Pinballers

Boulder Creek

(I am) Pouting at the Weather Gods

After months of gargling to my folks about the wonders of Boulder, including altogether TMI about how nice the weather is, they came just in time for two strait days of cold cold continuous rain. I am afraid they've lost all trust in my words. If I knew how to reverse-rain dance I'd be doing it right now. That "rain rain go away" chant just doesn't seem to work as well as advertised (by young children).

This globe shot is really more of a first draft than anything. I'll return when there is more activity on Pearl. P.S. I met my musical hero today, Andrew Bird in a bookstore and nervously told him about how his music inspires me to become a better photographer. I only wish that I had taken a deep breath, first, and figured out what the hell that meant. To avoid confusion, I will not bring my camera to tomorrow's show.

About a Kitchen

Recent Landscapes

Since last week was likely the last snow of the season, I thought I'd take this oppurtunity for at least one more snow post.
This one from last week at Arches National Park. I'm somewhat sad to report that I am almost entirely jaded of photographing landmark landscapes. I just couldn't bring myself to photograph a single post-card arch while I was here. Instead I treated the landscape as framing practice, keeping my eyes out for interesting forms and lines rather than scenes so commonly reproduced that they probably have done more to narrow than to broaden the vision of most park goers. I hope I don't sound too cynical, its just that so much of the joy that I get from photography comes from my freedom to photograph whatever I please. I get to satisfy my own little quirky tastes without having to worry about what others like to feast their eyes on. I don't need a sign with a camera logo on it to cue me into image worthy subjects. Sorry for the negativity. I think that I am mostly scolding my former self for ever falling into the alluring trap of this type of photography.

Utah

Nothing Like A Good Friend

It was great to hang around coffee shops all day, chat and take in the nice weather with my close friend from college, Davis. He was kind enough to listen to my ramblings about photography, and did not take offense when I told him as I shot this image, that I was more concerned with what’s going on behind him then what’s going on with him. Davis is a warm, understanding, practical-minded and refreshingly honest human being. Having friends like Davis makes me a very fortunate human being.

If You Put Your Belly Into It

So here are a couple images from my belly dancing assignment the other night. Prior to this show, belly dancing was not even a bead of dew on my little cultural web. I walked in to the venue, with my camera around my shoulder, feeling a bit like a tourist, if not a stranger. But the performers I met that night were so warm and down to earth, it didn't take long to recognize that, in the most basic way, I am about as home there as I am anywhere, and that some of "those people "are in fact "my people". Its neat to get a sense of that transcendent sameness, and I think when I'm out on assignment, I get an especially high dose of it.

A Dog's Patience

The past week has pretty much been a continuous adventure, which means I have a lot of photos to post and not a lot of time to do it. So my next few posts might not be chronological (or even sensical for that matter), but guaranteed they will contain images extracted from certified Serge Giachetti experience over the past week or so (I can attest, I was there). This is an image of Hershey the Dog, taken from a parking lot in Moab Utah. To those of you paying attention, I mentioned my hankering for hiking in this area a few posts ago. I made good on this hankering last week with a swift trip to arches and canyonlands this past week. Thats all for now, as I have a ton of photos to sift through, including a Kayaking festival, a Kite festival, and a Belly Dancing performance, all from Saturday. Summer has just about arrived, and I couldn't be more excited.
P.S. I just got word from the Boulder Daily Camera that they want me as one of their summer interns. My first gig with a daily! Yay. I may be taking baby-steps, but they are big bold baby-steps, like the kind you see from gargantuan babies on the front page of the tabloids. Magnum, here I come!

Snow and Joy

Ok, so its been too long since my last post, too long, too long. But there's a lot to catch up on, starting now: So I went on one of the prettier and more divine hikes of my life the other day, really. After a month or so of pleasant weather, Colorado decided to be itself on us, and dump a little snow back into the mix. Very white, and oh-so delicate-and-pretty snow covered just about everything that wasn't under a ceiling, and the mountains were neatly enclosed in matching white fog. So, it was time for a hike (even more than other times are). One of the great things about this hike is that I shared it with someone else whose receptors seemed to be wide open to a beauty-experience: Darryl, a friend from school, now living in Boulder. If the above photo doesn't say it, I'll say it in words: Darryl was quite happy to be out there; happy just to be alive and in attendance for the snow covered everything.


