Christmas at Riverwest

In my last post I shared about Imago Dei Church and how they served the poor in downtown Peoria.

While part of the church was serving the the dinner downtown, another part of the church was having a Christmas gathering at Riverwest, an apartment complex devoted to income restricted families. A step up from the poor, per say.

When I woke up Sunday morning, (after sleeping 16 hours!) I had the opportunity to help load the baskets to move them to the Riverwest area. (I didn't shoot images until 3pm that afternoon when the gathering took place.) I thought about how much work it would be to put these baskets together. Someone had to decide what to get, where to get it, how much to get, where to get that much of it and fill them all. Makes my help of loading the baskets rather petty, but my hand was apart of something bigger. And, that is what the church is much about. Working together to make a difference in the community around.

There was also a bag made for each child filled with gifts. I'm not sure what was inside, I didn't get one. I'm only the photographer. ;D
Each bag had the child's name on it. The excitement of them coming up to a bag as big as them was an amazing thing to watch and be apart of.



Smiles, hopping, dancing, spinning...it all happened when the kids name were called, one by one, to come up and snag their gift. Some were big enough to carry them, others were not. A few allowed mom to take their bag while others literately dragged them back to their chairs to open them.




It was adorable to watch as 3 little brothers (pun not intended) came up together. I could tell by how they walked together that they had a brotherly love for each other. They stuck by each others side, so close their shoulders were almost always touching. It's feels good to see unity in young siblings.

Well, maybe they were only terrified. *shrugs*











Some ignored me because they had gifts coming while others didn't want to leave without a picture. It's these smiles that drive people to serve. It's a reward in itself. A reward that isn't money, it isn't fame, it's not even a pat on the back.

It's a lot of work that's done knowing that what is being done goes beyond the physical action and into the heart and mind of those being served.

Serving the Poor

Imago Dei Church located downtown Peoria, IL prepared an extravagant dinner and invited many special guest to fill the seats, the poor.

I'm much impressed with the work the people at Imago Dei have done and are doing. I attend there on occasion and there is always a positive impact made on me when leaving. There are many upright people there. Real people doing real things.

Yes, that's me...the white guy.

Prayer Wall

A giant print of the Last Supper took up the entire stage of the church behind the pastor. His words were spoken effectively and with precision.

The ears of 1,000+ people were listening.

This resulted in hundreds writing their prayers on a (provided) post-it note and placed it onto the giant print.

Photography with Fire!

If you like fire, hand drums, hippie'ish style dancing and the smell of marijuana in the air, then this is a place for you! This is the first time for me to hang out at a Pyrotechniq event. It was fairly entertaining. I mean, people are freaking EATING FIRE! How is that not fun to watch!?













This event was held August 5th of this year (2009) in Chicago. There are going to be 3 more held this year. Check out the link above for dates and times.
















People ate fire, spit fire, hula hooped with fire, had sword fights with fire, bo staffs, chains, whips, and just about any sort of weapon with fire on the end of it was spinning around.
















Many photographers were there with tripods, flashes and all sorts of other cool toys. I shot hand held with no flash because I was late testing my ability to shoot hand held at slow shutter speeds. Most were shot between 1/30th - 1/80th at ISO 1600.

Fire Spinning

I was shooting an event downtown on the Peoria Riverfront a few weeks back and became fairly excited when the fire spinners came out. They came out when the sky was dark and the fire lit up the face of the person spinning. This little guy came out and was like a miniature crazy ninja on steroids with spinning chains of fire. It was totally awesome!!!

In a few months I will hopefully still have the honor of shooting the promo images for this group who spins fire. I'm definitely looking forward to shooting it! And, I already have a plan for it will not be the usual shutter-drag-fire-drawing-in-the-sky type of thing. Look for this later this year, September'ish.

Live Music

One of my most loved subjects to shoot is live music. I definitely don't shoot it enough. In fact, I shoot any and everything else more than live music. Why you ask? Because, I'm an idiot. Actually, I only haven't found a way to make it as profitable as I would want it to be, so I stick with other genera of photography that allows me to put gas in my car and eat. I have been getting little sleep, shooting a bunch, and retouching even more. Stick around, I have many images to post! :D

Las Vegas!

