1st wave of the trip

1st day of the trip. 1st photo taken. 1st wave. Kelly Slater in Fiji.

a modern collection of older images

Every once in awhile I will go through some old slides or folders of photos for inspiration or to see where my mind was during the times I took the photos.  Most of these were shot while I was still at school, so I was learning new photography techniques by the day...Here's a few taken between 2004-2008.

I'll start this off with a photo of my friend Iain Harris.  Without Iain I don't know if I would be shooting the photos I am today.  He was always keen for the 5am wakeups and willing to meet at the beach and pull into closeouts on the coldest days of the year while I was learning how to use my housing and film correctly.  This morning was particularly cold and was one of the first times I shot vertically in the water. I have always liked this image...the look of film looks really good at first light.

This shot of Superman was taken while I was in a stop action class at Brooks.  We used a high powered strobe to freeze the action and fill cards to balance the light on our "model."

Puerto Escondido 2004.  My first trip to Puerto.  The surf pumped for days on end and this was taken on one of the last days of the trip.  I was really tired and surfed out from the first week of nonstop swell so I ran down and shot a couple lineups

Fast forward a couple years and this image was taken in practically the exact same place.  Same camera, same beach, different lens.  This image was influenced by Kevin Zacher.  I was interning with him at the time and he loved shooting this high speed grainy b/w film.  I organized a trip with Matt lackey and Spencer Skipper to do a story for Movement Magazine.  The gritty and graininess of this film makes it one of my favorites to shoot.

After coming back from Mexico I was back into the school life, where I shot this image in the studio.  I combined product lighting with stop action photography.  In reality I love the water and the sun, but the sun is harsh on my pale skin so I combined my two loves.  Sun, water and sunblock...

more film and grain from Mexico...september 2007

My first portrait shoot outside of the surf industry was in 2007 by Canoe and Kayak Magazine.  This is a photo of Jason Hale, a crazy professional whitewater kayaker by day and a Dr. by night.  He was really cool and we had about an hour to shoot.  I had my roommate at the time assist me and help with the lights and I shot away.  The concept for the shoot was to combine his two professions into one photo.   I think it turned out well and the magazine ran it as a full page!

Puerto Local Checo Ramirez on a big one..This was shot 35 on the roll.

Playing around in the water at Sunset in SB and paying homage to Scott Sullivans whose image similiar to this inspired me to try it for myself.  The guy in the bottom of the frame was luck.

Surfin Life Japan Cover of Machado!

Australia update 1

Arrived on the Gold Coast of Australia a week ago and have been going nonstop shooting the WCT contest, freesurfs, and advertising shots for Dragon.  After thinking I broke my wrist the day before I left to go to Australia I found out it wasn't broken and just badly bruised/lightly sprained.  Here's a couple shots from Snapper today..its my first day back in the water in over a week.

February 2010 Surfer Mag tearsheets