Crafting Dramatic Images
July 4th, 2014.
This is a story about patience, planning, and perseverance. As well as happy unpredictable accidents.
This is a photo shoot that I had been scouting, planning, and coordinating for years. In the Spring of 2013, I finally got access to a rooftop to photograph the fireworks at the Empire State Plaza in Albany, NY. Two years prior, on the fourth of July, I was standing at the base of the building seriously considering scaling up a piece of construction scaffolding to get to the rooftop and take some epic photos. Fortunately, I resisted the urge to do so and instead went the professional route of requesting access from the building manager. After numerous attempts to even talk to the correct person, I finally got in touch with her and proposed my idea the following year. As most who hear this type of request are, she was initially very skeptical about the idea, and needed some additional convincing to even give it real consideration. Her final conclusion was to say no, because I would need liability insurance to guarantee that I am covered and her business is safe if anything were to go wrong. I reluctantly accepted her denial, went home and began looking into insurance…
Finally the shoot day came and I was super prepared. I grabbed an umbrella while running out the door “just in case” we got some rain. I lugged handfuls of heavy bags and gear into the building, up the elevator, and up the stairs to the top exposed roof. I ended up having to pay the security guard to escort me up there. We agreed on $20/hour, which ended up being $60 or so out of pocket. I was brought to the roof and left completely unsupervised. I noticed a small elevated platform at the West side of the building which faces the plaza. I knew immediately I had to be on that “control tower” or else I wouldn’t get an unobstructed view of the plaza. It was up a brick wall at least 10-15 feet higher than the rest of the roof. The only way up was climbing up piping that hung from the side of the brick. I made 3 or 4 trips up and back down the pipe until I had all my heavy bags, tripods, and stands up to the captain’s deck. The photo above was later staged and shot for behind the scenes content.
At the top I began setting up all my gear; tripods, suction cup, a c-stand, I even brought my laptop to have a file transfer station when my cards filled up.
What I’ve come to learn when I plan out big photo shoots of a specific event like fireworks, a rocket launch, or a natural phenomenon like an eclipse or blood moon; There are always more things happening than you think (Especially when at an epic location). so have as many cameras shooting simultaneously as possible. As you’ll see with the images I share below, it was amazing that even when you are stuck in a single location you can still produce such a diverse selection of photos. What I thought was especially interesting, is that my “main” camera (Canon 5DIII) during this photo shoot of the fireworks, didn’t even end up producing my favorite picture of the day. It was my “Behind the Scenes” camera (Canon t5i with a 15mm Fisheye) that resulted in the real banger (seen above). So many things about this photo seem very intentional and planned, but in fact, I would really describe as happy accidents. Most notably, having myself in the photo posing perfectly with an American flag umbrella. First off, I remember deciding at the very last minute to grab an umbrella before I left the house, “just in case” there’s some rain. Which I also remember thinking would be a horrible outcome if it did. I quickly grabbed a closed blue umbrella quickly from my parent’s porch, having no idea that it was decorated as an American flag. I lugged that umbrella up to the roof along with as many bags, tripods and stands as I possibly could. Later on that evening, right before sunset the clouds got gray and very thick, and began dropping some very light raindrops on my setup. I took out the umbrella and used it to cover my camera. After noticing the flag on it I goofily stood up and held it in the air proudly. Keep in mind at this point I was hyped up and excited for the occasion, blasting music and dancing on the rooftop. When I did that I didn’t even consider the fact that I could be a compositional element in the 2nd camera’s photo. While going through the B-camera time lapse photos later I noticed the shot of me heroically holding out the American Flag umbrella perfectly centered in frame, and knew that had to be the centerpiece of a 4D composite.
What I was really excited about and impressed with about this entire photo opportunity is the diversity of photos I was able to come home with. I spent every minute I had up there exploring my surroundings. While one camera was rolling with a time lapse, I would go explore the East side of the building and shoot towards the Hudson River and towards downtown Albany or the 787 highway. I also returned to the site a few days later early in the morning for sunrise. Between these two shoots that each lasted about 3 hours, I captured over 20,000 raw files, 250gb of data, and a handful of portfolio worthy images that would end up turning into prints, getting published, generating income, and attracting new clients. Below are a few examples of some portfolio shots and some throwaway shots that came to be all because of my determination to relentlessly pursue this crazy adventurous photo shoot:
I graduated from SUNY New Paltz two years ago today, and I couldn’t be happier with my experience. The variety of work I I was able to create in just three years is pretty wild to look back on. The major I chose was Visual Arts, which was intentionally vague so I could take a range of classes that peaked my interest. I explored photography, filmmaking, graphic design, illustration, sculpture, woodworking, printmaking, silkscreen, animation, 3D modeling, stop motion, web design, coding & more! It gave me a chance to experiment with different ideas & mediums to develop my personal style. Through this process I discovered my deepest passions and specialties. It was a perfect foundation of knowledge for me to start a creative business, and provide value (in the marketplace) through my artwork. To this day I’m still obsessed with creating, and I it doesn’t really matter what form that takes. I still love to surround myself with my artwork, but at least now I can see some walls in my office 😝
Here’s a few slides I put together that encapsulate different mediums and types of work created during college. This is only a small taste of all the work I made, many of it shouldn’t see the light of day!
My first year living in San Diego, and I’m already greeted with some pure magic! Starting in late April of 2020, the red tide came to visit Southern California. I had seen Bioluminescence before, but nothing even close to this! One night I convinced Erin to get off the couch last night to check out the ocean. It was like lightning in the water, or fireflies to the naked eye. Every wave lit up with neon sparkles as it crashed. I became obsessed with shooting the phenomenon happening right in my backyard. I went out to explore a different location along the coast almost every night. This was all during quarantine, so I had a bit more time than usual to work on this passion project. I kept expecting the red tide to disappear, but somehow it stuck around for almost a whole month. Over that time, I took over 16,000 photos and filled up over 1TB of data shooting time lapses. I spent weeks editing the culmination of all this content into a short film called “Neon Waves”. This film has since been screened in a half dozen film festivals, and won a few awards including 2nd place in the Beauty of Nature category at the Timelapse Film Festival in Joshua Tree, CA. Check it out below!
There was something so magical and mesmerizing about the neon waves. Capturing it was so fun and rewarding, it’s that thrill and energy that makes me obsessed with photography! I also did a print giveaway and promotional sale of my Bioluminescene photography. Visit my print store to check out the selection! 😉 “NEONWAVES” for 25% off my entire print store.
Allow me to reintroduce myself! I did an extensive interview with TurningArt – an amazing online art platform I began partnering with last year. I have the honor to be the first photographer featured in their studio visit series! I answered a lot of deep questions about my career, history, philosophy, success, growth, etc. We also addressed some tips on staying productive at home, and how life has changed during COVID. I definitely spoke a lot of truth here, and reflected on things on a level I haven’t before. I’m re-sharing the interview here to have on my blog, but you can check out the original here! Thank you TurningArt for featuring my studio & work, and thanks to you guys for checking it out!
Can you tell us about your journey to becoming a professional artist?