I just returned from 11 days in Las Vegas which I spent about 4 of those days mentoring and shooting for the LasVegas Supershoots event. Every cab driver that asked about our stay said that 11 days is way too much Vegas. They are right! It seemed like I was there three months!

In the past year I have set and attained a goal. My goal has to bring down how many frames I shoot but still attain the images I want. I used to shoot up to 70-100 frames to get one or two good images. Ridiculous I know! I have narrowed shoots down to less than 40. It takes time to see what the camera sees!

To the left/above is the lovely Leanna. When I saw her clothing I envisioned a Sports Illustrated type of cover shot on a beach. But, I didn't have a beach in the Vegas desert! So, I set this up using bounce light from the ground and a white wall at the hotel we were at.




A big thanks to Pete Springer for allowing me to use his strip light and trigger for this shot. I was excited about this image because it took only three shots. It's exactly what I wanted to walk away with. That made picking the best image fairly easy since they all three looked the same!

I changed the truck color from light blue to green because blue and yellow together wasn't doing anything for me.

Anyhow, this is Cheryl rocking the yellow bikini. She does a great job with posing instructions and she fell into what I asked her to do almost immediately. It's nice to have models fall into place for you!

I have never got to shoot with Laura until this Vegas trip. My file information says we shot together for 5 minutes. She can pull off the most interesting poses and angles. Hopefully we will have more time at another event.

This image was made in-camera and equally in post production. We didn't have anyone else around and no reflector or lights. (And only 5 minutes!) So, it was a shot in the dark to shoot an even exposure as possible and make it all come together in post production. You can see an un retouched version HERE.

Grandkids at church!

One of our sessions this month included 7 grandkids and a miniature church. This miniature church located in Groveland, Illinois is well-known in the area for a place to tie that knot. We have shot a wedding or two there in the past, but not the kiddies!

This session, or event as I would call it, took about 1.5 hours and was fairly enjoyable due to the kids having good attitudes. Lucky us huh? My wife and I each had a camera and a few lenses close by knowing that we would be all over the place. We started 30 minutes beforehand by cramming into the tiny chapel and choosing the best place to shoot. This also involved where the lights are going to go, do we even needs them, and where are we going to be shooting from. I don't have a great shot of the entire interior, but here is a 35mm shot that reveals about half of the interior and a few kids not paying any attention to me! :) Tech specs are at the end of this post.


I shot that first image above as they were running into the church. Immediately after that shot I ran towards the church doors. As I got closer I heard one of the family members yell to the kids "don't go in yet, they (us, the photog's) may not be ready!" PERFECT! I got inside as the kids ran back out which gave me the chance to capture the shot to the left. I decided to sepiatone some images because we were told before hand that the kids would be dressed in 60'ish vintage type of clothing.
What was a surprise is that the night before we found out that we were NOT shooting at their home, but instead at this miniature church. I figure, "hey, it's better than a living room!" I usually go with "don't pass up a unique setting!"

We figured that since we were not in a living room that we would go outside and see what there was to play with. We said nothing and watched where the kids naturally ran to. There was this awesome tree that screamed for kids to climb. This opened up many opportunities to capture the kids playing and not being coaxed into "smiling." I went with a sepia-like toned image, but with more color. I really wanted to push the vintage feel for them. I wanted the images to look like they were shot at that time period.

There was also a well that we played at for quite some time.



We ended our session with headshots of each child, but right before that I couldn't pass up shooting the guys (and girls) together while sitting on the church entrance steps. I mean, the place was built for kids right? Maybe not, but it sure fit their heights! I processed this image much different from the others. It reminds me of pictures of my father when he was young. It's like the images had some sort of color overlay on top of a black and white.

Tech Info:
Images inside the church: Alienbee800 softbox for a main and an unmodified light bouncing off the ceiling for fill.

Images on the church steps: Alienbee800 to camera left to fill in shadows.

All other images: no studio lights, Canon 10d and 20d with various lenses.