I recently got together with model Shamara Lee for an outdoor fitness and active lifestyle test shoot at one of my favorite spots in Los Angeles, along the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains. It was a gorgeous day with bright colors still popping on the trees along the dried up Big Tujunga River as the all-too-brief autumn season drew to a close. I have slowly been adding to a body of work focused on fitness and active lifestyle imagery. It’s a great niche that allows me to use my skills in portraiture and documentary photography to create beautiful, realistic images of people in a natural setting. It’s an opportunity for light, color, motion and mood to all come together. It’s not a bad way to spend the day either! Shamara was a great model, able to take direction well while also contributing good ideas. I hope to work with her again sometime. Thanks for looking!

I recently watched It’s a Wonderful Life with my wife, at the end of which Jimmy Stewart and all sing the holiday classic, Auld Lang Syne. It struck me that I wasn’t sure of the actual meaning of the phrase. Turns out to be of Scottish origin, roughly meaning “days long ago,” or even “the good old days.” It’s a phrase that will seldom be applied to the year 2020.

That said, this go around the sun did have its moments, from astonishing advances in medical technology and major political turnabouts, to getting to spend more time with your family, provided you a.) already lived with them and b.) like them enough to see this as a positive.

Whatever the hell transpired this year, one of the oddest parts is that we all went through it together. Not only is that terrible for so many reasons, but it also means it’s really hard to write about because, well, you were there too.

So, skipping any grand summary, I’ll just say that I’m thankful that my family and I are still on our feet and have thus far remained healthy. I hope you can say the same and I’m terribly sorry if you cannot.

Given this is my blog, I should also probably tell you what I’ve been up to all this time. Long story short, aside from a few shoots, I basically took the year off from working and focused on raising my son, who, when the world suddenly screeched to a halt, had just turned 1. With photography jobs at first impossible to find and then few and far between, I decided to skip the hassle of hustling for scraps and simply put down the camera for a while in order to spend my time watching after him. This also solved a childcare dilemma and helped my wife to focus on her job, which she has been fortunate to be able to continue doing from home. In that way, this turned into an exceptionally special year, with both of us home full time getting to spend way more time together as a family than any working parent could normally expect.

Taking time off was weird. I’ve been shooting professionally for over 15 years now and never once thought of doing that. Although early on there were certainly periods where time off was practically all I had. This was the first time, however, that I could do it and not be stressed out not knowing when the next job was coming. For a while, that was amazing. My life revolved around hanging out with my kid, walking the dog and working on projects around the house during naps and on weekends. I painted the house, xeriscaped the front yard, redid the bathroom… I got a lot done! As time went on though it became more difficult, as the anxiety of not being creative crept in to fill the void of the stresses that come with working. Finally, later in the year, I decided to put together an idea that had been ruminating in my mind and set up a small studio space in my garage. The project took some time to get going, but I finally started shooting again and am looking forward to having some fresh work to show early next year.

Also, around the same time, despite the pandemic reaching all time highs, the phone started ringing again. Well, it was emails, but there’s no saying for that. So, I was able to squeeze in a few legit assignments before year’s end. It felt great to be productive again and was also reassuring to reaffirm that I truly love what I do for a living. With so much time off, you have time to think – perhaps too much – about what other career paths you might have taken or might consider taking in the future. I certainly had some ideas, and to a degree am pursuing them to see where they might lead. After all, who knows what the world and the photo industry will be like on the other side of this great, historical chasm? But shooting again has reaffirmed that even if I were to expand on what I do, as long as the opportunity to shoot professionally still exists I will want to keep doing it.

2021 will undoubtedly be an off year again compared to previous norms, but it has to be better than 2020, right!? God, I hope so. Even with the pandemic reaching horrific new heights and still a long way to go before things turn around, there is hope on the horizon. Whatever next year brings for me and for the rest of you, I hope it is at least somewhat better and we can all start getting back to some semblance of the life we remember. At a minimum, there’s a solid chance we’ll get to be around other people, which, for the most part, is a good thing.