My creativity took many different forms throughout my life, first through drawing, graffiti, and graphic design. In early middle school, I discovered my love for cameras and making movies. I applied to schools to major in filmmaking and landed myself in the more general field of Visual Arts at SUNY New Paltz (in upstate New York). In college I fell in love with still photography, bought my first DSLR camera, and pretty much never stopped playing with it. In my senior year, I began showing my work in galleries and selling my photos as prints. After finishing college in 2013 I made the bold choice to move across the country to California to pursue my career as an artist full time. I worked hard to refine my craft, network, and put my work out into the world. Since then I’ve won a handful of regional and international awards, shown work in galleries around the country, and sold hundreds of prints to corporate offices and private collectors. Simultaneously, I built the commercial side of my business. I created a production company called PRISMEDIA LLC and established a niche in the architecture and construction industry.
Tell us about your work.
I shoot both fine art and commercial photography, with a lot of intersection between the two. My subjects include architecture, landscapes, cityscapes and aerials. As a photographer, I’m probably best known for creating dramatic images, my obsession over details, and my use of digital manipulation to create hyperreal scenes. Through my work, I encourage viewers to look at the world in unfamiliar ways. I do this by photographing from extreme perspectives, utilizing drone cameras, and often using photoshop to blend (space and) time and create alternate realities. My best known series is probably my “4D” photography. 4D is what I call a digital manipulation process in which I blend hundreds of exposures from different times of day into one surreal composite. This blending technique enables viewers to visualize the fourth dimension compressed into a two-dimensional image. By photographing the same scene as it changes I am able to study the effects of time and creatively blend light and other elements together.
Can you tell us about your process?
Aside from the occasional impromptu photo adventures, scouting and planning is a large part of my creative process. Using powerful tools to plan out exactly where I want to be and at what time, I spend hours virtually scouting a location before getting there in person. I use weather apps and live webcams to track interesting cloud formations. I use Google Earth to study topography and discover interesting vantage points to shoot from. I use “ephemeris” apps to identify the time and angle of the sunset and sunrise, the size and alignment of the moon, and the position of the stars and Milky Way when shooting at night.
Shooting a 4D composite requires extreme patience. I’ll often wait for hours to capture the same scene as different people, cars, lights, and objects cross in front of the lens. The time-lapses I create consist of hundreds to thousands of images depicting all the changes throughout a given day.
My meticulous approach doesn’t stop after shooting. Post-production is incredibly important to my process, and it’s when a lot of the magic happens. The editing phase is where I can really infuse my artistic hand, show creative personality, and experiment with fresh ideas. I use Photoshop to selectively blend exposures together, clean up details, and craft a scene to match my vision. I could talk all day about my technical process, so check out MY YOUTUBE CHANNEL for more of that!
When you are looking for inspiration, what resources do you turn to?
Inspiration comes in many different ways. As a photographer sometimes it just takes getting outside. I like to explore a new place with my camera or wander around a familiar one with a new sense of childlike curiosity. A fun exercise is to limit yourself to using one specific lens and try to find as many compositions as possible. When in my studio and I don’t have a pressing deadline, one of my favorite ways to get inspired is by digging through my archives. I have a massive 100+ terabyte library of photos and videos that I’ve captured over the past 10 years. Those contain infinite possibilities of fun things to edit. I can either pick up an old project I never finished or imagine new combinations to blend.
Walk us through a typical day in your studio. What is your routine? Has is changed with COVID-19?
After coffee and eggs with my fiancée, she goes off to work and I walk down the hall to my humble 175sqft studio office. As a digital artist, I require a lot less space than your traditional painter. Most of my time is spent at my Mac Pro computer, the heart and center of my studio. This powerful machine is essential for making all of my systems run smoothly. I use my home-made print rack and workbench to sign and package prints when orders come in, or to frame prints for an art show.
On any given day I could be juggling a number of tasks including sending emails and messages, managing files and data dumps, editing photos and videos, writing proposals or invoices, updating my website and social media, researching clients or galleries, applying to art calls and contests, watching online tutorials, etc. The best part of my day is getting into a flow state of editing. I’m typically juggling 2-3 client projects at once, so I alternate between working on those and personal work. I mostly just follow what inspires me. I try to cut off my workflow every day before sunset to get outside and either exercise or shoot. I’ll grab my camera bag, head to the hills or the beach, or explore some cool architecture downtown. The workday never ends for me; I almost always go back into the studio for another few hours before bed.
My daily routine hasn’t changed much since COVID. The main difference is that I now don’t take as many breaks to get outside or to the gym. A lot of my client projects were also postponed, so I don’t have as many photoshoots in the pipeline. On the bright side, that now gives me way more time to work on my personal projects!
During this challenging time with COVID-19 finding the right rhythm to be productive in the studio can be a challenge, what advice do you have for staying productive and focused?
I’ve worked from home six of the past seven years, so I’m quite familiar with the self-isolation grind. There are challenging aspects but also big opportunities for growth once you find your flow. These days it starts with having a positive mindset about the situation you’re in. You aren’t stuck at home, you get to be home and create! You finally have the time to take on those personal projects or tackle some of those mundane office tasks (that we all procrastinate on). Here are a few ideas for photographers to get hyped about doing while at home. This is basically my to-do list right now:
I hope this list gives you some inspiration to get ahead in your business or try something new and creative! Personally, over the years I’ve had hundreds of project ideas that I wanted to do at some point but had to stick them on the back burner because of a busy schedule. Your home is your oyster, get stoked!
What is your advice for combating creative block?
1) Take breaks! Looking at the same piece for a long time can make you numb to what you’re seeing. It’s important to recognize when you hit these ruts and to step away from a project to think about something else. Sometimes it takes days of setting aside, but when I come back to it with a fresh mind I’m reinspired and more observant.
2) Movement and exercise throughout the day, even inside! I operate at two standing desks, which helps me stay alert and moving all day. I also have a pull-up bar and balance toys to stand on while I edit.
3) Share your work and get feedback. Skype with friends and mentors. I’ve been sharing my projects with friends to get fresh perspectives. Seeing the cool things other people make with their time also gets me inspired to create.
As an artist, how do you measure your success?
Success comes in many different forms. One obvious answer would be when your craft can support you financially. However, I felt successful before my art was paying the bills. Early on in my career, I put a lot of energy towards finding contests and calls for art. Through this process, I won a handful of awards and showed my work in galleries, which led to my first prints sales. This recognition for my work (despite not making me much money) is what helped launch my career and build a reputation. Most importantly it motivated me to keep pursuing my craft. Now, seven years into my journey I’ve had my work purchased by national corporate offices, Hilton Hotels, the National Park Service, and Lexus to be used on bus stops and billboards throughout Canada.
It’s important not to let money be the primary metric of success. I think I’ve accomplished much more because, for the most part, my passions motivate me. When your main motivation is maximizing profits, you end up taking on projects that aren’t as exciting or creatively rewarding, which results in lower quality work. As much as possible, I’ve made an effort throughout my career to chase the assignments that energize me. While initially this can limit your income, long term this strategy positions you as a specialist and allows you to charge higher amounts for work that you are more proud of. To me, true success is having a job that allows you to follow your passion!
How do you see the art market changing? Where you do see yourself in this transition?
