CONTACT | Shapour

I sold myself short. At the end of Blackwelder St. Shapour sits outside at 3pm waiting for his driver. Rain or shine, torrid or tepid, he’s always out there. Dressed like a boss. One day I time it right and ask to take his portrait. Weeks go by, I print a few in the darkroom, and hope to give them to him the next time I see him. When I finally do, he asks “How much do I owe you?” What a sweet heart. I tell him nothing, and that it was a pleasure to take his photograph. He smiles and thumbs through the prints, stopping at the last one. It’s my favorite. An artsy little number that doesn’t include his face. “This one’s no good,” he says. I think to myself, “that’ll be $50.”

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Women’s March Los Angeles

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I have a confession. I almost didn’t march. Go ahead. Judge me. I’ll wait. In all honestly, I didn’t realize what the marches were about. Yes, I can read, so I knew it was for women. But I was turned off by the idea of protesting for protesting’s sake. Spontaneous rallies had broken out Downtown earlier in the week, and while I supported the cause I hated the goons who used the opportunity to close freeways, scream at cops, and twiddle up their T-Shirts into muggers masks. None of that was experience at the women’s march. Not in the slightest.

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Swing Away

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Now we can’t play ball no more. With the squad on bye week I thought it appropriate to post memories from our first two seasons. Hopefully it’ll encourage some, I’ll say shy, members of the team to get in front of the lens next time. Remember kids. There’s heroes and there’s legends. Heroes get remembered, but legends never die.

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Griffith Park

Wait, those hipsteresque boarders existed before Instagram? YES, and these black beauties come courtesy of a re-purposed Kodak Six-20 dating back to the 1940’s. After a brief stint as the focal point (pun intended) of my camera display at the old apartment, and an even briefer fall from said display when it slipped and destroyed my helpless Kindle, I noticed that the little black box might have had some life left in it. A far cry from current DSLR’s overflowing with useless features, the Kodak likes to keep it simple, like really simple, like choose between 5-10 feet or infinity simple. But it was so different and intriguing I had try. After a little digging on the internet, I figured out how to snip/cut/file down a 120 roll to make it fit into the 620 brownie, and from there I took went into the field at Griffith Park. I had long been yearning to re-visit the iconic L.A. landmark , and the resurrected brownie proved the perfect incentive to finally check it off my list. While I was at it, I brought along the Yashica to polish off a roll that had been sitting lonely for a while, and as a backup because I had little faith that any of the 8 shots from the brownie would make-it. It was an awesome day, made even more amazing when I pulled the film from the tank to see gorgeous 6×9 brownie boxes smiling back at me.

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The Spencer Dunn Experience

On Saturday April, 14th, Spencer Dunn lit up Jan Popper theater like the Knux at Paddy Murphy. Playing in front of a raucous crowd complete with  blown-up bobble heads (thanks to Erik and Mike), Spence rattled off an hour of classics and originals alike. Ending with an impromptu rendition of Calvin Harris, incorporating the infamous “DOW” effect to the delight of the crowd, he left the stage amid a shower of roses. For those who thought Spencer Dunn was nothing more than your run-of-the-mill “Face Guy,” think again.

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