Explosion and a Fire at My House, My House

A few days ago half of my apartment complex literally blew up. I was sitting in my living room when an explosion rocked me out of my chair. The neighbors across from me were trying to light their gas stove and something went very wrong. The explosion blew off an entire section of the building's roof. When I opened my door and saw the rubble and quickly growing fire I ducked back inside, grabbed my cell phone and dialed 911. Then I put on some jeans and shoes, grabbed my cameras and abandoned my apartment. After some initial shock I started shooting. I've shot quite a few fires, but the experience is very different when you are apart of it instead of just a bystander documenting the situation. Somehow my building didn't catch on fire and all of my belongings are ok (as am I) but others weren't as fortunate. I have had to move out of my apartment now since the gas, water and electric are all shut off and most of the complex is now condemned. I've been meaning to get back on task with the blog. I guess that this will do for the first post of the new year.

























There are a few additionaly photos to view in a gallery at Veronews.com

Food

Between all of the society events and the paper's dining review page I've been shooting food pretty regularly these last few months. I enjoy shooting food. I think people like to look at photos of food (as long as the photos make the food look appetizing). So, here are a few of my recent food shots. In order: Sea Scallops, Belinis, Salad, Sea Scallops, Alphabet Pasta, Ceviche, Truffles, and Honey.

Villin Cycle Works, Inc.

I figure that before I start posting my current work I should take care of some of the backlogged images on my hard drive. Around the end of the summer I did some work for Villin Cycle Works, Inc. back in Gainesville, Fla. The guys at Villin go to great pains to craft custom, handmade bicycles from raw materials. The amount of precision and detail that go into these bikes can mean over 80 hours of labor per bike. I tried to spend a good number of those hours hanging out at the shop shooting the welding, painting and filing. These images are a selection of the images that I handed over to Villin for their Web site. The photos are all cropped to fit into a stretched horizontal slot on the site. I shot a good number of images for myself while I was at the shop, but I haven't had a chance to work through those yet. So, here are some of my favorite super horizontals. There are a few more shots on the Villin site at: www.villincycleworks.com.

Beach Life

Since my last post I've started a new job and moved a little further to the south east. I'm now a staff shooter for Vero Beach 32963 and it's sister publication Veronews.com. The new job has kept me very busy, but that also means that I've been shooting a lot of photos. I'm going to start posting again now that I've begun to settle in here in Vero Beach. For now, I'll just put up this one shot from the other morning. After waking up to shoot an assignment at 5:45 a.m. (before sunrise) I decided to make use of my situation (being awake too early). Since I live across the street from the beach I wandered down to the water's edge with my camera where I stumbled across this guy. Nothing like some sunrise fishing. More to come soon.

The Alcove

Lately, I've been doing some work around town for local businesses. Here are a few from a recent shoot I did for Alcove.

Rainy Weather Spot News

It has been raining for about a week straight now here in Florida. Yesterday, I was downtown watching the UEFA Cup Final at the Alcove after work when I heard someone say there was a man lying in the middle of Main Street (in the rain). Well you know: have camera; will shoot. So, I walked over and took a some shots while the man (who had just been hit by an SUV while trying to dash across the street against the light) just lay in the middle of the street waiting for the ambulance to arrive and take him to the hospital. He was treated for non-life-threatening injuries (as you can see in the first shot he busted his head open). The second shot here is of the man being tended to by paramedics while the woman who was driving the SUV gives her account of the accident to one of the officers at the scene. I haven't shot much spot news in a while. The Sun picked up the first photo below for today's paper. It was an unexpected end to my Wednesday.

Gator Stompin': a big pub crawl

Lately, I've been shooting more for The Gainesville Sun, which is nice since it means I'm actually getting published again. The other weekend I photographed Gator Stompin'. It's billed as the "world's largest pub and restaurant crawl." I started at the beginning and worked my way all the way to the end with all of the Stompers. There was a noticeable change in many of the participants as the night wore on. The event also gave me the opportunity to check out some of the bars and clubs in Gainesville to which I've never been (and a few to which I don't plan on returning). The paper ran some of these as a photo package and also put a gallery up on their SITE.

Below are photos of people getting their Gator Stompin' shirts checked off as they visit each establishment on the list, catching a bike taxi ride at the end of the route, waiting in line in front of one of venues, playing a Captain Morgan's miniature bean bag toss game, and lastly a fellow taking a breathalyzer test at the end of the night.