Gallery walk

The first Thursday of every month, galleries in DUMBO, Brooklyn open their doors (and bottles of wine) for people to stroll through. My friends Rebecca and Justin live nearby and have been trying to get me to join them for….like, a year. And I finally made it in December. About time, I know.

I started off the evening getting lost, which I always do in DUMBO, no matter where I’m going or how good of directions I have. The highlight of the evening was a panel at VII Photo Agency called Believable Imagery: When Should We (Dis)Believe Photos and Why. Panelists included a photography professor at NYU, the director of photography at Time magazine, and the president of the Advertising Photographers of America.

One of the great things about New York is all the opportunity to attend lectures, book talks and panels like these…for free. The discussions took me back to college journalism classes (and Ethics class debates. Egh.) This perspective of photojournalism, not photography, is quite different from what I was introduced to in magazines when I came to New York (omg you took one photo of a woman and placed her in another picture of a beach for the cover…THAT IS ALLOWED?!)

(from left: moderator Stephen Mayes, APA President Theresa Raffetoo, Time magazine Director of Photography Kira Pollack, and Professor of Photography and Imaging at NYU Fred Ritchin. Photo courtesy of Rebecca Simpson Steele)

Photographers, photo retouchers and photojournalists were all in the audience, which led to a pretty heated Q&A session. One of the controversial topics was war photography. A concept the panel and audience kept discussing was whether it was authentic or accurate for a photographer to recreate an event that happened (the moderator’s introductory slideshow included raising the flag at Iwo Jima as an example). True photojournalists (i.e. news images) will not pose people or recreate an event they couldn’t capture. Photography and photo illustrations allow more liberal interpretations…but the problem lies when a credit doesn’t acknowledge something is an illustration.

Having learned in the photojournalism environment and worked in the photography industry with magazines, it was really interesting to hear so many sides including advertising photography. If VII has more panels, I’ll definitely be making more of an effort to get down to Brooklyn for First Thursdays. The seating was limited, with some people sitting on the floor, so I’d recommend arriving early if you end up visiting. And there’s free wine in plastic cups.

In the clouds

(on my way back to New York from Aruba.)

Aruba, Jamaica, ooooh I want to take you…

The entire time leading up to my trip to Aruba, I had the Beach Boys song “Kokomo” in my head. I almost could’ve lived out the lyrics, because Jet Blue flies to most of the places mentioned, but I decided to hold off on Jamaica until someone could accompany me for safety reasons.

I already made a video recap of Aruba, but here are some photos of my Caribbean vacation now that I have the cord to hook up to my computer.

(view of my hut from my beach chair)

(total relaxation)

(sunset)

(view from my beach chair. every day. it felt like a dream.)

Photos! At last!

I’ve been trying to take a picture from every plane ride (window seat pending). Here are photos from my flight to Portland, destination number one on my All-You-Can-Jet Pass.

First leg from JFK to Long Beach, Calif. Loved seeing all these mountains.

Sunset from Long Beach to Portland, Ore.

So fresh and so clean, clean

I’m getting a summer breeze feel from these pics. Makes me want to curl up in a hammock with a good book and a cold glass of lemonade. Not sure I could pull off a hammock in Central Park though.

{Photo credits. Row One: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Two: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Three: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Four: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Five: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Six: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6}

Twinkle, twinkle little star

Maybe it’s all the sparkles, but this mixture makes me feel like magic is going to happen

{Photo credits. Row One: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Two: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Three: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Four: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Five: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Six: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6}

Dream decorations

These photos are indicative of my desire to have chandeliers and textured windows and doors. Such inspiring colors.

{Photo credits. Row One: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Two: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Three: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Four: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Five: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Row Six: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6}

Enter at your own risk

Here’s another selection of my flickr favorites. Interesting to see the themes I’m drawn toward when looking at the order I’ve saved photos. Obviously locks, doors, chandeliers and bold colors were calling my name during this session.

{Credits. Top to bottom, left to right. Row One: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Row Two: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Row Three: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Row 4: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Row 5: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Row 6: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.}

Flickr inspiration

Whenever I peruse Flickr, I always lose track of time. I can never just scan through photos for 30 minutes or even an hour. It becomes an all-day obsession. My eyes hurt from staring at the screen. I have to put on my glasses. I have more tabs open than my computer knows what to do with. The inspiration is neverending, including things I’d never thought about being inspiring.

Here’s a collection of some recent additions to my favorites

{Credits. Top to bottom, left to right. Row One: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Row Two: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Row three: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Row four: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Row Five: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Row Six: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.}