I’m very pumped to roll out my favorite shots from Mark and Nicole’s June wedding, hosted at the PGA Hyatt Regency hotel in Cambridge, Md.
Mark, is an old friend of mine from the University of Maryland and I quickly became buds with Nicole after meeting her when I moved back to D.C. three years ago. These two make for a great couple and I was absolutely honored when they asked if I would shoot their wedding.
Mark and Nicole were a photographer’s dream to work with. The instant I got on scene, Nicole already had a list of ideas and locations we could go to before the ceremony. Not to mention, they’re both incredibly nice people.
I’m glad that this group was ready and willing to ham it up for some of their photos…
Hands down, one of my favorite grabs. A special thanks goes out to my assistant Erin, who did an awesome job of covering all the angles where I wasn’t. Because of her, I was able to hang out behind the bride and groom and snag this awesome shot.
Journey, The Killers, John Denver and many more great bands made an appearance and had this group on their feet all night.
With an extra set of hands, I was able to set up a photo booth for the first time. Oddly enough, almost all my fall and 2011 bookings want one too!
A big thanks goes out to Mark and Nicole. Thank you again guys for allowing me to shoot your wedding and I’m looking forward to seeing you two around!
I’m very proud to bring you guys some of my favorite photos from Josh and Nicole’s June wedding in Louisiana.
From one of their earlier posts, you probably already know that Josh and I go back to navigation school. What you didn’t know is that Nichole is a guardsman (or woman?), which makes this my first mil + mil wedding. Cool, right?!?
I absolutely love catching these little moments of serendipity. One easy way to make it happen; when everyone else is looking one way, be sure that you’re going in the opposite direction.
“Do you like to party”?
A big thanks goes out to Josh and Nichole for flying me down to shoot their wedding. I wish the two of them and Nicholas all the best and I look forward to keeping in touch!
Just before hitting the road at the beginning of August, I was tapped by C-Ville Weekly to shoot a few commissioned jobs for their annual Best Of C-Ville issue.
By far, my favorite gig was working with Russ Melton, who won best home repair/handyman.
Before I contacting him, I found a video of him juggling posted to his site and knew that this shoot was going to be fun. Russ was a cool dude to talk to and really wanted to nail the shot. After about a dozen takes and a few bruised hands, we called it a day and of course Russ helped me pack up my gear.
C-Ville Weekly decided to run another photo, and I’m sure it was a close call. I do like the photo they chose because of two big elements. One, the expression of concentration on Russ’s face is great and two, all the tools are lined up in the air.
The day before Josh and Nichole were married, Josh planned a golf outing for a few of his friends at a local Louisiana course. Not being a golfer, I opted to bring my camera and sit in the cart and hang out in the background.
Just as we were closing out the day, a B-52, the aircraft Josh flies in the USAF, came circling overhead for an approach.
This is by far, one of my favorite personal images and I think there’s a pretty funny story behind the photo.
C’Ville Weekly hosts an annual photo contest with a different theme each year. This year, the theme was “local” and the judges asked that you submit a photo in a portrait orientation. After reading this I immediately knew that I wanted to take a photo of someone in front of Spudnuts, a landmark here in Charlottesville.
I scouted the location for two days at 5 a.m., watching the sun rise each time and waiting to observe how it would hit the building and see what colors it would present. This shot had to be achieved in the morning since they close around 2 p.m. everyday, and I also wanted to make sure that I could capture their truest cut of customers. The morning prior to the shoot I went in to pitch the idea to the owners, Mike and Lori, who immediately gave me their stamp of approval.
The day of the shoot, I went back to the spot I scouted in the parking lot and set up one Alien Bee 1600 with a 22″ beauty dish attached to it. Armed with a dozen donuts and the most inviting smile that I could come up with that early in the morning, I politely stopped customers and asked them if they wouldn’t mind posing for a quick photo in exchange for a free Spudnut (careful, they’re not doughnuts!).
After about 15 minutes this blue Geo Metro pulled up to the parking lot and out popped Gip. I walked over to him and briefly explained what I’m trying to do, and without hesitation he jumped in front of my camera. I handed him a Spudnut (jelly, I think?) and he said, “what do you want me to do?” to which I replied, “what would you normally do?” That’s when he took a huge bite and looked up at the strobe.