I feel that art is finding its way into mainstream culture in new ways, especially with the explosion of the internet. You don’t need to rely on high-end galleries to build a reputation. Of course, it still takes effort, but artists now have the ability to build huge audiences on social media without paying a dime. People buy art where they come across it, and these days it seems people are online much more than in galleries. Now with COVID and the new lifestyle it brings, I feel the importance of having stable forms of residual income. I’m more inspired than ever to put all my work for sale on TurningArt and other online platforms.
What advice do you have for artists who are beginning to build their careers? Have there been any habits or strategies that you have adopted that you feel have created more opportunities or visibility for your work?
1) Find the things that light your fire. If you are fully committed and passionate about your craft, then working on it won’t feel like work. Become obsessed. Experiment, explore, keep practicing, and creating. No matter how good you think you are, always strive for improvement. Quality over quantity!]
2) Network, find mentors, put yourself out there to get honest feedback, and find people who support what you are doing. Share your work with everyone. You also never know who will help you out or connect you to a client. Be a good person and don’t burn any bridges!
3) The key is to be visible in as many places and platforms as possible. These days it’s hard to predict where people will discover you. I’ve made print and licensing sales from having my work in physical galleries, but also on the web and social media. When uploading to any platform, it is essential to keyword your files with relevant words that people might be searching for. Otherwise, how would anyone find it?
Do you consider yourself, and all artists, to be entrepreneurs?
Unless you have an agent or great representation, these days being business savvy is essential for artists. You need to be able to look at your work objectively, calculate the numbers and make sure your prices are sustainable after all of your time and expenses. A lot of new artists (myself included) get so excited to make a sale or land a job that they don’t really think through the appropriate profit margin. This is another reason to establish mentors, and talk to other people in your market about standard rates, etc.
Failure is an inevitable part of success in any field. Do you have advice for overcoming setbacks?
It’s way easier said than done, but simply put you can’t get too attached to any one project or client. At least, don’t put all your emotional eggs in one basket. Art is very subjective. Accept that your work isn’t for everyone. I get denied from at least four out of five shows that I apply to, or clients I reach out to. You need to grow thick skin, and keep pushing forward. Be patient and persistent and over time you’ll find the right audience who loves what you do. Keep putting your heart into everything, and grow from the failures. Besides, in a few years, you’ll look back on your old work and be amazed at how much you’ve improved!
What sparked your interest in partnering with TurningArt?
TurningArt discovered me before I knew about them, and I’m sure glad they did! I had never heard of a platform quite like it. There are plenty of websites to display your work online or to try selling your work, but I’ve never had great luck with those. TurningArt has a very user-friendly platform and a dashboard that gives you a ton of insight into how your work fits in the market, what’s being viewed, how many are purchased, and where they end up. They also have an amazing team of advisors to promote artists and connect clients with the right work for their space. It’s like having gallery representation, but with a much larger audience and reach. You can focus on creating what you love, and they help you get it out into the world!
What does having your artwork in the workplace and other commercial or public spaces mean to you?
Creating work that people will live and interact with is such an honor. It also gives me an extra sense of responsibility. I’m setting the mood for a space. One of the goals of my work is to be inspiring and provoke innovative thinking. I love that my work can bring that kind of energy to a workplace where people spend long days.
Additionally, my work is designed to be seen up close. I take pride in refining every detail of my images, including things that would never be noticed on a screen. Thanks to TurningArt I have a handful of my images printed on wall-sized graphics in offices across the country. I enjoy having a platform to display my work where those details can be inspected and appreciated.
To see more featured TurningArtists, RETURN TO OUR BLOG. To get Alex Nye’s art in your space, set up a free consultation with an Art Advisor HERE!
I was happy to kick off 2020 with an art installation at the library in my home town where I grew up! This venue (The Bethlehem Public Library) is a great place to show work. It gets awesome natural light because of the tall skylights, and it also gets way more traffic than many other venues I’ve been part of. It took us extra long to install the show because so many people stopped to chat as we were setting up. I had a great time talking with people about the work. I put a huge stack of bio sheets and biz cards but apparently they were already gone in the first week!
In a surprise twist, the artist who was meant to install work in the other hallway entrance didn’t show up, so I got my mom to fill that space at the last minute with her watercolor paintings. It’s awesome to share a show together! Make sure to check out the full hallway if you make it by the Library – Its only up through the month of January! Big thanks to my parents for helping me setup the show. I wish I had more time while I was home to put together a more cohesive series of my most recent work. But I was pretty restricted to working with pieces I had already in my inventory. I also definitely underestimated how much I could fit in here. There’s a huge waiting list to show work here, I signed up for it over 2 years ago. I’ll probably be signing up again for 2022!
Last year was the first time I put together a blog post reflecting on my highlights from the year before. I was pretty proud of the progress I made throughout 2018 and honestly remember thinking it would be hard to live up to those highlights in 2019. After reviewing my calendars, camera rolls, social media feeds, invoices, and receipts from the past year, I’m both surprised and happy to say that 2019 was even more eventful. I was reminded about the significant growth in my business, landing huge new clients like Lexus, Hilton, the National Park Service, the County of LA, and shooting projects for global engineering and architecture firms. 2019 also marked a complete decade of many things for me. Ten amazing years together with Erin, my girlfriend turned fiancé soon to turn wife. Ten years since graduating high school, and ten years in the real world. It’s actually wild to think how much of a baby I was in 2009. I literally didn’t even know how to take a picture on a DSLR! Now a decade later I use them to make a living. In no particular order, here are some significant highlights that happened in 2019:
Last year my big trip was to Alaska, and this year it was to Ireland. While wrapping up Graduate School, Erin had the opportunity to attend a large chemistry conference in Dublin for a week. We decided to make a whole trip out of it together. We took bus tours, visited castles, drove through hills and hedges, and even met up with a UK friend. We drove up the coast to Northern Ireland to explore incredible locations like Giants Causeway, The Dark Hedges, and Carrick a Rege rope bridge. We drove east to Galway, Dunguaire, and the Cliffs of Moher. I had always heard good things about Ireland, but I must say it dramatically exceeded my expectations. I was truly impressed and inspired by the country and scenery, and had a blast extensively shooting both urban and natural landscapes. I shot over 20,000 images and over 1,000 gb of data on this less than two-week trip and had my work shared by a number of Ireland pages. I also made one of my favorite short films on this trip, consisting exclusively of cinematic 4K time-lapses. Watch the film here.
Last year I teamed up with @safewaysign to create a new interactive way of experiencing art. We printed my photos on a reflective sheeting material that causes them to illuminate when lit directly from the viewers’ perspective. Since the material is made up of microscopic prisms which bounces light back towards itself, the only way to properly experience the work is to light it from the same angle as your eyes. I developed the concept to hand out LED flashlight glasses and other light toys that viewers could experiment with. The process calls viewers to interact with art in a whole new way, forcing them to participate in the act of “exposing” the images. I installed the show at the Moxi Museum in their Interactive Media Theater for an experimental pop-up exhibit. The genuine excitement and responses from both kids and adults were awesome, and it gave me more ideas to expand on the concept, refine this new series, and exhibit the work at more venues down the road. Video and Blog post here.
