Bethwood Sitting Room

The image above was an exercise on how to balance ambient light with a single on board flash set to manual control. For the record, I prefer shooting off camera flash and normally crosslighting my subject. The situation presented itself in a sitting room about 15ft wide x 9ft high x 12 ft deep. To the left of the couch was a single tungsten lit lamp, too low for handheld exposure. I had an onboard flash which when shot dead on just wasn't doing the atmosphere justice. I tried turning the flash head behind me to bounce of the wall but that gave me a big wash of light with no shadows, just flat. I then turned the flash head to my right where the wall met the ceiling (45 degrees) and that gave me a soft directional light with soft shadows. The next step was to balance the exposure so that the lamp still registered with a glow plus the directional flash coming from 45 degrees up and right. After working on the image in photoshop, there was something that just felt wrong. The motivation from the light wasn't right. I should've bounced the flash 45 degress up and LEFT. This way, the shadows would have been cast on the camera right side of the subject mimicking light cast from the lamp. Posting this image will remind me to constantly think about motivation of the light and not just merely bouncing light. Lessons learned.

DJ Kryptoknight

In the late eighties and early nineties, DJ Kryptoknight fell in love with hip hop and in February of 1997, while attending a development conference in high school, he was introduced to turntables by his close friend DJ Lingo. By May of 1997 Kurt had saved up enough money to buy his first set of turntables. He never looked back and he would subsequently join the iRT DJ Crew (consisting of DJs Lingo, OnPoynt, JonyFraze, Reason, Rik Guyver [aka Rik Cordero], Cuekut & Swerve). The iRT DJ Crew was very involved in the battle scene of the late nineties, and was also a fan of the underground hip hop scene.

Originally dubbed "$pecial K" by DJ Lingo, Kurt decided to change his name to "Kryptoknight" while he was attending Morehouse. He quickly became a household name among his classmates and started deejaying house parties and school events. Upon returning to the NYC area, he picked up where he left off in Atlanta, spinning at various lounges, clubs and private events. His DJ style is characterized by impeccable song selection, seamless transitions, and sword sharp scratches.

Kryptoknight has spun NYC clubs such as Touch, Providence, Stay, Fat Buddha (formerly Forbidden City), Light, Tribeca Cinemas and Katra.

Follow him on facebook http://www.facebook.com/kurtkryptoknight

DialySus Photo Shoot - Oct. 24, 2010

I had the pleasure of photographing hip hop artist "DialySuS" (Derek Simmons) from Scotch Plains, NJ. He is currently the Freestyle Champ on the Mix Tape Comedy Show which hold battles for up and coming hip hop artists every month. He just won the title last Oct. 17th but unfortunately Mix Tape's website has not yet updated their video links. When they do, you can check it out from the link below:

http://www.mixtapecomedy.com/category/freestylebattle/

Read on after the images to get info on this promising new artist.








Taken from his myspace page: http://www.myspace.com/dialysus

Derek Simmons - DMoney - DialySuS Born on March 12, 1989...and that's when it started! A lot of people probably wonder how or why I have the name "DialySuS." Well at first, I had the name DMoney. This was a nickname given to me by many of my peers. It was a chain reaction, one person, then another, and then everyone! However, due to life experiences, and advice from my older brother, I decided that DialySuS would be a better fit. At the age of 10 I was diagnosed with a kidney disease. This disease became worse over the years, and in February of 2006 I had to go on dialysis. This was an everyday thing for awhile. I was hooked up to a machine 10 hours a day, 7 days a week. Dialysis is "the process by which uric acid and urea are removed from circulating blood by means of a dialyzer. " In a sense, you could say that dialysis "flushes" out your system. I like to think of the hip hop world as a "system." A lot of artists nowadays use inappropriate language in their songs. I, "DialySuS, pride myself in saying that i don't curse in my songs. In a way, I say that I am "flushing" out the hip hop system, therefore, giving myself the name DialySuS. With much prayer, family, and friend support, I was lucky enough to have a perfect match for a new kidney: My father. On July 12, 2006 I had a kidney transplant at St. Barnabas Hospital. After 6 other surgeries I was finally released from the hospital on August 26, 2006. After I was released, I wrote a song about my life and received a lot of compliments. This encouraged me to keep going and I feel I got better and better with time. Now, I am where i'm at today. "I been through the pain, i been through the tears, held it down for myself, and held it down for my peers, I been through the struggle, i been through it all they tried to knock me down, but I'm still standin tall" SO NOW....SHOW ME SOME LOVE

Props

Going through the test shots from last night, I realized that I am a cross-lighter. I love this technique and just wanted to give props to Matt Adcock of FlashFlavor.com to whom I draw most of my inspiration from. Sol Tamargo of delsolphotography.com is equally inspiring (Matt's talented wife) and to you I tip my hat off as well. Thank you so much for fueling my soul !

Test Shots for Next Project

With the Family and Friends photo shoot wrapped up, I am now gearing up for my next project. An up and coming rapper from Scotch Plains NJ is in need of some promotional images. I have a few preconceived ideas of what images I want but try not to have limitations. However, after viewing the images on my computer, I think these images are more suitable for the DJ project I have down the pike. Either way, the exercise was good for the soul. Here are a few frames from the test shoot for my first idea.

Family and Friends

Best Buddies - Dylan, Morgan and Adrian

Kurt and Sarah

Mei and Adrian

John, Angela and Dylan

Angelo, Karen, Ashley and Morgan