I’ve been getting a bit restless and cranky lately. Those of you who know me well know that that is not a good combination. I get a bit, well, um, snippy. I need to be doing something, creating something. I need to be shooting something, anything. I’ve been reading some blogs that say just go shoot anything, it doesn’t matter what. If you are a car photographer, you don’t have to shoot cars ALL the time. I know this to be true. Just shoot. But, what to shoot. I can fall into a rut just like most any photographer where you feel like there is nothing to shoot and then quite conversely, I can find my self with an over abundance of ideas. It is the hot and cold of the creative mind. You get stuck behind a computer. You get stuck trying to figure out how to earn a living. You get stuck building a shed. Just shoot. I’m not complaining, I love what I do and couldn’t see doing anything even if someone would hire me! The day to day stuff of life can weight on a creative mind, as can whatever internal battles there are. And if you have a creative mind, you have internal battles, well, wars sometimes! Just shoot. So today I finally decided that I just had to shoot something, anything. I thought I would go for a drive, maybe look for a location or find some people, anything that caught my eye. Shiny! But then I got caught  at the desk finishing up an assignment, it started raining, the cleaning crew came and the blinds installer came. Enough stuff to squash my plans. Then I decided to just find something, anything. As I  watched the rain I kept seeing patterns in the drops, in the splashes. They looked great. I thought about lying down and trying to shoot some of those drops and splashes. Not the most original idea, it’s been done by most everyone with a camera. And of course it was now about 5pm and the light was going, going, going……. Stop coming up with excuses to not shoot! Solve the problem, make some photographs. Just shoot. So, I did. found a spot with lotsa drops and laid down and started shooting, I was using the highest ISO setting onthe camera, 6400!, But as soon as I laid down and started shooting, I felt good, no, make that great! I started seeing other places I could lay down and not get totally soaked. I started to play with camera settings and angles, I started shooting! Feels good. The photos aren’t going to win any awards, aren’t going to appear in a magazine or and ad and they aren’t going to make me any money. They are just the product of a creative problem that I tried to solve, the product of one side of my brain winning a battle. Just shoot.

So we tried something new this year. We joined a CSA this past season.  CSA stands for community supported agriculture. Basically you pay up front for the seasons harvest. This does a few things, 1 -it guarantees you some food. 2 - it guarantees the farmer a certain amount of sales and 3 - it supports local small farming operations. ( there are many many much more detailed and, probably, more correct explanations all over the interweb thing )The farm we chose is a USDA certified organic farm. That is kinda big deal as there are many , many hoops to jump thru to get the USDA certification. We went and did a farm tour and we liked the farmer and her operation so we signed up. What we were guaranteed was a part of the harvest every week. Whatever was in season, whatever was harvested, we received some of it. I think. We did receive vegetables every week, but some weeks we didn’t receive very much and other we received way too much of things that we didn’t want or like. We would receive a list in the email that said what was expected to be harvested and some weeks it matched up others, it looked like we were sent the wrong email! Either way it was always a nice surprise on Wednesdays when the box came. The worst thing about the program was having to clean everything when the box came. We couldn’t put it away dirty and the veggies were so fresh from the fields that there were often bugs and slugs mixed in, much to Lesley’s displeasure! Over all I would recommend a CSA to everyone. The veggies are as fresh as you can get them other than growing your own and your doing your part to support local farming. Remember, no farmers = no food!

We found out a few things about our own eating habits during this 26 week period. We found out we really really like the greens. Yup, the chard, the kale, the mustard and beet greens, we love em all! Before this neither Lesley or I would have even thought of trying them. But we realized quickly that the spring boxes were piled high with these so we tried a few recipes and we loved em. In fact we are still buying them from the farmers market or the grocery now and are excited for the spring to come for more fresh greens! We also liked the Pak Choy. The carrots were awesome! As were the green beans. The purple beans, which we received for over 7 weeks, were not so good. we ended up with about 2 large ziplock bags full that we tried to give away. The fresh garlic is outstanding and is much better than the store bought stuff. the potatoes were just amazing also. Lesley loved the eggplant, I didn’t care for it. The micro green were surprisingly awesome . I found out i liked radishes. We didn’t care for the beets or kohlrabi, but loved the broccoli rabe.

So with all that said, I thought it would be a fun idea to photograph the boxes every week. I started out being very disciplined and getting it done every week, but then work and life gets in the way sometimes. We couldn’t let the boxes sit as everything started to wilt right away ( and the bugs would crawl out of the box apparently! ) So if I wasn’t there to get the box right away or within a couple of hours I didn’t get to shoot it. Then we bought a house in the middle of this and that got in the way too. Then towards the end the boxes also started to lose their appeal to me, it was hard to get motivated to come up with a new way to shoot the same veggies. At first I looked forward to it as a visual and creative exercise, but after 10 weeks it grew a bit old. I really loved shooting the veggies but being in the new house and moving and having all my stuff all over , it all just got to me. But I did shoot 13 weeks worth, half of the program. Not bad. And I took some pretty great photos.  So here is a roundup of the photos.