In the middle of the year, I was contacted by a company called TurningArt that would eventually lead to some of my favorite client projects of the year. TurningArt is an art advisory firm and art sales platform based in Boston but are quickly expanding all over the country. They first discovered me because of my Albany photography. I ended up working closely with their team to supply almost a dozen large prints of my work to a brand new corporate office in Albany, NY. A few months later they had to find artwork for a few other west coast corporate offices and once again connected with me to collaborate. One of their clients based in Irvine, CA had a very specific need for images of six popular beaches in Orange County. I ended up being commissioned to go on a photographic scavenger hunt to shoot these places I had never been to. It was one of the most unique, challenging, and fun assignments I’ve had. I spent days on pre-production to virtually scout the locations, visualize most of my shots, and plan out a shooting schedule that would take advantage of the best lighting. I spent a day and a half shooting Newport Beach, Laguna, Doheney, Capistrano, Salt Creek, Dana Point, and Crystal Cove State Beach. It was an interesting challenge to see how much quality work I could actually produce in a short period of time without any control over the light or conditions. For my personal work, I’m typically more interested in shooting at golden or blue hour, but for this assignment I was forced to make good images of unfamiliar places in the middle of the day with direct sunlight overhead. For the limited time and amount of control I had I’m pretty pleased with the overall collection that I came home with and delivered, and so is the client!
2019 was a year that I began printing my work significantly larger than I ever had before for corporate installations. First, I worked with a company called SB Card Connect that was based in the same office building as me. They had a huge 8-foot wooden frame that they wanted to be filled with a classic Santa Barbara print. We worked closely together to select the image they wanted, and I went on an assignment to capture an ultra high-res panorama of the scene. I stitched hundreds of photos together to make a super sharp and detailed print that tells stories along the SB coast. Then right before I moved away from SB, one of my original Goleta prints was mounted and installed inside the lobby of the Hilton Garden Inn of Goleta. It was great to find it a good home in the same city it was captured! As discussed in the previous highlight, my collaborations with TurningArt lead to corporate art installations of epic proportions. For the first time ever, my work was actually blown up and printed onto an entire wall in PwC offices on both sides of the country. Before my OC photo assignment, I invested in a new 50MP camera to increase my standard image resolution. With that combined with panoramic stitching, I was able to make files at over 20,000 pixels wide to be printed on vinyl wall mounts. The most extreme case was a panorama of the Newport Pier that was literally printed 40 feet wide across multiple office walls!
This is possibly one of the highlights I’m most proud of 2019, and it was also the one I could have least anticipated. In 2019 I generated the most revenue from licensing my photography than I have any other year by far. The most epic case of this is my deal with Lexus. They discovered my blood moon time slice photo online and ended up purchasing a license for a full year commercial campaign throughout Canada, using the image in advertisements on bus stops and billboards. I made a behind the scenes video and post about this project, you can check that out here. Another very exciting deal was with the National Park Service. They discovered my Alaska time-lapse footage and licensed it to be included in a museum exhibit in Anchorage. The Hilton of Santa Barbara licensed one of my aerial “4D” photos of their hotel and used it in a full-page advertisement in the annual Visit Santa Barbara Magazine. The University of California at Santa Barbara (UCSB) licensed one of my aerial drone photos of downtown Santa Barbara to be used in their 2019 student admissions brochure on a full page. ACI jet, a private charter jet company also licensed an aerial photo of Santa Barbara to be used in their annual sales catalog brochure. Finally, the Italian construction company Permasteelisa licensed my aerial photo of the Academy Museum of motion pictures building for their annual calendar publication.
In 2019 I was fortunate to be involved with a number of exciting video projects. The first one that stands out is the project my company made for the County of Los Angeles called OurCounty LA. The video highlights an ambitious county-wide sustainability plan. Along with my team, we attended multiple community events across the county, interviewed politicians, community and organization leaders, as well as passionate citizens on the topic. We spent weeks editing together a short inspirational film to spread awareness and enthusiasm for the plan. The film was even shown on the big screen before an LA County board meeting. Watch that film here. Later in the year my company also had the chance to shoot interviews with the Mayor of Santa Barbara and a CA Assemblymember for a feature-length documentary film on women in power. Just like we did in 2018, my team shot even more fun video projects about the new Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in LA. We made a few films for BuroHappold, the engineering firm responsible for the structural and mechanical design of the museum building. Watch our most recent project here. I was also hired many times for my drone work, including a fun jet-ski action sequence, and also on a commercial shoot for Harley Davidson.
It’s interesting to see my production company transform, adapt and evolve over the years. Because of increased project demands, last year I began expanding my team and hiring subcontractors much more frequently. Also, instead of personally editing every project by myself, I experimented with hiring both video and photo editors to help share the workload. There was even a time that I was on vacation but still facilitated a shoot, wrote a script and directed a team remotely to cover an event for my client. Another measure used to evaluate my company growth is the investments we make into equipment. As more frequent, higher-end, and more advanced jobs come up, my kit of tools grows as well to keep up with those demands. There were a few big camera upgrades that were needed to step up my production value. The Canon 5Dsr is now my primary photography camera with 50MP resolution, so all this large scale printing I’m doing won’t be a problem. On the video side, I’m now using a Canon 1DX Mk2, a powerful tool I’ve wanted to have for a long time. For increased aerial demands I invested in an Inspire 2 drone, which is a huge upgrade in image quality, power and versatility from my previous drones. Learn more about it here. Last year also came a motion control slider kit that allows me to get incredible dynamic time-lapses, and that I also use to get perfectly smooth and effortless slider shots during my multi-camera interview setups.
In 2019 Erin completed her 6th and final year in graduate school at UCSB. Since 2013 we enjoyed six amazing years in Santa Barbara building our own life together, making close new friends, and establishing my business. Once Erin finished her Chemistry PhD it was inevitable that we had to move to a new city with great biotech jobs. We essentially had the choice of San Francisco, San Diego, or Boston. We ultimately decided on San Diego, because it was a closer transition and felt the most like home. Erin found an incredible job that she is thriving at, and I was able to continue working closely with my LA clients as well as establish myself locally. The move definitely signified another chapter of adulthood. We once again were wiping the slate clean, and starting fresh in a new city to build a new life, explore new places, find new clients and new friends. It was sad to move away from SB, but also refreshing and inspiring to reinvent our life and routines. We got a larger apartment that gave us much needed extra space, but it also nearly doubled in cost from our last one. I moved out of my SB office and went back to working from home, although this time I’m using an entire master bedroom as my office which is meticulously organized and increases my productivity. I’ve already started networking and meeting some great people that I’ve partnered with… have influenced/contributed to my business. I include this photo of a Mormon temple because it’s right next to my house and I see it every single day!
I kept this pretty focused on my professional highlights, but there are plenty of personal things I didn’t even have a chance to mention… Like how I started the year wearing a boot with a terrible ankle injury, and from there made a comeback & got back to good health. I competed in half a dozen ninja competitions, and in a few of them placed on the podium to advance to finals in both NNL and UNAA leagues. I can already tell 2020 will undoubtedly be a huge year! My wedding, my honeymoon, traveling to Hawaii and China, Ninja Warrior, and shooting more epic architecture. I already have a handful of client projects in the planning phase. I can’t wait to continue growing my team, improving my work, and pushing my capabilities as an artist. Thank you to all my clients for an amazing 2019. I’m excited to reach new heights and grow together in 2020!
