View the slide show here!

I’ll update with the blog with my favs of the night alittle later (I’m away from my harddrives atm…).

A big huge thank you to Eric of Red Theory and Sarah, they really helped getting the right people in front of my lens during the crunch.

I would also like to thank Absynthe, Red Theory, Bury the Weak, Dying Season, Brianne Costa, Tomoko Omura, Scarecrow Hill, Mongrel, Dark Symphony, Excyde, I Will Fix Your Spine!, Rock Karma Promotions, Skada, Chris from the radio, Kurt from Thy Will be Done, Erric of Percent, Joel from next door, Harlequin Logic, Pretty Pollution, Keynote Productions and last but not least Nikki & Dennis.  Not everyone made the portfolio and it was completely my fault.

The following is my final edit  for my editorial portfolio…

You can also view as a slide show here <–

Crunch time is over, “the light at the end of the tunnel may be you”.  Signed off for both major and minor which means I can go to portfolio review but more importantly it means that I pulled of the improbable.  I switched majors and minors about 4 weeks ago; Digital Arts to Editorial.  I had 8 pieces, maybe, 5 weeks ago when I decided to make the switch, I now have 20, so if any one wants to do the math on that be my guest, I know i did several times and it didn’t add up.

In all regards it was a pretty effin good day.  I saw a production crew shooting a new movie in Copley on my way from Back Bay to the T.  It was inspiring and their two trailers of gear was awe inspiring.

Last night was hell.  it’s gut wrenching to see expensive photo paper chewed up by your printer, particularly when you need each and every piece from a pack of 50 to pass your school.

But that was a tastey beer, the perfect small celebration to mark the end of these stress zits.  There’s still work to do… of course, but least now i can enjoy a beer again, for the moment…

hey give it up for the T, the midnight train to Providence is allways on time.

There’s actually a great story on how that picture came about. As a few of you know I’ve been working on a portfolio of band/musician promotional pictures and since Tomoko is a good friend of mine and we’ve worked together creating her CD “Visions” as well as a few other projects, it was only natural that I called her up to set up a shoot. I honestly had no idea what I wanted to do with her as I walked up Newbury Street to meet up with her on an unusually gorgeous April afternoon. I gave myself some extra time to scout the area for that killer location… those walks are great, eyes wide open, looking everywhere and anywhere, that pit in the bottom of the stomach knotting over and over as the anxiety builds from that nasty little thought this picture is going to suck. And then I lean over this little stairway down to a basement dentist office and there it is… my shot.

My wife and I love watching Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations Last season he went back to Tokyo and one of the things he’s always wanted to learn was the art of Ikebana Anthony I agree, me too. The clean, purposeful, and graphic style of traditional Japanese art has always appealed to me. So much of the focus about the state of mind during creation rather then the finished creation. But I digress, of course, isn’t that what blogging is about?

So in the stairwell was a perfectly weathered wall and a bare potted tree with nice lines. That episode immediately came to mind and I thought it would be a great way to subtly speak to Tomoko’s culture. Granted it was a bit of a stretch.  Yes the scarf I asked her to wear plays into that as well.  As Tomoko and I were walking back to the stairwell I explained my idea. When I finally presented the location and exclaimed Ikebana she kinda quirked an eye and didn’t really nod. Hey I thought I was cool that I knew about a little known Japanese art form.

As I said the afternoon was perfect, we were on the shaded side of the street and the sunken stairwell paired with the open shade created this huge softbox, had her turn just so and look up. Thirty frames later we were done and walking back. Oh yeah I have a point… On the way back she told me she was asked by Strings for an interview and to submit a picture. She wanted to use one of the promos we did for “Visions” and while I do like those shots I thought the picture we had done that day would be really great too. Besides when The Strad Magazine ran a review of “Visions” they used one of the aptly named “red promos”. But she needed to submit materials that day to to make the deadline. So we shot at about 4pm, the commuter rail got me home by 7pm, two hours of editing, and the files in both jpeg sRGB and tiff CKMY uploaded by 9pm.

Everyone ended up pretty happy with them, it landed in my portfolio, helped me pass the second term Editorial and now it’s published… I’m stoked.

Tomoko has an upcoming show at Ryles Jazz Club in Cambridge Mass on May 14th. If you haven’t seen her you should, not only is she an amazing musician and composer but her band is absolutely astounding. In addition to her album she’s recently begun recomposing a few traditional Japanese folk songs that she remembers from childhood. It’s interesting to note that as a child she actually didn’t like these songs but as she learned more and more about music she came to understand the complexity and underlying grooves within these songs. Now she’s made them her own fusing modern jazz with ancient folklore, the result is a song rich in culture and thick with groove. Two other reasons to seek out her shows… She’s just been named as one of 15 of the top emerging violinists in the world (yes I said world) and (a little insider info) she’s moving to NYC in a few months. Actually that’s all inside info…

Oh yeah the picture…

Tomoko Omura

Slideshow of Tomoko Omura’s “Visions” CD release party at Ryles Jazz Club on 2/24/09

Visit Tomoko Omura’s website for news, show listings and music

I couldn’t cover the entire event but I was there for the evening capturing the music and the party. Bands featured in the slideshow include Absynthe, Red Theory, Scarecrow Hill, Bury the Weak, Hemlok and Skada respectively as well as many, many candids of the fans enjoying the killer show the Percent Crew threw down.

Percent’s Battle of Mayhem Slideshow 4/5/2009

Brendan Mercier of Percent Apparel

Erric Molloy of Percent Apparel

This was from Monday on a mission to find peacocks in North Attleboro… I think it’s too early