Sarah and Daisy

Sarah and Daisy, originally uploaded by calanan.

One of the portraits I shot for my new photo project, "This Is Their Place"

See: thisistheirplace.calanan.com

Sarah Nielson

Blog: "Tales of Wit and Charm"

Twitter: sarahbellum

Liberty Lake at Liberty Park
Downtown SLC, UT

Sigma 30mm f/1.4
Nikon SB-800, 1/4 CTO

Orv and his new chick

, originally uploaded by calanan.

Orv Nebby

Salt Lake City, UT

Sigma 30mm f/1.4

Favorite photo of the day

"Garlic Nest" by [Tarky7]

For beebo wallace

For beebo, originally uploaded by calanan.

Cheers, beebs!

Steve and Maude
Salt Lake City, UT

Sigma 30mm f/1.4

Favorite photo of the day

"Jasper" by [beebo wallace]

Couch-Be-Gone

CouchBeGone, originally uploaded by calanan.

Breaking news!

For those closely following this story, the couch made so famous by jakerome has just been lifted by three Utes!*

* Disclaimer: There is, in fact, no evidence that any member of this gang is actually enrolled at the University of Utah.

That is all.

NO to red couches on Flickr!

NO to red couches on Flickr!, originally uploaded by calanan.

Salt Lake City, UT
Sigma 30mm f/1.4

Some bloody MFA dumped a mangy couch in front of our house. Jake, known on Flickr for his Explore-jamming, sign-wielding protests (one of which led to Flickr caving in and buying everyone donuts one day - photo below), agreed to make the best of a bad situation and use the couch for good, not evil.

Hopefully someone will take him up on his offer and drag that beast off of our property.

Here are a few of Jake's previous remonstrations:

Goading the Flickr admins


Mocking those obsessed with Flickr Explore


A protest sign protesting a lack of protest sign paper


And finally, the one that got the world free donuts


Favorite photo of the day

"Dog on Couch" by Benjamin Long [Ricohmatic]

Another visit by jakerome!

Steve and Jake, originally uploaded by calanan.

Jake made another appearance here in SLC so we decided to host a "Wipeout" Cookout in his honor. Our good friends/neighbors also stopped by as did their playful canines.

It was good to see the donut-eating lad again and an honor to host a living legend. :)

We hauled the tube out onto the back patio, wired up the rabbit ears and tuned in to ABC for 2 hours of Japanese game show-inspired mayhem.



Not surprisingly the dogs were much more interested in playing and young McKenna was thoroughly unimpressed with the TV shenanigans.



In short, we got a kick out watching people make fools of themselves on "Wipeout" but "I Survived a Japanese Game Show" tickled none of out fancies.

All photos: Salt Lake City, UT
Sigma 30mm f/1.4

Favorite photo of the day

"Mikado" by Stephen Jesse Taylor [west of the sound]

Part of a group show in Buffalo, NY

Two of my photographs have been selected to be included in a group show of Buffalo, NY (my hometown) photographers in July 2008. (There's a discussion in the Buffalo Flickr Group about the show.)

The location is in Betty's restaurant/gallery, which was one of my favorite places to eat when I lived in Buffalo. Here's the announcement for the show:

From http://www.bettysbuffalo.com/exhibits.html

Reflections of Buffalo
Buffalo Flickr - Photographs
June 30 - September 7, 2008
Opening Reception Monday, June 30, 6-9 pm

Expect to see some uncommon and diverse points of view in this premier photography exhibition "Reflections of Buffalo" by members of Buffalo Flickr.

The Buffalo Flickr group has been active for 3 years as an online meeting place where a collection of individuals with a common interest in photography share their images.

www.flickr.com/groups/buffalo

The selected photos:

Opening sequence, originally uploaded by calanan.

"Opening sequence"
Allen St
Buffalo, NY
March 2006



"By then, penitence comes so easily"
Roswell Park Cancer Institute
Carlton St at Elm
Buffalo, NY
May 2006

Both images are from my ongoing (now in Salt Lake City, UT) "Drive-By Shootings" street photography series.

Unfortunately I can not go to Buffalo for this show but will send my work to a good friend, Shelly Levy, who has offered to frame them and drop them off at the show. Hopefully they won't be making a return trip across the country.

Favorite photo of the day:

"Niagara" by Lisa [Riot Sauce]

Anatomy of a photo shoot

Anatomy of a photo shoot, originally uploaded by calanan.

Here are some behind-these-scenes shots of the Photowalking Utah crew shooting Heidi at The Great Salt Lake. Check out Rich Legg's blogpost for a great summary of the event, too.

(Taken during the Photowalking Utah June Meetup)









And a few of the shooters:





I'll wrap this series up with two more shots of Heidi:

Photowalking Utah Event

Heidi Mason, originally uploaded by calanan.

Above is Heidi at The Great Salt Lake
Salt Lake City, UT

Taken during the Photowalking Utah June Meetup

This month's Photowalking Utah (PU?) event was at the Great Salt Lake near Saltair and this one was a whopper! About 40 photogs gathered to shoot one intrepid model in a "trash the dress" photoshoot using natural light, daylight balanced strobes and, as you can see above, tungsten work lights (with the camera's white balance set to tungsten).