Huge career achievement unlocked ✅ – Talk about a bucket list, first my work gets blown up to full wall-size prints and now it’s being used on Billboards! Lexus of Canada has licensed one of my favorite “time-slice” photos for a year-long, nation-wide campaign in Canada. The image will be used as part of an advertisement on transit shelters, billboards, dealership showrooms, and who knows where else! I made this “behind-the-scenes” video to tell the story of how I created the image to begin with, why it wasn’t very high resolution, and then how I later dramatically improved the image details to be ready for large scale printing. Check it out here:
Before / After Retouching Overhaul
I’m excited about my first art exhibition in San Diego. I’m showing these ten prints at Team LEWIS (Global Agency) San Diego office. Do you see a trend across these images? The show had a theme, and among other things they were looking for artwork that incorporates their brand’s color palette (shown below the cover image), orange, pink, blue, etc. I dug through all my work to find a dozen photos that I thought fit the vibrant color scheme the best. These ten were selected for the show. Some additional text from the art call: “…work that embodies movement and the feeling accompanied by productivity. How can the concept of movement be portrayed in your work? How can we warp the perception of time to show that we tend to move faster than those and that which lie around us.” Which photos do you think fit that description the best? Stay tuned about the public reception this spring, SD locals are welcome!
BIG updates in my art career. My work has been printed larger than ever before as part of a corporate art collection. My photos are printed on vinyl taking up entire walls with dimensions of up to 9×20 feet! The installation was curated for a brand new Albany office of a global financial institution. Because of client privacy I am unable to name the company or show real photos of the location, so instead I made these “mock” installation photos that portray my best guess of what the work might look like in the office space. In addition to three full wall-sized prints, the company also purchased six framed prints, all with a theme of the Albany region. Big thanks to @TurningArt for discovering my work and choosing it as the right fit for this project. I’m excited to be potentially working with them again on a similar corporate installation out here in California!
The newest tool in my toolkit is a DJI Inspire 2 drone. This machine is pretty unbelievable and I can’t wait to start using it on more client projects! What improved from my previous drone? With interchangeable lenses, I’m able to shoot with a more shallow depth of field, and at wider or longer focal lengths like 90mm in this movie for a more cinematic look. Being larger and more powerful, it also stays more stable against the wind and has max speeds over to 60mph for keeping up with vehicles. 5.2K raw video resolution, battery redundancy, 360-degree camera rotation, and dual operators are a few more upgrades I’m excited about! Enjoy watching this movie I shot the first time getting the drone. I wheeled the gigantic case down paths at the Sandpiper Gold Course to get to the beach. From there I took three 2o-minute flights capturing the Ritz Carlton Bacara and the Goleta coastline at golden hour.
BLOG POST COMING SOON!!! Watch the 4K Short Film Here
In late 2018 I was commissioned by Harper Construction and DLR Group Architects to photograph the completion of a brand new school in Los Angeles. Harbor Teacher Prep Academy (HTPA) is a high school located on a college campus (Harbor College). We shot for two full days from dawn until dusk and highlighted a variety of features from the classrooms, media lab, gymnasium, soccer fields, and basketball courts. Since the project was finished so recently, the sports areas had never been officially opened or used before we got there. With help from Brenda from DLR Group, we brought our own basketballs and had the kids play in the new facilities. It was awesome to see them so excited to use the fresh new courts for the first time. The kids were an absolute joy to work with and happy to be the subjects in our photos. In some of the photos below, you’ll see I even had some aspiring photographers who wanted to chat with us. As usual, my post-production process was pretty extensive to balance light and color as well as clean up blemishes. Use the sliders below to compare photos straight from camera to the final edited pieces! Big thanks to Werner for being a great assistant and getting all the behind the scenes coverage. Thank you to Principal Murata, Kiwante and all the staff and kids from HTPA for being so welcoming. Thanks to Harper and DLR group for trusting me to capture this awesome project, and thanks to Brenda for being on site to help out with the shot list!
I originally recorded this video as an instructional piece for my team of photo editors. Instead of keeping it as a private message I decided to make it public for anyone who might find value in me outlining my architectural photo editing process. Make sure to watch the bottom video as well where I critique and give feedback to one of my editors. If this stuff looks right up your alley and you’d like to be considered as an editor, reach out to chat!
Very exciting things are happening recently that I’ve kept quiet about. I’m pleased to introduce my new series; “Prismagraphs.” I teamed up with @safewaysign to create a new interactive way of experiencing art. We printed my photos on a reflective sheeting material that causes them to illuminate when lit directly from the viewers perspective. Since the material is made up of microscopic prisms which bounces light back towards itself, the only way to properly experience the work is to light it from the same angle as your eyes. We handed out LED flashlight glasses and other light toys that people could experiment with. The process calls viewers to interact with art in a whole new way, forcing them to participate in the act of “exposing” the images. This past weekend I installed them at the Moxi Museum in their Interactive Media Theater for an experimental pop-up exhibit. The responses from both kids and adults were awesome, and it gave me more ideas that I’m anxious to share. I’m very excited to expand on the concept and refine this new series. Huge thanks to Moxi, Safeway, and my Fiancé Erin for making this happen!
At the end of every year, I enjoy reflecting back on the significant events and the progress I’ve made in the past 365 days. As I look back at 2018 in review I’m reminded how many amazing things happened to me this year, both personally and professionally. In this post, I would like to highlight my major professional accomplishments, life milestones, career updates, trips I took, and some fun facts in between. Let’s jump right in and start with a few personal life gains!
Easily the biggest milestone of 2018; I’m finally engaged to Erin! On March 14th, 2018 we embarked on an extremely grueling hike together to experience the rare spring wildflower bloom on Grass Mountain. Despite being somewhat spontaneous and being extremely nervous, the proposal went so well that I couldn’t have scripted it any better. It was an incredibly magical day. I also captured a photo that later ended up going a little bit viral on Reddit. Check out the full blog post about it here.
Yeah, this happened too! It was a dream of mine for years to compete on American Ninja Warrior, the TV show on NBC where athletes try to conquer an upper body intensive obstacle course. After training aggressively throughout all of 2017 I finally had the chance to compete on the show. After making it through to city finals I was disqualified because my toe dipped in the water on the 5th obstacle dismount, leaving me literally inches away from going to national finals! It was an unfortunate ending, but an incredible and fun experience regardless. I also competed in the National Ninja League and qualified for NNL World Finals later in the year. You can check out my ANW submission video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdJCK9ZfPew
My body took a few big hits this year which have caused me to take significant time off of physical training and doing the activities I love. First, while rock climbing around the new year I tore a tendon in my ring finger. This took a few months before I was comfortable using it again, and now a year later still isn’t back to full strength. Then in September while training at a ninja gym I fell from a tall salmon ladder and badly twisted my ankle in the crack between two mats. What I thought at first was just a bad sprain, ended up being multiple torn ligaments on both sides of my ankle. It put me on crutches for almost a month, and now I’m in a boot for at least a few more. While my ninja hiatus is obviously very unfortunate, it has also given me the chance to focus more deeply on creating art and developing my business. Because of the ankle injury, I decided not to apply to ANW this year. However, I’m planning on making a big comeback for Season 12 in 2020!
