So damn glad…

Siemens MRI

Sometimes life is just too strange with the coincidences…  Three weeks ago, we were shooting MRI machines (kind of scary because of the giant magnet that will suck your gear inside the doughnut.)  What I didn’t know was that a couple of weeks later I would be laying in one myself.  But not as a photographer, as a patient.  I got up today and couldn’t even put my arm in a jacket nor close the door to the truck.

I think the cases are getting just too heavy.  (Partial tear in my left rotator cuff.)

Ugh…

So out of the loop…

Man alive have we been slacking with this blog thing.  Oh well.

The good news is things have been off the hook.  We are full swing in AR season, and have been enjoying the road.  Lots of science and technology work, lots of manufacturing, and some biotech.  We also have a couple of aerial jobs booked.  (looking forward to the flight.)  I’ll make sure to post about those shoots.

Heading back out tomorrow for a week for a client outside of Rochester, NY.  I will try to post some picks of the side show, however we have been mostly under contract lately to keep the clients on the DL when it comes to the blog.

Got some cool new shots for the “Road Kill” project.  We shot some porcupines up on the tip of Cape Breton, NS at Meat Cove.  Very cool up there.

Lately the big problem is the wear and tear on the gear.  Totally blows.  Almost all of the glass in the bag is out with Nikon now because of one bit of damage or another.  Thank God for NPS (Nikon Professional Service.) One quick eMail, and a loaner 17-35, 24-70, and 70-200 were over nighted so we wouldn’t skip a beat.  Thanks to Carrie over at Nikon for your help and fast turn around!

Here’s a quick image we grabbed of Rabbit in his proverbial test subject roll.  I really like the feel of the shot.  We did it in a tiled hallway in a ordinary coridor.  The real shot (which I am not allowed to show…) had an engineer standing in the hall with a gizmo in his hand.  We used the Profoto Octa just above his head.  It’s cool what you can do with one light.

Rabbit posing again...

Video interviews…

Shot some more video interviews the other day.  I think interviewing is one of my favorite parts of working with video.  Its such an amazing chance to sit with brilliant people and get the chance to learn!

A good interview makes or breaks a film.  It is the basis for a solid story, and is the narritive that drives the film along.

Stay tuned for another of our finished films.  You can also check out some of our video work on YouTube.

Rabbit Reads….

Behold! Rabbit reads!

We were sitting patiently yesterday whilst waiting for subjects to miander into the room for their portraits when the peace and quite was broken….

“Did you know.. That the sea otter has the densest hair of any mammal known; 130,000 hairs per square centimeter of skin by one count….”

Fascinating!

Heart Gallery

I have been trying to talk a lot about volunteering on this blog in order to stress its importance.  I think as artists, we have been given more than our fair share (both in good and in bad…)

Once or twice a year we try to shoot photos for the Mass Adoption Resource Exchange Heart Gallery Project in order to try and help place foster kids with parents.  Each photographer gets assigned one child.   Its a good outfit that does important work.

I urge you…. get out there and volunteer!

“To whom much is giving, much is expected.” (Luke 12:48)

Latest film…

Here is the latest film in our Investigator Prifile series or IP’s for the Research Lab of Electronics at MIT.

Hope you enjoy!

DroboPro… or DroboJoke?

So far it’s not looking good for Data Robotics and their new DroboPro product.  (see last post)

First let me explain how we intended to use the new DroboPro….  In a nutshell, I don’t think that the DroboPro is nearly fast enough to use as a primary storage device for professional use.  Even when you can speak to a Data Robotics expert, they will admit that hands down transferring data via an internal bus (i.e. and internal RAID such as in our MacPro’s) is leaps and bounds faster than via an external bus such as the DroboPro.

Knowing this, we decided to upgrade all the internal Macintosh RAID’s from 1TB drives to 2TB drives.  This would effectively double the internal RAID capacity from about 1.8TB to somewhere in the 3.5TB range for each workstation.  With respect to our “EditOne” (the main video work station which has both the internal Macintosh RAID as well as a 3Ware Sidecar,) upgrading to all 2TB drives would effectively raise the internal RAID capacity from around 3.8TB to roughly 7.5 or 8TB of primary editing space.