Here's another photo of Heidi, this time I left the camera's white balance set to a much warmer, natural light temperature:



Both images were taken with the venerable Nikon D200 and the Tokina 12-24mm f/4 lens.

Today's event was led by guest host and great, Great Salt Lake photographer, Charles Uibel - take a look at his portfolio, his landscapes are just stunning.

I'll upload more shots from this event to my Flickr account tomorrow...nighty night.

Favorite photo of the day

"horse2" by Enrique San Roman [nreeque]

Thom Allen

Thom's Contact Sheet, originally uploaded by calanan.

Latest portraits for my new photo project, "This Is Their Place"

The funny thing is that I keep hauling a bag of lenses (30mm, 12-24mm, 50mm, 85mm) and speedlights/brollys and for most of these portrait sessions I use the Sigma 30mm f/1.4 for like 80% of the shots. I need to start leaving more gear at home and trust that I can do a great job without swapping lenses and worrying about complex lighting.

See: thisistheirplace.calanan.com for Thom's interview, thanks!

Abravanel Hall
Downtown SLC, UT

Kerby and Maude's playdate

Kerby and Maude's playdate, originally uploaded by calanan.

Kerbs had a playdate with his lady-friend, Maude. Those two tore ass around the yard chasing each other before collapsing in exhaustion.

bigger

Salt Lake City, UT

Sigma 30mm f/1.4

Favorite photo of the day

"molly and conversation piece some post processing" by Garry Nixon [Pin Shy Avenue]

No.

No., originally uploaded by calanan.

My response to Manray when she asked, "Would you stop that? Don't you have enough photos of Kerby already?!"

Salt Lake City, UT
Sigma 30mm f/1.4

I went a little heavy on the processing but I wanted to give this one a little punch, especially considering how bland the original (Nikon RAW) was:



Favorite photo of the day

"Scherzi da barbiere" by [ctulu]

Meat. Steve.

Meat. Steve., originally uploaded by calanan.

Orv Nebby

Other Stevetychs

At home
Salt Lake City, UT

Sigma 30mm f/1.4

Favorite photo of the day

"The Tub, the Man, the Dog and the Derelict Cement Plant" by [.eyebex]

Super (Thirsty) Maude!

Super (Thirsty) Maude!, originally uploaded by calanan.

At home
Salt Lake City, UT

Sigma 30mm f/1.4

Favorite photo of the day

Portrait of Becky by Vicky Martienssen Slater [sweet distin]

Heather B Armstrong of dooce.com

Heather B Armstrong of dooce.com, originally uploaded by calanan.

At her book signing event at The King's English Bookshop
(1511 South 1500 East, Salt Lake City, UT), Thursday June 5th for her book, Things I Learned About My Dad (in therapy).

See here and here.

About this photo:

A good friend of mine in Florida, Liesel, asked if I would be her stand-in at the book signing and ask Heather to sign a copy of her new book for her. L added, "And if she could sign it something like...'to the best Liesel on earth...' or something like that, I'd be well pleased. ;-)"

Heather seemed to get a kick out of the "best Liesel on Earth" request (she did spell "Liesel" correctly) and remarked that she knows three other Liesel's "so this must mean something." I told Heather the backstory about my proxy signing and she asked in what part of FL Liesel lived adding that she'd be going to FL soon. Watch your back, Liesel.

To be honest, until Liesel told me about Heather I had never heard of the dooce phenomenon. After signing the book Heather asked, "Does she like Chuck?" and I had absolutely no idea who Chuck was! I thought maybe "Chuck" was the dapper gentleman seated next to her (her husband, Jon) but then she handed me a postcard of one of her dogs and said, "Here, I'm going to take a guess that she does!"

*whew*

Anyway, after the signing Liesel asked me, "So... is she nice in person? Witty? A drooling idiot? Did she spell my name correctly? ;-)" Heather was very friendly and gracious - and drool-free - I didn't spend much time with her simply because I didn't know enough about her to ask anything but she did spend plenty of time talk with the patrons ahead of me. And in spite of the large number of fans the actually line moved quickly. Heather's family was there, too...her mom kept walking up and down the line introducing herself and thanking everyone for coming, it was so sweet.

All in all it was a fun night. And now I have a new blog to follow, too.

Sigma 30mm f/1.4
Nikon SB-800, 1/4 CTO (bounced)

Shilo Jackson

Shilo's Contact Sheet, originally uploaded by calanan.

Newest portraits for my photo project, "This Is Their Place"

Shilo Jackson
Kayo Gallery
Downtown SLC, UT

See: thisistheirplace.calanan.com for Shilo's interview, thanks!

My hairy princess.

My hairy princess., originally uploaded by calanan.

University of Utah
Salt Lake City, UT

Sigma 30mm f/1.4

Favorite photo of the day:

pony hitchin' post by whitney arlene [whitneyarlene]

le sigh

Kerbs, originally uploaded by calanan.

Kerby
Salt Lake City, UT

Nikkor 50mm f/1.8

Favorite photo of the day:

"You got a purdy mouth" by [macredeye]