I didn’t quite realize it until I looked back at my calendar, but I took a lot of fun trips to new places in 2018. Throughout the six years we’ve been living in California, Erin and I have talked about seeing Yosemite but never actually did it until this year. In March we made the 6-hour drive up to Yosemite National Park with our friend Dean. It was frigid, snow-covered, and just as epic as I imagined. In April I flew to Colorado to visit a few friends where we went snowboarding and explored Boulder and Golden. From there we took a road trip through western CO and Utah; camping out, photographing the stars, climbing and hiking through national parks a few days. Erin and I also did a lot of traveling to celebrate our friends’ weddings. We went to Long Island and upstate New York, as well as a road trip to Sedona Arizona to see our friends tie the knot.
While this would technically fall under the previous category of traveling, I thought it deserved its own acknowledgment. In the cold of winter, a friend James and I made a once in a lifetime trip to Fairbanks Alaska for almost a week specifically to photograph the Northern Lights. It was an incredibly surreal experience in which I produced some of my favorite and most unique images. I held a print sale that was popular among my audience. Between that and image licensing, my content virtually paid for the trip! I won’t go into much more detail because I wrote an entire blog post about the trip. Read it here.
I’ve always enjoyed the idea of teaching and sharing my skills and experience with others interested in learning about photography and videography. This year I had a few opportunities to give presentations for the first time in the local community. The first was at the Santa Barbara Drone Club on the topic of drone settings and photography. The second lecture I gave was at the Channel City Camera Club on the topic of Photoshop and digital compositing. You can check them both out on my Youtube channel here. I don’t know if teaching is something I’ll continue doing, but It was definitely rewarding to help people and beneficial to establish myself as a leader in my community. Taking initiative in those local groups actually led to a few more professional relationships and client opportunities down the road.
This year I had my photography published in more diverse platforms than ever before. First, to kick off the year in January I had a full two-page spread published in 805 Magazine in a story about the Blue Sky Center in New Cuyama. In that same issue, one of my photos was also on the Contents page as seen below. In addition, I had my work published in an issue of F-Stop Magazine, on the cover of a brochure for AIA Santa Barbara Architectours, and as a finalist in the Photographer’s Forum annual coffee table book titled, “Best of Photography 2018.” After posting my Northern Lights time lapses to Vimeo, the National Park Service reached out to me about licensing my clips to be used in a video montage at a museum in Alaska. Most of these opportunities were unexpected and unsolicited by me. This makes me realize my work could exist out in the world more often if I took more initiative to reach out and market to publications.
Despite primarily focusing my efforts on the commercial side of my business this year, I still maintained relevance in the Fine Art world as well. Throughout the year I showed my work in five different gallery shows on all sides of the country. Including at the Black Box Gallery in Oregon, the Royal Mayors Ball in Albany NY, and a new Photography gallery called “WideOpen” in Santa Barbara, CA. I also received five different awards for my photography, including a citation award from the American Institute of Architects, and a first-place award from the New York Center for Photographic Arts.
Ever since my I started my career I’ve operated my business from home, combining my bedroom and my office into one cohesive workspace. For the past six years this worked well for me and it never even crossed my mind to look into alternative options. It wasn’t until a professional acquaintance was in desperate need of filling a room in their shared office that I considered the idea. After some deep analysis with my friend and production partner Chase, we decided to join the office crew for a year and lease our own room together. While I was a bit skeptical at first, the office turned out to be one of my best professional investments for a number of reasons. For starters, I am now able to invite clients and collaborators over to meet in a nice clean space outside of my bedroom or a coffee shop. Secondly, I’ve enjoyed the separation of working and living spaces which gives me a place to store my bulky gear, and keeps my precious lenses clean from excessive dust and cat hair. Third, the office connected me with an awesome community of local creators who I’ve learned from and collaborated with. As a total of seven office mates working in similar industries, we share professional insight, experience, and even hire and pass along gigs to each other. We also have a shared gear closet that has virtually any piece of kit you need for a shoot. Beyond just working together, all six guys at the office (Chase, Jesse A, Jesse N, Max, Eric, & Tony) all became really close friends of mine. The last office bonus; I enjoy being downtown more frequently, which has enabled me to shoot a lot more Santa Barbara sunsets and diversify my portfolio.
At the beginning of 2018 I completely quit shooting weddings with the goal of growing and focusing on my architectural photography business. I couldn’t be more proud of how well that decision turned out. It’s been clear for a few years that shooting commercial architecture was my real calling. Not only do I thoroughly enjoy the work I’m doing now more than any previous year, but on a financial level, I also doubled my income from the previous year. Below is a partial list of the clients (from local organizations to international firms) that have used the content I’ve created throughout the year 2018. I’m grateful to have discovered a career that gives me the opportunity to cultivate my skills and passions by creating content for incredible organizations. I’m very excited to make a name for myself in the AEC industry, and continue building solid and genuine relationships with my clients. I can’t wait to see where my business takes me in 2019!
I’m so proud and grateful for all my achievements this year, and so glad to have you along with me on this amazing journey. Thanks for being part of it!
East Los Angeles College: Physics and Earth Science Building G8
General Contractor: Harper Construction
Architect: Sillman Wright Architect
Completed: 2018
For this project at ELAC, the architect and I wanted to emphasize the “physics and earth science” aspect of this classroom building. To play with that theme, we came up with the idea to add star trails in the background of a few night shots. What do you think?
Final Shot vs. Behind the Scenes – shout out to the best assistant out there @romero_studios for capturing me in my element.
Last week was the opening reception of a brand new photography gallery in downtown Santa Barbara called WideOpen. The show was assembled by local professional photographer Fran Collin (FranCollin.com). He had only a week to take an empty renovated space and transform it into a gallery. I first met Fran at a gallery show he juried in Carpinteria a year prior, and I was fortunate enough to be one of the artists he invited to show my work at this new space. I brought a couple of other friends on board as well, including my buddy James Studarus.
I’m so grateful for everybody that stopped into the gallery opening on First Thursday! I had a great time, and got to see so many great people in one night! I was exhausted from talking and socializing by the end of the night. Special props to Fran who took initiative on an opportunity and put together an amazing show in such a short period of time. He’s hoping this space will keep the Santa Barbara photography scene alive. The gallery space will also be used for camera and product demos, artist lectures, and a rented studio space. This exhibition will be up through January, if you want to check it out visit 506 State St.
These are a few photos I remembered to snap in between some heart-to-heart chats. Thanks to the brother Chase Paisley for snapping some photos of me as well =)
It’s safe to say this once-in-a-lifetime trip only happened because of my friend James Studarus (@stardustimages). He has made fourteen trips up north in the past three years specifically to photograph the Northern Lights. His adventures have brought awareness to many people about the magical phenomenon of the Aurora Borealis, including myself. Ever since I saw the incredible photos he captured, I knew I needed to join him on one of the adventures. The seed was planted, and he began teaching me about chasing the Northern Lights. Based on the 27-day aurora forecast, we kept an eye out for days for a high KP index, meaning the Northern Lights would be the most active. There are a number of places that fall within the aurora oval including cities in Norway, Iceland, Canada, and Alaska. For my first trip we chose Fairbanks, Alaska since it’s the closest place and the cheapest flight from LAX. Plus, James knows the area very well (this would be his sixth trip there). We first had our sights set on a 4-5 day aurora swell in October, but as the day approached, the weather in Fairbanks ended up showing overcast skies, which would ultimately cause us to postpone the trip and wait for the next active aurora swell. Our patience paid off since the following month showed a strong four-day swell with perfectly clear skies the entire time. We booked our tickets two days before the flight and began preparing for the cold!