The trick was just getting out of doors and into the mountains. Otherwise, as Darryl pointed out, it would have merely been some cold stuff to scrape off the windshield. But once there, in the mountains, it was the kind of beauty that just shoved itself into you, and tickled. Yeah, at one point Darryl wondered off and disappeared in the fog (shown above). Before I could see his figure return, I heard this deep gut laughter. The laugher continued as he came back into sight, but he wasn't laughing at anything in particular. I think he was just full of joy, and wonder, and a lot of other things that aren't so easily amenable to vocabulary. Man, it was a great moment! I'm glad that I attended!

Justin

Went on a search for wild-art the other day, and found only my own fellow staff from the Mile High having a drink on the patio of a local bar. Definitely not newspaper material, but the light was too good to ignore. This is photojournalist Justin Segarse catching the last couple minutes of it (trying to make a point which was lost on me).

Shed Building

My housemate, Greg, and his friend were putting the finishing touches on a new shed in the backyard yesterday. Its great to have an industrious and crafty housemate whose inspirations often involve the building of highly practical structures.
(the door of the truck was open so that they could listen to the radio as they worked).

Colorguard

I had the good fortune of photographing a colorguard competition yesterday. I would comment more, but I'll just leave this image for now, b/c I must be off to bed. More later on the phenomenon that is colorguard.

Gunther Toody's

I went to Gunther Toody's yesterday to converge with a college friend for a good old fashion mediocre old fashion diner breakfast. I ate what felt like enough greasy food to fuel a thru hike of the Appalachian Trail. Although early in the morning for a night owl like I, and just the beginning of what turned out to be a marathon of a day, it was a joy to sit and eat with my guy from school, his pops and his friend from home. The waitresses at Gunther Toody's have an enormous amount of flair, both as a trait of their personalities and as a component of their uniforms. I hung out for a bit and photographed afterward, but never felt overly welcome. I can understand this, considering most of these waitresses most likely don't identify on a personal level too closely with their Gunther Toody's flair pins and tacky outfits. But, I think, that is what makes the staff there an interesting subject to photograph in the first place, not to mention the brilliant lighting and colors that Gunther's has to offer.
NPPA has published their Best of Photojournalism. In my opinion, Mary Calvert absolutely stole the show. She's good. Although, considering her portfolio really pushed the envolope in some ways, I don't think that the "at-least-one-image-with-subject-reflecting-back-in-the-mirror photo-essay quota" should've applied to her. Seriously, there must be other ways of demonstrating your access to a subject and your appreciation of eye-candy, without falling victim to that cliché (again and again).

A Matter of Frames

Continuing in the rich tradition of photographing mountains through parking decks, I made/took this photograph while fumbling around Golden looking for wild art. I don't know if this series is even a little bit pleasing to anyone else (my roommate responded with a mildly befogged, but more of a neutral "huh"), but I sure would like to put together an exhibit of mountain-car garage images, even if it only goes as far as the walls of my room. There are only so many rock arches to frame mountains with, and most of them are at least 5 hours away from here. Too much time/money/fuel to burn towards photographing something that so many photographs have already been made of. That said, as soon as I get the time/money/fuel to burn, I will for sure head down there to the motherland of arches for a few nights backpack. Which brings me to the next thing I love about Boulder: its so much closer than the east coast to all my favorite places in the United States. In fact, its pretty much equidistantly close to all of my favorite places in the US--lets call it the mean of my favorite places in the US.
One more thing, on a total sidenote, and I promise not to venture too far from photography: how could I have forgotten about Bob Marley?!?! Man, what a musical genius. Having been reminded of this, I find it even less understandable why we peddle out so many prescription anti-depressants to our mopey.
One more music related thing: Andrew Bird continues to put out some of the highest grade and most creatively juiced music around. Thank goodness for that.

Climb Envy

Although, I am not much of a climber myself, I am in awe of climbers, the rocks they climb, and the gear they use to do it. I like talking to climbers too, especially when they use words like "burly" and "knarly". This image is from a mountaineering shop in Golden.

Select Comfort

As I have not had my camera around my neck enough lately to post new stuff, here's an oldy but goody, or maybe just a strange oldy. Regardless, I love it, and I laugh out loud every time that I come across it. Oh, and the guy in the center of the photo is pretty cool, too. Who else would oblige to sprawl out in a pile of tires without a moments hesitation, and very organically meld into a posture as perfect as this? Was that a rhetorical question? Yes. If you are reading this, Tron: Oh, how I miss taking walks in which we spontaneously decide on you jumping into a pile of tires to strike a pose.

Doubles and Wires

Also, church exodus

Leaving Church