Well it has been a while since I updated. It’s been a very busy, crazy time. The house projects are mostly done. I am moved into my new office. The shed is built. The walls are painted. Lighting updated. We had a trip to Florida and I had a fishing trip that turned into a fly tying trip because of the poor weather and rough seas. I have also been shooting quite a few different things. This post is from  our road trip back in September and our trip to Florida. Mostly these are just some photos that I wanted to share. I am hoping to get a few more posts in before the end of the year.

I hope everyone has a great and safe Holiday Season!

This boat is huge and has a history according to Google. Yes that is a helicopter on the deck. This was in Montauk, NY

This is my friend and super talented photographer Cary Conover. He shoots in a pool league in NYC. I taught him everything he knows. Just kidding, I’ve not been able to beat him in a long time.

This is the view from our room at the Cooper Square Hotel, looking uptown. Not to shabby.

While in NYC we visited the Met. I had not been there in over 30 years and I had forgotten how much I love it. We went to catch the Robert Frank exhibit of his classic work, ‘The Americans’. No photos were allowed in the exhibit and I followed the rules for a change!

A close Close.

I love me some Jackson Pollock

Part of the Asian art wing.

This is The Tomb of Perne. It is very impressive and only peaks my interest in traveling to see more Egyptian sites.

In the Roman and Greek wing.

Hand carved Buddha’s, there were hundreds of them on this one piece. I am in awe of the craftsmanship and effort put into what we consider art today.

While driving outside of Philly, we came across this abandoned rose green house operation. At least I think it is abandoned, it was way over grown with much broken glass and roses and other plants everywhere. It was a photographers dream. I would love to go back, but I’m not sure I could find it again.

While in Miami I visited with my friend Mark and we stopped for a happy hour drink at one of my favorite watering holes, Mac’s Club Deuce, a great dive bar on Miami Beach.

It’s five o’clock somewhere!

The E-Train!!!!

Always a photo waiting to be made at the Deuce.

Neon left over from a 1980’s Miami Vice episode!

It’s been awhile since I had a cover shoot. This one was shot back in Sept. We shot 3 or 4 different foods for possibility’s. We had a food stylist and 2 art directors on set. The stylist made the biscuits and prepped them. I helped stack and arrange them, picked the color for the background. I also made a decision to keep every thing skewed to a warm color balance as that was the felling I wanted to convey, warmth and comfort. We shot it in the new house, in the dining area. It has a sky light and 3 large windows. Of course it was overcast and dreary that day, so I lit everything. I want to give a shout out of thanks to Deanne O’Connor and Kathrine Dayton, the art directors at Our State magazine. They have been awesome to work with and they keep giving me more and more assignments! I am so happy to be back shooting full time!

Here is the November 2009 Our State cover  and an inside spread they made from one of the out takes!

So my great friend Willis Loughhead and his lovely wife Emily tied the knot recently in Montauk, NY. Willis is an incredible chef who has helmed some of the best restaurants in the country, and Emily is an incredible pastry chef. When they met, it was all over. They decided on a wedding out on the tip of Long Island in the early fall. They love Montauk and get away to visit as often as they can. I was very excited when Willis called and invited me to the wedding. He went on to say that he would be honored if I were to also take the photographs for them, but that if I wanted to just chill and be a guest, he would be equally honored with that also. I of course said that I would be honored to be the photographer. The wedding was my kind of wedding, very chill, very low key, a fun ceremony that didn’t last very long. Willis and Emily decided that we would do some off-beat bridal portraits before the ceremony at one of their favorite places, the Clam Bar, which is basically a road side shack with awesome food and some tables under umbrellas. They felt these kinds of photos were much more in line with their style than a more formal set of photos. After a quick steamed lobster and some Dom Perignon,  we headed off to do some quick pix in the dunes, then it was back to the Manor for the ceremony. The service was officiated by their friend who wore a seersucker suit with orange socks and white bucs! It was on the lawn at the Montauk Manor overlooking the  water. After the ceremony it was off to the Surf Lodge for the reception. A great sunset and an awesome clambake/grill was on tap, along with kicking music and even a visit by to police! ( just a noise warning, no one was arrested! ) I was assisted on this shoot by another great friend Cary Conover who took an excellent set of photos. I am now neck deep in editing this set of pix, but thought I’d share a few here. I know Willis and Emily are back from their honeymoon and are probably anxious to see some pix! ( remember guys, this is just a little tease, there are many more to come ) - pt