Something I didn’t consider about Alaska in the winter is that the days are extremely short (only about six hours of daylight). The sun also stays low on the horizon, which means sunset lasts all day! It’s pretty cool to be able to shoot beautiful golden hour light all day long. On the first day, I took a number of drone flights with my new Mavic 2 Pro around Fairbanks to scout the local territory.
The first night began around 9 pm at Angel Rocks trailhead. It was the first time really being tested against the cold. I layered at least four jackets but still wasn’t comfortable at first. However, once I got a taste of the Aurora, I almost completely forgot about the temperature. My first sight of the Northern Lights was a subtle green glow on the northern horizon. Once I set up my camera and took a few long exposures, I began getting really excited about how much better it looked in camera than in person. I crouched down low in the snow next to this ice-cold river to create a nice foreground shot. I chose a few tripod locations and left each one to take 30–60 minute time lapses of the star trails while we warmed up in the car. Being a seasoned aurora veteran, James was hardly impressed by the strength of the aurora on our first two nights. The first night he only took a couple of photos while I took thousands as a newbie. James was starting to worry that there would be no real heavy aurora swell on our trip. Luckily, we got what we were looking for the third night.
On the drive back home to our Airbnb, we noticed the lights picking up a bit, so we pulled off the road to check them out. Here are a few of the photos I took on the first night, as well as a time lapse from Chena Road.
On the second night, we parked on the side of Pedro Dome Road. Before the aurora came out, we hiked up a snowy hill to look for good trees to use as our foreground. I used the opportunity to teach James about capturing star trails using an intervalometer. We each set up a time lapse and laid down in the snow to relax. Somehow it was actually comfortable, which could be because the dense forest protected us from cold air drafts. I later realized that is when my flashlight fell out of my pocket and became the first item lost on this trip. A few hours later, the lights started to pick up, so we shot on the road and over the edge of the lookout. Once again, I had two or three cameras clicking time lapses.
The primary camera setup for the majority of my shots was a Canon 5D mark 4 with a 20mm f/1.4 Sigma lens. I specifically got the Sigma lens right before this trip because I wanted something wide and incredibly fast (meaning good in low light). Next time, though, it would be nice to have something even wider than 20mm (maybe the Sigma 14mm 1.8?) since certain shots were hard to capture the entire scene without panoramas. My secondary camera setup was a Canon 5D mark 3 with a 24mm f/1.4 Rokinon lens. This is also a very good low-light setup, but not quite as sharp and crisp as the 20mm lens setup. Lastly, at certain times I set up a third time lapse on my Sony a6500 with a 12mm f/2.0 Rokinon lens. This camera setup was responsible for some of the behind-the-scenes time lapses that show James and me running around with our tripods.
Night three was by far the strongest aurora we had. At around 7 or 8pm, we were killing time playing pool at a local bar, thinking that the lights wouldn’t pick up until later on. When we stepped outside to leave around 9pm, the lights had already been cooking for a while. Feeling excited and anxious, we raced to our first destination, a spring-fed lake which was the only non-frozen one we found nearby. The lights were popping off! I finally understood why James was disappointed the first two nights. We were literally smothered from all sides by Northern Lights dancing around. You could look in any direction and be smacked in the face by aurora. It was UNREAL and incredibly energizing. I felt like I couldn’t shoot fast enough. The best part is that it never slowed down either; it remained strong all night long. We spent at least three or four hours shooting at the same location, barely walking around but still finding a variety of compositions. One thing I didn’t realize about the Aurora was how fast it moves. It literally changed shapes in the blink of an eye, so you had to always be ready! That also means you can shoot from the same location all night and continue making different photos.
In my hasty excitement, I came unbelievably close to falling into the lake with BOTH of my cameras. First, one of the only shitty hiking boots I brought literally had the Vibram sole fall off, so not only was one foot frozen at all times, but it also was incredibly slippery. I was traversing along the riverbank to look for new shot locations holding my two camera setups with one tripod in each hand (carrying a total value of almost $10,000). Second, I had no headlamp on as to not ruin other photos, and I was navigating by the dim light of the aurora. In my haste, I saw what I thought was a bank of pebbles, so I jumped down to it. Turns out it was actually a floating piece of ice, and I slid all the way out to the edge of it, mere inches from the water and was unable to catch myself from sliding because my hands were full of cameras. Amazingly, the ice didn’t break on impact, although I did hear slow creaking. I stood there frozen and terrified, thinking if I moved at all I could fall through. I nervously called to James to come grab the tripods out of my hands and luckily slid my way back to safety without any harm done. Needless to say, this was WAY too close for comfort. The near tragedy definitely slowed me down a bit.
Below is a time lapse of James and I slipping around on the ice and taking countless photographs while the northern lights dance around in the sky above us. It’s crazy to see the wide variety of shapes and forms that the aurora can take over time. I’d also love to hear an explanation of why in some places it creates a pulsing flicker as seen in the lower right corner of the sky.
This was one of the coolest Airbnb’s I’ve ever heard of! We stayed in this yurt our last night in Fairbanks with a cozy fireplace, which made it easy to go outside and shoot. It’s also located on a husky sled dog farm, so we got to play with all the friendly pups in the morning. As you’ll notice in the first photo below, the aurora was not very strong by the fourth night. To create better images, I ended up compositing the northern lights shots I got the night prior into the sky above the yurt (Before/after example is seen in a slider below).
I took over thirty time lapses throughout my trip. I would love to assemble them together into a short film/abstract montage. Let me know if you think that’s something I should do! Additionally, a producer from the National Park Service came across my time lapses on Vimeo and reached out to me about using them in one of their projects. Now a number of my time lapses will be used in a video installation at a museum in Alaska! Very exciting and completely unexpected.
After the trip was over, I announced a fun print-giveaway contest among my followers. I asked them, “How many total photos did I take on my Alaska trip?” The correct answer was just over 20,000 individual photos, which includes all of my time lapse files. I had three or four people out of over 100 guesses close enough to win prints. After the giveaway, I filled my online store with northern lights photos and offered holiday print discounts. Most of my aurora photos are available as fine art prints, so check out my print store to see the full selection. Also use coupon code AURORA15 at checkout for 15% off! Reach out to me to learn more about acrylic, metal, canvas, or framed prints.
Well, heading back to reality sure was weird. My week in Alaska was so surreal. Experiencing the Aurora in full blast is like looking back on a dream, almost like it didn’t really happen. Now I also fully understand James’ addiction to chasing it. I’m already dreaming about my next Northern Lights adventure… I’m thinking Iceland?