As for me, I will at least miss this special window of time where it was just my wife and I, focusing on each other and watching our boy transform from a babbling baby just learning to walk to one who’s running down the sidewalk and amazing us with his daily, newfound abilities. In that way – and only in that way – maybe these were the good old days. I hope there was something about this year that was special in its own way for you, even if everything else was shit. As for that shit, time to leave this garbage year in the rearview window.

Happy Holidays, Happy New Year and get bent 2020!

A few months back I spent some time shooting Lia Navarro at the apiary she runs from her home in La Tuna Canyon, a rural area on the north side of Los Angeles. After moving to the property with her husband a couple years ago she fell into the hobby of beekeeping and it quickly became a passion. In short time she grew her apiary, which she named Olivewood Bees after the many olive trees on the property, eventually keeping several colonies comprising around a million bees on site. She is now in the process of forming a non-profit dedicated to rescuing and protecting honeybees, as well as educating the public about their value to nature and society. She also offers a tour of the apiary as an AirBnB “experience.” Her love of bees is contagious and it was really fun spending time there and learning more about them.

In addition to photographing her amongst her hives I accompanied her on an educational outing hosted by a synagogue and on a rescue in which she saved a rather large hive whose occupants did not care to be saved. The immediate swarm they formed around us upon being exposed tipped me off to their sentiments. If you’ve never been swarmed by hundreds of angry bees, it’s not something I’d recommend! It was overwhelming enough that I had to put the camera down and walk away to get them to leave me alone. For the most part though, I learned that bees are generally docile if not aggravated and was comfortable working up close with them throughout the project. In this case she was able to calm them down with her smoker and soon enough was able to get in and remove the hives.

One of the things that drew me to this project was the knowledge that bees continue to die off in large numbers every year in a phenomenon generally known as colony collapse. While it’s not entirely known what the causes are, the main culprits are global warming, use of pesticides and an infestation of parasitic varroa mites. It’s a sad situation, but also quite concerning as about 1/3 of all food humans consume rely on pollination.

While this is an ongoing problem, this post is even more timely as a new threat has entered the picture…MURDER HORNETS! In fact, I just heard a piece on the NYTimes’ The Daily podcast today. Murder hornets, aka Asian giant hornets, are large predatory hornets that recently made their way to the state of Washington and are known to decapitate honeybees by the thousands in order to eat their thorax. So far it’s a regional problem, but if not contained could be a major threat. One interesting thing I learned from the podcast is that bees in Asia have developed a defense in which they swarm the murder hornets, forming a tight ball around them that creates enough heat to literally cook the hornets to death. Pretty amazing. Bees here, however, don’t yet know that trick and are thus vulnerable. Check out the podcast here as well as this recent article from The Guardian to for general info on colony collapse if interested.

If you’re in need of a bee rescue, want to adopt a colony or are just interested in finding out more about Olivewood Bees the best way to find her is to follow Lia’s Instagram at @olivewoodbees.

While here staying #saferathome I’ve been looking through previous work and was reminded of an interesting series of shoots I did in 2018-19 that I’ve yet to share here. So, time to share!

A couple years ago I was contacted by the assistant to a man named Manny Scott, who would soon be speaking at a local high school in the San Fernando Valley. At the time I didn’t know who he was, but in retrospect I’m glad I got the call. Over the next two years I ended up traveling with Scott on several occasions to presentations he was giving in Boston, Monterey and Honolulu. It was a great experience getting to see the impact that he has on people, as well as getting to know him and his wonderful family, who typically travel with him as he tours the country up to 300 days a year.

Scott is a well-known speaker in the world of primary education, bringing an inspirational message and practical advice to both students and educators around the country. As a teenager, Scott was in the Long Beach classroom that inspired the 2007 Hollywood film, The Freedom Writers, about a group of underprivileged students who were inspired by their teacher, played by Hilary Swank in the film. He went on to study at UC Berkeley and later launched a successful career as a speaker and author, traveling the country to speak directly to students and educators about the power of education and having the will to overcome your circumstances.