To make this move however, we would need to first move the data off the existing RAIDs, upgrade the drives, and then transfer the data back to the new, larger arrays.  (getting confused yet?)
This is where the DroboPro comes into play.  The idea was to set up a 16TB array, temperarily park the data onto the array, and then move it back to the newly expanded internal RAIDS.  Once this was completed, we would hang the DroboPro in the rack with the XServe, and have it act as a TimeMachine back up of both “EditOne,” as well as “PhotoOne,” (my primary photo workstation.)  In effect, this would give us double redundancy.  All data would be protected on each workstation via a RAID 5 array, and then it would be further protected via a TimeMachine back up on the network.  For data storage above and beyond the local RAIDs, we would count on the rock solid reliablity of the Promse RAID connected to the server. If the DroboPro seemed to work out, a second unit would be fitted in the rack for even more storage space.

Shooting out on the water…

Any time we get a chance to do some shooting out on the water, were gone!  Don’t have to ask us twice!

One of the current video projects we are involved in is a promo for a summer program called TOPS, and we took advantage of the only nice day we had this past weekend and headed out on the water to shoot some “B” roll.

Another cool treat was having my little brother Chris work as my assistant.  Chris used to work as my full time assistant a number of years back, and it was good to have him back on the job.  He has the summer off from biz school, so you might see him on jobs from time to time.

My little brother Chris

The coolest part of the day had to be going through the locks from Boston Harbor to the Charles River.

Heading toward the Cambridge locks from the river toward the harbor

Stay tuned for the finished TOPS film in Aug.

Couldn’t let these go with out sharing…

Rabbit loves when we share these photos with the world….

For those of you who are interested in the on-going saga of young Richards facial inventions… I give you some of the outtakes from the other days photo shoot.

Happy 4th of July everyone!!!

Always needing more space…

Ever since we started shooting video we have been in a constant battle for storage space.  It seems like every time I turn around I am ordering more drives.  First 500’s, then 750’s, 1TB’s, and now 2TB’s.  In the studio we have two editing suites set up for HD video editing, and one workstation for still photography.  Between the three, there is something crazy like 25TB of storage, most of which is RAID 5.  Most of the RAIDS are set up with 1TB drives, and I cant even begin to try to count just how many there are kicking around to in order to create the total storage volume.

The good news is that there are some really big video projects in the works right now, but the bad news is that we are pretty much maxed out and need to find another storage solution.

Richard sent me the info on the new DroboPro from Data Robotics, and we are going to take a chance and give it a try.  We have three of the first generation Drobos in the studio that we use for back ups and such, and they have been pretty much bomb-proof.  Their big downside has always been that they are VERY slow!  Even with the Firewire 800, they are dogs.    Forget editing video with them.

Portaits dont always have to be serious…

We shot some portraits in Cambridge this week.  It’s important to remember that portraits dont always have to be serious.  Sometimes you can just have fun!

We’ve done stuff like this in the past, and its always great fun.  These shots were for an undergraduate program that brings in aspiring physic teachers from all over the country in order to give them experience teaching middle and high school students in a summer program

Shooting them this way embodies all the emotions experienced over their six weeks in the program.  (we also shot them in a nice smiling pose as well.)

Interesting iPhone

Shot this at a conference in Upstate NY the other day…  Thought it very peculiar and worth sharing….

The web design/branding biz…

scfrazier.com, Yoga and Fitness Trainer

Over the past eight months or so, we have had several requests to expand our photo/video business and make a move into the web design biz.  Like a lot of our endeavors… how could we say no?!?

In a nutshell, I have moved into a Chief Creative roll, shooting the photos/video, art directing, and managing the jobs over all.  I’m an OK designer, but in order to raise the bar, we brought in our friend Gary Hedrick to run the design department, and our friend Eric Benoit to run the programming end.  So far, the sites we have done have been simple yet really cool.  They are not terribly complicated, but are all totally customizable by the client, and have integrated blogs using WordPress.

