I'm Back

So I haven't posted in months, this is because I've been extremely busy.  I have a full time job at Adorama Rentals in Chelsea.  I am the Digital Specialist, my main task is to maintain and pack out the digital cameras.  I've received more assignments for Revolver, and my first one was published a few weeks ago.  Things are going very well, I'm trying to find time to work on my book, right now it contains 7 photos, I have 2 more to put in, but still, a book usually contains more than 9 photos.  I've also been doing some great street photography when ever I get the chance, bellow are some photos I took in China Town and along the subway, enjoy!

Peace and Love,

Willy J

CRISIS! They are not fun

Today was one of those tough days where you contemplate giving up (i never do).  I went to take a test at Christian Oth's studio for an image processing job, after talking with Christian I had a feeling that he thinks I'm not experienced enough for the position, cause he seemed concerned that I have NO paid experience, except for shooting.  They said I'd hear from them so I'm not giving up on that.  But heres where the crisis starts, I went to the Miracle Maids office to pick up an $80 pay check for doing some cleaning last week, and on the way home I saw my landlady who was wondering about rent.  So I forked over the $80 I had for literally 5 minutes, anyone who's experienced this, I AM SOOOO SORRY, it's possibly one of the worst feelings ever.  So I'm left with $2 to my name and the credit cards are threatening to sell my account to collection agencies if  I don't get my act together, and a cell phone bill thats 3 months over due, and my $2 will get me to my internship but not back.  So with doom in mind I posted my light meter and my photo bag on craigs list, and also posted my resume.  Then took a nap, stress does horrible things to your body, when I came to my landlady said she felt bad cause I left her a message saying I'm selling some of my equipment to make rent, and told me to call her tomorrow and we'd work it out.  Then Dave came over to sign some model releases for photos I took, and I told him my story, and like the nice guy he is got me some business cards and loaned me $20.  So this story has a happy ending, I'm just not too sure how many more days of this stuff I can take, I'm running on fumes here, sometimes I laugh to myself and ask "how the hell have you made it this long?"

Peace and love,

Willy J

Shoot from the hip

I apologize for not making an entry yesterday, when I got home I was to tired to even look at the computer.  I went to Williamsburg to clean up after the movie night once again, this time I came home with a case of Starbucks coffee in cans, for FREE!  Anyway, on with today, INTERNSHIP!  Did a lot of photo research, enough to make your head spin.  Looking for photos taken well over a decade or two ago, which makes it a safari, not just a hunt, but hey someone has to find them.  Tomorrow I have to go to the city and take a test to determine the possibility of a job!  Cross your fingers for me!  And back to today, I took a self portrait this morning, and did some hip shooting in my neighborhood, enjoy!

The Stairs to my apartment

My door!

Peace and love

Willy J

Take a walk

So today was pretty slow.  I slept in, not meaning to, I think Jason left for North Carolina about 10am.  When I got up I decided I needed to go to the center library in Brooklyn, it's not that far of a walk, but enough to break a sweat.  So off I went, it was the first time I've been in the center library, after passing it over 100 times when I lived in brooklyn when I was a kid.  I took out the biography of Hunter S. Thompson titled Gonzo, and the biography of Ralf Steadman titled The Jokes over.  After that I sat at home wondering what to do with the rest of my day, when I got a call from Dave asking if I had taken shots of Brooklyn from the Manhattan side yet.  I hadn't so I told him I'd leave @ 6:30 so I could catch the sunset.  Off again this time to the Brooklyn bridge, took some shots for brooklynblock.com (a project Dave and I are working on), so here are some of those shots.

So that concluded my day, not a very productive day, but any day I take pictures is a good day.

Peace and love,

Willy J

Shoot the day!

So today I went to Shoot digital (a rental Studio) in the city for the Shoot The Day event put together by Photo Shelter, the stock photo agency I submit my stock to.  From what I gathered, the event was to promote tons more stock photography because the stock photo market is crashing because of the limited variety of images being created.  I blame this squarely on Getty Images, contracting photographers to shoot safe images for stock.  Anyway, there were tons of professionals speaking about how we can sell our images, what we should be shooting, basically what they want out of us.  I found a lot of the information intriguing, like the fact that most of the images sold today are so basic, no photographer in their right mind would put it in there portfolio.  In addition to the lectures, they had a small trade show of sponsors who were giving demonstrations, nikon was also there showing off the new D700, which hasn't hit the market yet.  All in all I learned quite a bit today, and I also ran into Leslie Grow (lesliegrowimages.com) a friend I graduated Hallmark with.  Now that I know the art buyers are craving lifestyle stock, I am pumped to start shooting some!

Peace and Love,

Willy J

The first day as an editorial photographer

Good evening,

Today marks an important day in my life.  Today I shot my first paid and published shoot for a magazine.  It's the moment I can say "I have arrived".  Let me start off after graduating Hallmark...

After graduation I went home to Connecticut for a week or so, packed my things and took off for NYC on June 30th, with $60 in hand, I started my internship at Revolver and Guitar World the day after I moved.  After the first day I was more than excited, I enjoyed working there with my office and Revolver email address.  In the past weeks I've had crazy ups and downs, worrying if I'm going to make rent at the end of the month.  Finding photography work in NYC is harder than I thought.  I've had a few interviews with photographers, with studios, but no official job.  So on the 2nd week of my internship my photo editor of Revolver asks if I want a photo assignment, a PAID photo assignment.  She began to tell me it will be published in the October issue of Revolver Magazine, and I will be shooting Max Cavalera of Soulfly for the "Ink Spot" section.  Today was the photo shoot.  Woke up at noon, gathered my confidence and took off for the office.  There I met Jason (my room mate @ Hallmark and best friend for 7 years) and we went to the Revolver studio and began to set up for the shoot.  Max came in and was interviewed and then proceeded to the studio.  He was very friendly and photographed well.  When we were done I showed him the photo on the screen of my 40D, "oh man, you kick ass" he told me, that was that, and he packed up and left.  

This might not be what is published, but this is one of the shots I took today.  So look for my photos in the October issue of Revolver!  Thanks for all the support everyone!

Peace and Love

Willy J.