cameras and a couple of the neatest people I know. Jarrod Renaud is a Colorado-based photographer that I’ve been able to befriend over the last few months thanks mostly to Twitter and Flickr. Carrie Davis and I met last year in Portland after having become Facebook friends. She’s from North Carolina, but lives in Colorado now, which is a convenient coincidence. We met up and walked into the mountain woods and wandered around.

It was a great and easy-going way to open up the holiday season.

 

 

With the Portland Bazaar

So. Something awesome happened last weekend in Portland. Grace Bonney from megablog Design*Sponge paired together with Greg Hennes, Matt Pierce and a whole gaggle of local Portland designers, builders, and awesome-makers in order to pull off the first ever Portland Bazaar. It all went extraordinarily well.

Below are some snapshots I was able to grab during the weekend.

The best part for me was that most of the vendors happened to be friends of mine in some way. It was like going to a weekend-long, all-day party with the people you care most about. And where everyone had the opportunity to contribute their own unique talents towards something that was totally off the heezy.

Some particularly noteworthy local bazaar participants included Wood & Faulk, OMFG Co., Beam & Anchor, Bridge & Burn, Antler & Co., Sketchbook, and Studio Olivine. Be sure to check them all out. I mean it.

Oh, and what Portland event would be complete without a live performance by my boys in Greylag? None. None would be complete.

 

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