Extra shout out to James for being my tour guide on this adventure, and sharing his lengthy experience on tracking the Aurora. He planned out an incredibly efficient and memorable trip for us. Visit his website to learn much more about the aurora and how to chase it yourself.
To see the complete album of images from this trip, go to AlexNyeArt.com/Alaska.
I recently went on a spontaneous creative tangent and processed all my favorite Albany photos in Black and white for a new gallery on my website. I’ve always appreciated b&w photography but never thought it was for me. I chose to give them a super dramatic high contrast look, and had fun dodging and burning different areas to isolate subjects in the frame. It was an interesting creative experiment with light I think every color photographer should try! Check out these interactive before/after slider comparisons. Do you prefer the color or black and white processing more? To me they invoke totally different moods.
This is one early example of a 4D composite I took in Albany, NY in 2013. I returned to this location at least 4 or 5 times to capture the scene in different lighting conditions. The final shot is the result of combining hundreds of exposures. The panoramic stitching is made up of about three stacked vertical rows and eight horizontal frames from a 24mm lens. Doing this enables the final shot to be extremely high resolution, in this case almost 15,000 horizontal pixels, which would enable it to be printed over 17 feet wide (at 72ppi) without losing quality. The only downside of creating such massive blends is the amount of data it consumes. My Photoshop file was over 25gb large which made it very slow to work on at times.
This time-lapse video shows my 30-hour editing process condensed into 4 minutes. The video only shows about 25% of my actual process, I slimmed out some of the fat so you can only see the adjustments that contributed to the final result. There is a lot of experimentation and trial & error that leads to a 4D composite. I wrote a few subtitles at the bottom that describe each stage of the process in simple terms. Enjoy watching me work in fast forward!
Albany, NY. 2013.
“El Andaluz” in 4D
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Collaboration with Jeff Shelton Architect.
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One of the most well planned and executed day to night photo shoots I’ve done. We prepped the site and restricted street parking to get an epic 4D beauty shot of this unique apartment facade in downtown Santa Barbara. With my camera set up in the same place for a whole day, I captured time lapses of the facade in a spectrum of lighting and blended them together. Would you want to see a behind the scenes video?
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Building: “El Andaluz”
Moroccan Style Design
Architect: Jeff Shelton
Metalwork: David Shelton
Builder: Dan Upton Construction
Developer: Leon Olsen
Photography: Alex Nye
Here is a behind the scenes photo of me and my tripod setup in action:
Below is a video I made slightly after to advertise one of the available units in this apartment building:
El Andaluz Teaser | Interiors from Prismedia on Vimeo.
The video below is a behind the scenes look at one of my first 4D composites I made after moving to California in 2013. A short bike ride from my apartment brought me to this iconic beach bluff lookout. I brought camping supplies to take a nap next to my camera while it took a 5-6 hour long time lapse of the star trails into the morning. The video first shows the two raw time-lapses that I captured and then presents a simplified look at the steps I took to selectively stack and blend those thousands of layers together into one composite image. Instead of showing the entire trial and error process I just chose just to show the layers that resulted from my experimenting. Things that seem to just “appear” (like the birds) were manually masked out from another moment in time. Nothing in the final image was artificially added, I only combined real moments from this location.
Song: First Snow – Emancipator
Technical jargon if you’re into that kind of thing: The exact number of layers that ended up being included in this particular composite is 1,997. There were actually over 6,000 individual photos taken for the purpose of this shoot but of those only a third ended up contributing to the final picture. As you may notice, there are composites within composites within composites. This shot utilized two different forms of time-stacking to capture the movement of objects. The star trails alone were comprised of over 1,400 photos taken over a 5-hour period. The rest were from a three hour time-lapse at sunset in which I selectively blended the light and cloud streaks. Digging even further – each “photo” from the sunset time-stack was actually an HDR blend of 3 raw exposures.
Between shooting, and editing of the photograph and video I spent over 50 hours on this project.
It’s hard to take a threat seriously until it’s in your own backyard. The Whittier fire of 2016 was one of the first times living in California that I’d experienced a wildfire right in my backyard. It became clear that you can never be prepared too early. Most local stores were closed making it tough to go out for supplies. It’s super important to have solid emergency plans, no matter how unlikely they seem.
This time-lapse video was taken of the #whittierfire and smoke clouds consuming Goleta CA in 2016:
This timelapse was taken at the beginning of the Woolsey Fire in Ventura CA on 11/09/18.
April 14th, 2018.
We had always heard the wildflower super bloom was a sight you had to see in California. Near us, the top of Grass Mountain fills with vibrant orange poppies in the spring, but to see them you really have to earn it. We hiked a few miles up what felt like a 45-degree incline all while carrying heavy 30+ lbs backpacks containing food, gear, lenses and tripods. It was (hot slow &) grueling but incredibly rewarding. At the top we had the mountain completely to ourselves for sunset. I began meticulously setting up the cameras for what Erin thought was another one of my day-to-night landscape photos (Not suspicious at all). I had her stand in the middle to grab focus, and set up an intervalometer so the camera would take consecutive photos every 3 seconds. I took off my hat, put on my button-down, and awkwardly fiddled in my camera bag when she wasn’t looking to grab “the box” and slip it into my back pocket. The cameras were rolling, and I jumped inside the frame so we could take an epic “selfie” together. We did a series of poses, looking at the camera, looking away, etc… My hands were shaking with nervous excitement. Finally, before pushing my luck any further I asked her to turn away and pose as if hiking up the mountain. That was my chance to drop down to a knee, grab the box from my back pocket, and once she turned back around pop the question (with a nervous stutter). Miraculously for me, she missed all the signs and was completely surprised and overjoyed. We soaked in the moment together, completely alone in one of the most epic locations we have ever been to. I then left my camera in the same exact position for the rest of the evening so I could capture the stars and blend them with the sunset shots for this epic 4D proposal photo. I could not have even imagined a better scenario or conclusion. I’m a lucky man =)
Here are some behind the scenes photos before & after the big moment:
The ring is an antique heirloom that’s been in my family over 75 years. I had been holding on to it for over a year just waiting for the perfect moment to give it to Erin. After being together for over 9 years I wasn’t about to do something casual or mundane, it had to be EPIC, and we had to earn it! I finally found that moment, and somehow pulled off this photo without her getting at all suspicious. Oh… and #shesaidyes ?
Proposing to my girlfriend on a flower-covered mountain at sunset. [OC] from pics
I later shared the photo and story on Reddit, and it got quite a lot of attention. It had over 80,000 views and received hundreds of comments from mostly internet strangers. The comments are extremely entertaining to read through, some very nice & meaningful, some a bit negative and some just plain goofy, but all taken with a light-hearted grain of salt. One viewer even photoshopped his own version of the photo with volcanoes in the background. Gotta love the internet!
My Camera, Lens, and Settings:
Canon 5D Mark 4, Canon 16-35mm 2.8L Lens.
Day Settings: 1/1000sec at f/8.0, ISO 400
Night Settings: 30sec at f/4.0, ISO 6400
Blended in Photoshop.
If you’re curious to hear a more in-depth explanation of how I specifically set up this shot and tricked her into posing for it, I eventually plan on making a separate blog post targeted towards my photographer audience. Let me know if that’s something you’d want to read about!
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