Little Brother

Dion Agius | Los Angered

 Attended the party last week for Globe, who was celebrating the release of Dion Agius's new signature shoe, the Los Angered, at American Reg in Hollywood. Look for more photos soon on StabMag.com and TransworldSurf.com as well as in Bliss Mags.

Bill Travis | Shaper

This is Bill "Aku" Travis, one of my oldest friends. He has spent the last two years rehabing an injury to his hand. After five surgeries and months upon months out of the water, he is finally getting back to his old self. We intended on surfing all day together but the waves didn't turn up so we decided to get into the shaping bay and work on a couple of new boards. Bill is in the process of starting his own surfboard shaping business so look for his boards to start showing up in stores sometime next year. 

Autumn Afternoon

Escaping the Madness that is the US Open

Ah the US Open...a whirlwind of concerts, parties, thousands of the smallest bikinis a man has ever seen, a city rising from the sand complete with its own skatepark, and a surf contest thrown in to give its some legitimacy. I've tried to document the contest for the last couple of summers and I've tried every possible approach for someone who doesn't have any industry connections and can't gain a VIP access (though I've been working my butt off recently to try and make that happen). Its frustrating to have to deal with the daily morning overcast skys and the blown out chop that happens in the afternoon, making it hard to find a window to get a good photo. I only went a shot a few days out in the water on the northside, hoping to catch some of the competitors out practicing. Didn't get too much luck this year with waves, however. Slow, fat rollers on the high tide.

 The first day of the little swell we had, I shoot with my lens at 35mm opposed to the 16mm to try and give myself some forgiveness in terms of positioning. The current runs pretty strong on south swells and I tend to find myself doing laps in order to stay on the peak. This was one of the only decent shots of that day. I haven't shot in the water in while, so I was a bit rusty. Hopefully I can get some better waves and try out some different lens and techniques soon because the lens I'm using now is really more effective when the waves have a bit more size and fill out the frame more.

June Gloom

New one for my Water and Light/ Immersion Series (still not set on a title). I haven't really done any black and white for this series but with it being June and the ever present gloomy skies every morning there's not much else you can do. I'm still quite happy with this one no the less.

Stress

This is the first photo of a new series im going to be working on for the next month or so. I've recently been going through some rough couple of weeks and plus the added stress of graduating college soon and uncertain plans for the future. I'm actually really happy how this photograph turned out. The lighting is just beautiful in my opinion

Hit Me

This is from a dramatic lighting assignment for my studio class. The idea I decided on (or peer pressured into by my great friends) was to take a punch to the face. I came to this idea through a lot of deliberation and self reflection. I am nearing the end of my college days and the real world is fast approaching, therefore my mindset hasn't been the most anxious free. I decided that in order to prepare myself this upcoming challenge and to stay motivated, I had to get over the fear of failure or uncertainty. In order to succeed you have to get over that negativity and believe in your strengths. Allow failure to humble you but don't let it break you. For this photo I willingly allowed my friend to punch me as hard as she could in the face. This is taken about five seconds after the hit. Sure it hurt but its not the end of the world. More photos and video evidence to come soon.

4th Street, Long Beach, California, February 19th 9pm - 2am

Chairs

First assignment for my studio class. Subject: Chairs...