whole foods

i recently had the opportunity to work with whole foods grocery to promote local vendors here in wilmington for their new store's grand opening. photos and short stories about the owners and their businesses will be printed for in-store displays to let customers know who's making their products. this was definitely an amazing experience and i really enjoyed getting to know each of the owners. there were so many great qualities about these people and what they're selling, but my favorite part about them is that they are all doing what they love.

here are two of the assignments i shot for the store...

sara webster, creator & founder

finny's greens

topsail beach, nc

rich roehl & kris bell, owners

cape fear rum cake

kure beach, nc

assignment: macro metal

my grandmother's typewriter

assignment: what is it?

assignment: water

the purpose of this assignment was to capture water... not something that contains or produces water. not something that is associated with water. plain and simple, show the water.

assignment: superfoods

"what appears to be an average everyday food is far from average and ordinary. contained within it are a vast array of 'super substances' that are thought to be absolutely essential for good health. could this be hope for the future of our health or just another unfounded claim?"

this was our starting point for the project. as i researched superfoods, i discovered countless nutritionists and dietitians who oppose the idea, maintaining the thought that it's all a marketing ploy and there aren't any special benefits to eating exotic foods that cost you three times what you'd pay for something just as good for you and simple as...

... blueberries.

assignment: panoramic

this double-stacked panoramic was created using 22 vertical frames of the scene 

(11 across the bottom and 11 across the top) and sewn together in photoshop

[click on image for larger view]

assignment: pottery

light the pottery. watch out for too many specular highlights. 

background must have white to black gradation. make it look pretty.

this made my brain hurt. one day i'll be able to do it with my eyes closed.

[pottery by adam wiley]

assignment: architectural details in the city

assignment preview: business brochure

biocommunications photojournalism class:

our final project in the class was to find a business with at least 10 employees where we had access to the president/CEO and a handful of employees, as well as the offices, for the purposes of producing a brochure or annual report. in addition to employee portraits, we were asked to take some photos of other employees while they worked, detail shots of the company's product or service, and finally an exterior of the office. the photos were to be organized in a layout with copy related to the company's history and mission, along with captions to explain each photo. 

i chose to photograph HIGHLAND BREWERY in Asheville, NC for the project and cannot thank Nancy, Oscar, Erica enough for their willingness to help me out! the kindness and generosity of the entire staff made this a great learning experience!

looking over my instructor's notes, i've decided to make some adjustments to my final turn-in, but in the meantime i thought i'd post a few of the detail images from that photo shoot...

assignment: on-location business portrait

chuck hall,  president

streetcars car wash

greesnboro, nc

assignment: lumen prints

  supplies needed:

-old b&w photo paper

-flowers (or any plant life)

-a piece of glass

-the sun

-time

the easiest image you could ever create! arrange flowers on b&w paper and cover with glass. using the sun as your light source, expose the paper (could take anywhere from 30 minutes to 3 hours). there's no real way to tell if the paper has "cooked" long enough, but once you think it's good, remove the glass and flowers and place the paper in a light safe box so it doesn't continue receiving light. go inside.

for the purposes of our class assignment, we scanned the original prints using a flatbed scanner to later print using an inkjet printer. (for a lasting effect, there is a process to keep the image you've created. 

i've read about it but haven't tried it yet, so i won't go into that) once scanned, we were also asked to play around with these images in photoshop and print our final version to share with the class. no other instructions were given and we were free to do whatever we wanted. since i'm still in the infant stages of understanding photoshop, this was a good exercise to practice different actions i already know, as well as learning other features within the program. 

[set-up]

[original scan]

[final version]

assignment: infrared/UV photography

we were recently introduced to the Fuji IS Pro camera. 

used with a set of Peca filters, visible light is blocked to create images that show different areas of the electromagnetic spectrum not seen by the human eye.

i spent some time in the studio this week with the Fuji camera using a 60mm Nikon lens...

the above image is a daisy without any filters on the lens.

because i'd never photographed infrared/UV images before, i thought i'd go through all the filters to test and see what each one does...

(the last image is a "visible light" filter, which is why it looks so similar to the original)

*other than cropping, no editing was done to these images - what you see is what was taken in camera*

assignment: multi-pop tabletop

in our large format class we learned about using multiple flash pops to light an object (painting with light, in a way), as well as the Sinar method for calculating a specific depth of field and finding the correct exposure for both the camera settings and the flash. while it was very time consuming to have to stop set up every time someone in another studio bay yelled "dark!" and turned off all the lights to shoot their assignment, i really enjoyed this process...

[camera: sinar F1 / film: kodak E100G 4x5 ektachrome color slide]

summer portfolio

one of the images used for my large format summer portfolio...

[camera: sinar F1 / film: kodak E100G 4x5 ektachrome color slide]

assignment: lines

first design assignment from my first semester in school... 

[camera: rolleicord twin lens / film: kodak b&w tmax 100]

assignment: baseball

asheboro copperheads vs thomasville hi-toms

assignment: HDR

assignment: up close and personal

my small format class is all about approaching strangers to get a photo. i don't mind meeting new people, but when i have a camera in my hand it is the absolute last thing i want to do (mostly because i assume everyone i'd meet on the street hates having their picture taken as much as i do). for one of our major assignments we had to get up close and personal with thirty-six strangers in three different settings: inside with flash, outside with fill flash and outside with natural sunlight. the idea of asking that many people to pose for a picture made my stomach hurt - thank goodness for mimosas to ease the pain! turned out more people were happy to help with the impromptu shoot than i expected. and now i have a whole new set of friends from the experience. big thanks to everyone in salisbury who helped me out with this!

assignment: americana

design portfolio, spring 2011