I don’t know about you guys, but I think intercontinental bomber + engagement session = rad!
Josh is an old friend of mine from navigation school whose awesome new wife Nichole, reached out to me immediately after they got engaged to shoot their June wedding. They were gracious enough to fly me down to Shreveport, La. for their wedding weekend and with a little extra time on our hands, we decided to head out to the flight line on Barksdale, AFB for an engagement session with their son Nicholas in trail.
The massive B-52 and overcast day made for a fantastic backdrop.
A special thanks goes out to Josh for going above and beyond, working the permissions to get the four of us out on the flight line.
I’ll be rolling out their wedding photos in the coming week, so stay tuned!
For Christmas, Amy bought me an incredibly cool Yashica Mat 124G, which was stamped in 1973 and was purchased from a retired Navy air traffic controller off of eBay. I’ve talked about the camera a bit here and there on my Facebook page and in passing, but I still don’t think a lot of my digital friends get just how rad this camera is. So, I’m going to write a post about it in the next couple of weeks and in the mean time, here are a few images from a March trip to Charleston.
I shot this trip on expired rolls of Kodak 100 VHC Vericolor, that I got for free from a friend who teaches film photography back home in Bethesda, Md. I couldn’t find anywhere what exactly VHC stands for (and I’m hoping one of my film buff friends jumps in here…), but I know that the film has a boost in saturation and contrast when compared to other 120/220 Kodak films from the same era.
The expired roll held up pretty well, except in the shade where a lot of nasty greens and yellows came out in the scans that I had to edited out with Adobe Camera Raw. I love the desaturated, almost flatter tone look to this expired film.
I’ve been trying out a combination of different developing and scanning labs and still have yet to find that sweet spot between quality and value. This last batch was developed at Richmond Camera here in Charlottesville and scanned by ScanCafe, which is based out of India. Both labs did an awesome job, but it took over 45 days for me to get my scans back for a marginally cheaper price. However, ScanCafe does offer a pro scanning service which kicks out files at 4000dpi, which makes for a 75+MB ginormous JPEG file. It was probably an overkill this time, but something to think about if any of my future rolls ever make it to print.
I’m headed out of the country for a week to attend a wedding in the UK, but before I hit the road I had to plug my good buddies book.
Greetings From Afghanistan, Send More Ammo drops June 1st, but you can pre-order your copy now from Amazon. I haven’t read the book yet, but I absolutely know it’s going to be a home run.
Ben, pictured above, is a really damn funny dude and I always enjoyed listening to his war stories while at DINFOS, which paled in comparison to my Air Force complaints about my steak being not cooked to the right temperature while at war.
This quote that I plucked from the Amazon page says it all to me:
“Tupper is a true grunt. He has that crazy, infectious sense of humor based on the absurd, grasps the poignancy without sentimentalism, and tells the reader straight up how it is to be a grunt adviser in the zany land of Afghanistan.”
-Bing West, author of The Village
I am really stoked to read Ben’s book when I get back to the States and believe it or not, this overachiever has another book coming down the pike.
I know, I know, you must be thinking “weddings one week, martial arts the next?!?”
Unfortunately, I am still in the process of saving up enough money to split the site into two entities, so until then everything is going to get lumped together.
Gordon the owner, pictured here, was gracious enough to let me set up during one of their evening practices and occupy a corner of mat space while the class rolled around me.
This was a pretty challenging shoot considering that I only had a 7 X 7 area to work with, the ceilings were about nine feet high and the gym had these bright fluorescent bulbs to contend with.
A lot of the other shots I took were just alright, but this one really stands out to me.
It felt good to be back at a BJJ gym and hopefully I can join up with Gordon’s gym in the near future.
Just before hitting the road at the beginning of August, I was tapped by C-Ville Weekly to shoot a few commissioned jobs for their annual Best Of C-Ville issue.
I’m very stoked to bring you guys and gals some great news…
I know, I know, you must be thinking “weddings one week, martial arts the next?!?”