Hacienda Brisas Del Mar

Not only have we been doing the web design, but we have been doing all the branding and associated print in conjunction.  Overall, it is very exciting for us.

The best part of having designers working in house, is we can us a “photography first” method of design.  This is a principal that was ingrained in me by Mike Weymouth of Weymouth Design, and is a mainstay of their business model.

Typically, a design firm is hired, comps are created using stock photos, and then a photographer is hired to fill the holes.  Conversely, we shoot photos and video first, then let the designer go to town with the clients own images.  The net net is a much better design, and a smoother design process.

Perigrine Tactical

To date, we have completed, or are in various stages of completion on seven sites, all of which feature my photography, and have an integrated blog.  Im not quite sure where this new dimension will lead us, but it certainly has been very rewarding creatively.

In order to be competitive, we are trying to keep the process reasonable for the client, so if you are looking for a web solution, shoot me an eMail and we can have a conversation about our process.

Locke DMD

CB Kearney Fine Woodworking

Newest IP film for MIT… Yoel Fink

We’ve finished another Investigator Profile film for the Research Lab of Electronics at MIT.  This one features Yoel Fink, and was a ton of fun to produce!

Blog slacker…Mea culpa

Yes yes… I have been a total slacker!  Its been about 6 weeks since I have posted here…  And thanks to all that have been pestering me and wondering what the hell has been going on.  I took some much needed vacation in May/June to shoot some personal work, do some surfing, build a deck on my house, get the garden going, and reorganize the studio.

Long board at Nantasket

Spring planting around the shop

I have to admit, the time away from the posting was nice!  Richard and I also took some time and found him a really cool 1976 Honda CB550.  We have been diligantly restoring it down in the shop.  If we can pull it together and set aside the time, we plan on shipping that, along with my bike out west for a cross country ride back to Boston.

Rabbits new CB550

Building a deck...

I also was able to get up to Maine with my friend and fellow photographer Mike Weymouth of Weymouth Design. We did some great trout fishing and had some nice quite time up in the woods.

Best trout in ME...

Probably the best day so far was spent with Robert Krevicich (a print designer over at Weymouth Design.)  We headed up to Joppa Flats at the mouth of the Merrimack River in Salisbury MA for the first Striper fishing of the year.  Ill let the photo do the  talking…

44 inch Striper

The second half of June has been pretty much chalked full of video work.  Rabbit has been putting in 70hr weeks again trying to keep up with the editing work.  We have also done some interesting portrait work, along with some other cool projects.  I will start posting on the where and the when.

Anyway… we are still alive and kicking!   Thanks to all of those who sent me the “are you dead” eMails.  You guys rock!

Greg-

Begining another film…

Rabbit sets up for the interview

Started on another film on our RLE Investigator Profile series last Friday.

The workflow process for these films are as follows:  Two camera video interview on either black or white seamless.  B-roll of the subject teaching, in their lab, as well as their students.  Possibly some more B-roll around campus, then into the editing room.

These films roughly take 110-150hrs of post production before they are finished, which takes roughly 8-12 days to finish.  I’ll post it when we finish.

To see some other RLE films, you can find them on YouTube.

Photos in use…

It’s always a great feeling when you start to see the images you shot for a campaign become integrated in a design project.

This past Feb, Rabbit and I spent a week down in the Dominican shooting, and the photos are finally matriculating themselves into the project.

You can read about the trip and see some of the photos from day one, two,  three,  four, and five.

Red Eye Revenge

Wiped out from the road...

I must say that we finally have gotten our asses kicked!

Took the red eye flight back from Denver on Sunday night.  We arrived in Boston at 05:30, and had to head straight to a shoot.

I have to admit… we are officially smoked.  I even skipped a day on the blog yesterday, and was contemplating doing it again today…  Maybe something more interesting tomorrow.

Weekend Tip For Location Photography: #10 The Detail Shot

When shooting photos for clients, especially when they are going to be used for the web, it is always a great idea to shoot lots of detail shots.

These detail shots will not only be good for illustrating concepts, but they are great for backgrounds and web banners.  Plus… designers love to have this stuff to play with.

We always say: “give em what they want, then give em more…”