When I first heard what he did I didn’t know what to expect and was even a little skeptical, never personally having had much interest in other motivational speakers. That opinion changed immediately after seeing his first presentations. Twice in a day he filled the auditorium at a school full of “at-risk” youth, all of whom sat in wrapt attention as he discussed his own troubled youth, plagued by abuse, crime and drugs and how he then rose out of those circumstances to lead a fulfilling life. I was surprised to see so many students in wrapt attention throughout the program. Many of them were in tears as he related his stories and several lined up following his speech for a chance to meet him and tell him their stories, to which he listened before offering his embrace and words of encouragement. It was obvious watching them that what he was doing was having a profound impact.

We enjoyed working together and after that event I went on to shoot a large education conference in Boston, another in Monterey and another school event in Honolulu. Despite the differences in venue and audience, in each case he was very well received and made an impression on everyone in attendance.

As I sit here now it’s obvious that large speaking events are not in the cards for a while, but I do recommend you catching his program once normality resumes, particularly if you are involved in education or have school-aged children. In the meantime, I see he has posted some advice for distance learning on his site that is worth a look.

Below is a fairly wide edit of some of my favorites from each of the events. Thanks for looking and stay healthy!

Late last year I worked on a great project with the Pillsbury law firm that highlighted several of the firm’s partners who are also working mothers. As a working parent, and someone whose wife is a working mother with a very busy career, I was very much behind showcasing these hard working women. The project featured eight partners from LA, San Francisco, Washington, D.C. and New York. My role was photographing the three partners in LA and also compositing and retouching all of the final images, the others shot by photographers from their respective cities. It’s great after all the hard work to see the images now featured on their homepage. You can check out the full piece here.

For those of us who need to be around people to work, this has been an epically slow period of time. What to do? Hunker down of course. Also, take walks. Many, many walks. We are fortunate to live near some expansive natural areas where we can get out of the house while maintaining more than adequate social distance. It’s helping to keep us sane while caring for our 1-year-old and a very active pup.

A huge thank you to all of you who continue to work through this to keep us all afloat! Particularly front line workers risking their lives and those of you who keep stores supplied with food and other necessities.

We are all hoping we get through this sooner than later, with as few casualties as possible. In the meantime it’s been inspiring watching everyone step up where needed. Even congress!

These are from a recent outing to one of our favorite local spots after a rain. Stay sane and stay healthy!

Late last year I worked on a couple assignments for long time client the Chronicle of Higher Education. The first piece was about the issue of schools failing to accommodate students who are among the growing number of young adult family caregivers. To illustrate the issue we took a day-in-the-life approach to telling the story of a former Cal State Northridge student named Andrew Rahal, 27, who is the primary caretaker of his 77-year-old grandmother, Elizabeth, who suffers from Alzheimers and dementia. While he’s happy to do it, the time taking care of her demands caused him to fall behind in some of his courses due to regular tardiness and missed exams. Inflexible to his situation, his professors wouldn’t allow him to make up for missed time, which of course led to poor grades. There are an increasing number of young adults in his situation. Some 10 million young adult family caregivers between 18 and 34, many of them students, are taking care of a loved one due to a number of factors, including an aging baby boomer population, a caregiver shortage and the prohibitive cost of long term care. The two were incredibly sweet to one another and Andrew works incredibly hard to make sure his grandmother is well taken care of. It was a pleasure tagging along as they went through their day, which included getting ready in the morning, working on memory and physical exercises and then hopping around town to doctors appointments, with a stop for lunch at a favorite diner along the way.

The second story was about an expanding on-campus student rehab program called the Haven, which is at a number of schools around the country. My part focused on Sophie Pyne, the national director of university programs for the program at USC, who, while a student a few years ago, was also a client. Sophie was very open about her personal story and very accommodating during the shoot at the facility, which is

Last November the Woolsey Fire ripped through Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, a unique coastal area comprised of federal and state parkland and a number of communities, including Malibu and Calabasas. By the time it was done, the fire had spread to nearly 100,000 of the park’s 150,000 acres, destroyed about 1,500 structures and killed 3 people. 

The following March, I was assigned by the editors at National Parks Magazine to go out and document the progress in the park’s recovery, particularly in the wilderness areas, and to try to juxtapose that against the remaining visible damage. The story recently published in their Fall issue, which you can check out at npca.org.