AVP in the ATL 2008

For the third year in a row the AVP (Professional Beach Volleyball) made it to Atlanta for a tour stop and played at the Atlantic Station development in Midtown. This year was a little different for me in that I was asked to shoot the event for a volleyball website. In preparation for the weekend I rented a lens (70-200mm f2.8 L), and was revved up for some good shooting. Just before the event though I was contacted by John, from volleyshots.com, and was told I would not be able to receive the press pass for the event as he was going to have a photographer make the event after all. I was l slightly disappointed, but I think I was even more relieved, as I was a little nervous about shooting the event for more than "just fun". Anyhow, I had a blast and as usual, the AVP was great.

check out my photoset on Flickr HERE

Another Architectural Trip

One of my favorite things of late has been taking quick weekend trips to see places and architecture. My most recent trip took me and a friend of mine to New Harmony, In. If you don't know anything about the town, it has an interesting history and is certainly worth a visit.

The highlight in New Harmony is a building that acts as the towns welcome center and has on display a scaled model of the town as it was originally built. This building is a Richard Meier building and was completed in the late 70's. What is really great about the building is its juxtaposition within its context of nature and the town it sits within and serves. If you know anything about Meier you know that he has a very limited color pallet. This limited pallet, white, serves the building well in New Harmony and makes for a building of sculptural quality and allows for a very modern building that doesn't distract with the very historic vernacular in the New Harmony.

There is more discussion on this building at Pushpullbar.com

Here are a few images:

Finally a Post...

Thought I would make a little post of what I have been up to lately.

Work has been keeping me busy the last month or so and with everything else going on I just haven't had the time or energy to make any blog posts lately. A lot has happened since the last post, which was the weekend trip to Cincy and Akron.

The one big thing I have done since my last post is...

I took a 9 day trip to New York and got to stay with my good friend Karen in Stanford. I had a fun trip exploring the city. I was able to see the AVP at Conney Island, see a ton of architecture, and even hang out with my sister who was in the city for a few days (and that was a big coincidence). I even got to meet a fellow Pushpullbar.com member, Cesar, who is interning at a firm in Chelsea, who is here on a work visa from Argentina.

I saw a lot and was able to get some great shots of the city from different vantage points. You can see some of these on my Flickr site HERE.

Akron Museum of Art

This last weekend a friend of mine, Nick Hill and myself took a little architectural weekend trip (I will probably have to blog about it more later). From this trip we happened up to Akron, Oh and saw the new Museum addition by Coop Himmelblau. This project is their first public building in the US. Coop is known for their avant guard design over in Europe and they didn't pull any punches with this one.

What was great was that we took lots of pictures. From that I have had two sources use some of the images for their websites/blogs. The first is a blog called Archidose (see the blurb HERE with my pic). Archidose basically does daily updates on different and new architecture being built. It has brief info. on modern designed buildings and is a great resource for Google Earth placemarks.

The other website that has used my images from my Akron visit is www.architectureweek.com, an online weekly architecture magazine. I was approached earlier in the week for permission to use some of my images for an article they were writing. I might be one of the few, so far, that has any images up on the web for this building, as it just opened on the 17th. Anyhow, you can check out the article, which gives some good information on the building, and check out some of my images they used.

If you want direct access to my photo set of the Akron Museum of Art check out my Flickr photo set.

Shooting Models

So after I finally made my DSLR purchase I figured it was time to get out and check the Atlanta Flickr community. One of the off=shoot groups from the Atlanta Flickr Group is the Atlanta Photographers Guild(APG).

The APG is mostly about getting together down at the Elliot Street Cafe/Pub and shooting a couple of models. Two weeks ago was my first time and I wasn't sure what to expect. I have never really shot people in a portrait/modeling way and so it was a first time experience for me, and I had a blast. Also, the people were great and it is a very fun group. I only knew one person before going and so it was great to meet other people with interest in something I am becoming more in love with - Photography.

Anyhow, here are a few images from the shoot that came out for me. I was really struggling with using my flash and dealing with low and now natural light. I took about 200+ shots and maybe 10 were worth doing something with. Thank goodness for Photoshop :)

Condo Floor revisited...

A while back I made a post about redoing my condo floors with slate and a "fake" wood flooring. Well I got the wood down and slate but months went by before I actually put the finishing touches on everything. I finally got around to grouting the slate about 3 weeks ago and getting in the rest of the quarter round. All I have left now is the put the final coat of sealer on the slate flooring and the last trim molding piece between my sun room and living room floors.

Here are a couple of shots I took the other evening of the floors...

This one is from the entry foyer and the transition to the wood flooring. Gotta love how dogs shed hair. I can never keep up :)



And here is the flooring transition from the sun room to the living room. After I seal the slate here I will have a mold piece just like in the image above. Sorry for the sideways view. My camera had auto-rotate on (I hate that option).

Cool Views & More

Just recently I switched places of employment (you can read about it HERE). My new office of this new job is in Midtown Atlanta. Fortunately we are afforded with a great view of the city and can see right down Peachtree Street. With the view I have become more and more conscience of what is happening with Atlanta's development.

One great resource I came across a while back is the Atlanta Metroscapes forum. The forum was started by an enthusiastic high schooler; and soon to be in his first year of college. What is fantastic about the site is its wealth of information about what is happening in the South and specifically Atlanta. So if you have a spare minute or two check it out, and I promise you will see so much of what is happening with Atlanta's growth right now you'll lose an hour before you know it :) .

The image I wanted to post is from our office at night. Below in the image to the bottum left is the 1010 Midtown project (which I am taking pics of weekly). This will be a big first step in the realization of the Midtown Mile (a million square feet of retail space along the Peachtree corridor from North Ave. to 17th Street.