Hobie for Canoe & Kayak Magazine

In November Canoe & Kayak Magazine assigned me to shoot a portrait of Ken "Hobie" Hoeve at his home in Gypsum, Colorado. Hoeve is the brand manager for Dagger Kayaks and also the weather man at the local television station in Avon, Colorado.

Hoeve is great to work with as he is very media savvy and willing to take direction during a photo shoot. When I arrived he was under the weather and yet willing to do whatever it took to get the photos that I needed for the assignment.

I made use of two SB-800s on lightstands with snoots for this assignment. I also used pocket wizards to trigger them from my Nikon D2Xs. The strobes worked like a charm and I was able to make some nice images of my subject without having to carry bulky studio strobes to the assignment.

Ken was gracious enough to loan me a small step ladder to make the photos since he is over 6ft tall and I on the other hand am vertically challenged. He also had a large number of kayaks at his home that we used to add color to the portrait on a gray fall day.

I would like to thank Ken's wife Brandy for the photo below which gives you an idea of what the set up was like. Thanks for showing my best side Brandy!

(Photo by Brandy Hoeve)

I'm back (stroke)

After a bit of a hiatus I have returned to the land of the blogger. From time to time I have a reality check and have to tend to other parts of my life. I am hoping that I will be posting more regularly from here on out, but as we all know "life happens".

As a former competitive swimmer I have always enjoyed shooting swim meets. It isn't an assignment that I usually have to fight for as the rest of the staff is happy to let me shoot all the swimming I want. LOL. Over the years,I have tried many different lighting set-ups, lenses, and camera angles to try to get interesting and unique swimming images. And of course when it comes down to it keeping it simple seems to payoff more often than not.

At a recent multi-school meet I decided that I would skip mounting heads on stands and lighting the entire pool. So I just went with an on-camera strobe and used the built-in bounce card. I was encouraged by the light I was getting while shooting test images in the warm-up period. So I figured I would go with it.

In swimming, once you get the lighting, the rest is timing. The photo I wanted to try would only allow me one shot and as luck was on my side, I managed to get the image I was hoping for. I guess crossing my fingers, holding my breath and saying a little prayer did the trick.

Next time I will have to cover my camera so that it doesn't get soaked too.

It's always something...