I got my first test roll back from the lab on Friday…I am very, very excited.

It was a perfect excuse to make a couple more iPhone montages.

I have known Coburn for a while now and worked with her on my Migrant Death and Identification project which ran on the NPR website a few months ago.

Coburn had this to say on the blog:

“As a photo editor, I spend a lot of time sequencing images. When I build an online gallery, I want there to be a specific flow to the piece — a story with a distinct beginning, middle and end. I want to engage the viewer’s eye, making him look into the distance in one shot, then pulling back to examine the details of an extreme close-up in another. In my mind, I refer to the process as “Zen editing.” I couldn’t explain in words just how I know the correct order of the photos; I just know when the sequence feels right.

Perhaps that’s why I was drawn to Matt Nager’s iPhone montages. Instead of sequencing photos linearly, he places his images in a grid. The viewer’s eye wanders over these composites, not settling anywhere specific, but skating around while the brain processes the larger feeling created by the framework.

The montage that first appealed to me was Winter, which coincidentally was the first montage that Nager built. I love the simplicity of the color palette — crisp whites, deep blues, and that pervasive winter brown. I first look at the clouds in the center frame, then toward the clouds in the upper right, then to the Ferris wheel in the upper left. My eye then wanders to the frosty leaf in the top center, then back down to the middle, and finally around the edges. Individually, the photos are striking, but as a group, the canvas truly draws me in.”

Thanks Coburn for the words and the gallery!!!

You can see a gallery of my iPhone photos and order prints with your left over holiday monies at my Archive.

Here are two recent additions from Laredo as well.

Each team of students, which came from high schools all around Texas and New Mexico, built a robot which had to battle others in timed matches. The goal of each match was to gather balls, globes, and cans and direct them back to a designated location. I don’t think I could even drive one, let alone build it.

I am kicking myself for not bring my lights to the event. I did manage to take a series of portraits with some of the kids and their robots. I could have spent all day with a studio set up…and would have. I’m pleased with the images I got simply because it was so fun to shoot. These kids are the future and they seem to be loving it. Pretty refreshing.

You can see the Dallas Morning News article written by Jeffrey Weiss online.

***Just as a note: I did not tell the kid to flex his arms like that. I suppose his ripped body just does it on his own.

A month or so ago, I got to hang out with Wall Street Journal reporter Ana Campoy and photograph a canning class. It was fun despite the different pickle recipe. The process I shot was for instant pickling as opposed to the fermenting process I would work on with dad. The pickles weren’t dill and didn’t crunch…but they were still tasty. I suppose that is the magic with canning…everyone has their own recipe and cans in their own distinct style. They also made jam…but the peaches weren’t really ripe.

The story was highlighting the reemergence of canning in the US. You know…slow economy…people have to can right? I was talking with my mom about the story and she more or less…well more than less…laughed at me when I mentioned “reemergence.” She reminded me that we have been canning for the past twenty years. It made me think there really hasn’t been a rebirth of canning, so much as simply an idea to market canning in a slow economy.

It is a little late this season to start canning, but I know next year I will be buying a set of jars and lids to begin the long tradition of canning that already exists in my family.

You can check out the Wall Street Journal canning article and slide show online here.

***So…after hearing critiques from EVERY immediate family member, I find it necessary to make a few corrections and revisions. In so doing, I hope to successfully mock each member of my family for taking such an interest in my blog, and inadvertently mock myself for writing this very sentence.

My dad would like to point out that we do not, in fact, make dill pickles, but rather Sour Garlic Pickles. He also would prefer me to use the word “preserve” instead of repeating “can.” His only other objection was to give more credit to my mother as the one who picks out the pickles and thus make it truly a family affair.

While my mother enjoyed my embellishments, she was just quick to point out (and certainly enjoyed pointing out) my grammar and spelling errors as only a mother can.

My brother was quick to call me out as a phony (my real job was to simply eat the pickles.)

Lastly, and in my opinion, most obvious, I am a nerd. Yes, yes I am.

I spent my summer in Tucson working in the desert. I am still sitting on the photos, but I do have this to show. I was amazed by the geography found in the Sonoran desert. While it is a desert, and it is dusty, there is far more green than I first guessed. This desert was certainly no Mojave. Animals roam and plants grow everywhere. We can thank the monsoons for that, although they didn’t come until late this year. It was hot.

Oh yeah. Everything had spikes and I mean EVERYTHING. I guess you have to when it is 105 degrees everyday.

The first two photos are Jay Jensen. I owe Jay a lot. Jay let me sleep on his floor for the entire summer while shooting my project on the border. If it were not for Jay I would not have afforded to spend so much time on my self-funded story. Thanks Jay.

The second set of photos are of psychiatrist Dr. Bharat Patel next to the garden he and his staff planted in front of their medical clinic. Dr. Patel feels the garden helps heal the mind and aids in relieving mental stress. I completely agree.

I don’t fit in, but I do enjoy the ridiculous nature of the scene and the people watching I encounter.

To bring back the iPhone montage, I had fun one night before watching Angels and Demons (substantially entertaining but not overwhelmingly fantastic.)

A free cookie to the person who can point out the one square that does NOT come from the West Village.