Ms. Marvel Cosplay: Holly Rebelle
comics
Assassin Jacqui: A Black and White Series
Denver Comic Con 2016
This marks my 3rd year of covering Denver Comic Con and it always seems to wow me every year. It feels like this convention only gets bigger and bigger every year and this year absolutely felt the biggest. Being on the floor on Saturday put you elbows to elbows with everyone and mobility was incredibly limited. At many cons this would be seen as an issue with the layout but in the case of DCC this year it was purely due to the shear amount of people packed into the rather large Denver Convention Center. That being said it didn’t stop me from trying to get the best images possible down on the show floor. It’s been a while since I have been able to shoot such a festive event and I hope I get to do more going forward in the future. It is a always important to challenge ones self when getting out to shoot.
Joy as Spider Gwen
When you spend some time specializing in a certain field of photography people start to come to you specifically for certain types of images. In this case Joy approached me about doing a photoshoot involving her new Spider Gwen suit.
When it comes to shooting any costume based set the first thing I always think of is “what location does this costume work in”. In the case of an urban super hero I wanted to keep it as urban as possible. Downtown Albuquerque provided plenty for the aesthetic that I was looking for. We shot at and around the civic plaza and found plenty of things to work with and even found a few hidden gems in the process.
The best part of shooting with Joy was how much of a trooper she was. I asked her to climb up to different ledges and railings while balance herself without any compliant and it added so much more to the shots.
The big thing I’m trying to be better at as a photographer is collaboration. Receiving input and ideas from different sources and putting it into use. In this case my part time assistant and full time girlfriend Emilie was much more involved in location scouting and posing and I gave her free reign to give suggestions to try out. This system works especially well because even if an idea doesn’t work you can easily say hey we tried and move on. But all of Emilie’s ideas worked perfectly so there was no need to worry.
During post processing the main challenge I faced was balancing out exposure and color. The white portions of the suit caused some major highlights and when getting them balanced out brought in a blue coloring which could be changed in white balance. Post is always a game of feeling out the image and experimenting with what works and what doesn’t.
The images came out extremely well and we got some very unique looks throughout the shoot. It’s always great to get to work with new talent . Joy lives up to her name by being a fun new model to shoot with and I look forward to more work in the future.
Denver Comic Con 2015 Preview
Con Season is now upon us and to kick the epic summer off, I’m making the trip up to Denver for the second year in a row. Last year DCC was the biggest convention I had ever attended and this year I’m expecting it to be even bigger and better than ever.
Denver Comic Con was the text book definition of comic book conventions; with amazing and weird panels, Cosplays ranging to a intricate Galactus and a closet made Silent bob, and vendors selling all the nerdy goodies that you can find.
Again like last year I’ll be covering the event in coordination with Nerdout Entertainment and Catamelt.com as the designated camera man. Hopefully this year I can improve the production quality (and apply some color grading to the video).
Major change ups from last years Con include the amount of man power that I have available to me and the ideas my partners and I have cooked up. I normally go into conventions blind but this year Nerdout Entertainment and I have a clearer game plan on how we want to tackle the event.
Polish will be key for content this year. Last year I put so much emphasis on just getting the content out that some things (like the video productions) suffered and I plan to rectify that this year.
Another exciting thing about this years event is the amount of people I know that are going to be at the conventions including some of my favorite cosplay type people Like Cheesecake Panda and ChayAra.
Excited for this year and I hope to get all the great images for everyone.
Shooting with Girls of Geek
One of the biggest hurdles you ever have to deal with in the world of photography is working around schedules. More often than not shoots get cancelled because one party or another has something urgent come up or they end up having to work on the day that is scheduled or sometimes you try to organize a shoot and it just never comes to fruition because calendars just don’t line up. That seems to be a common thing when it comes to my efforts to work with the Girls of Geek, but lucky for me I finally got my opportunity.
Girls of Geek is group based out in my hometown of Albuquerque NM run by Delina Ellise, seen above as Harley Quinn. They place themselves square in the center of geek culture and do a lot of promotional work for events such as Comic Convention which shouldn’t come as a surprise given the name.
I’ve been aware of the group for some time but didn’t have a real connection to them until my friend and often subject of my photography Cheese Cake Panda became part of the group and through her I became a sponsor for their recent calendar. At the beginning of the year during Albuquerque Comic Con Delina approached me about doing a shoot for the group at the convention which I was excited for but unfortunately due to scheduling conflicts (as foreshadowed) we never got around to it.
Now fast forward a couple of months; after I whined online about wanting to do a shoot because I had been too busy moving and I had gotten the itch in my shutter finger, Delina contacted me and we finally got around to getting something set in stone. We decided on a batman themed shoot (in case you hadn’t noticed) downtown taking place between 10am and 1pm.
Going into the shoot I was giving myself an unnecessary amount of anxiety about the potential shooting condition. Shooting in the middle of the day presents some very challenging lighting conditions so I had borrowed a gold reflector from my work and asked a few of my friends to help out. It ended up being a bit over kill because the tall buildings down town provided plenty of shade to get even lighting and we were able to find excellent locations. Over-preparation aside, it was nice to be able to get anything I needed from my girlfriend Emilie, my coworkers Anissa and Kendra, and my photographer-in-training friend Nina in any given situation.
Being that we went with a batman theme for the photo shoot, the urban environment of Albuquerque’s down town was perfect. The only unfortunate thing was the tone of the lighting. It’s hard to do low key shots in the middle of the day without any kind of strobe lighting (which I’m not geared up for, nor do I have a high level of expertise in flash photography).
The girls themselves were excellent to work with. All of them have varying degrees of modeling experience so their ability to take direction and give different looks without any directions made shooting with them a smooth experience on top of being an enjoyable one. Having good models to work with is highly underrated.
What I loved so much about working with this group was how well their personalities melded together and their ability to work together in photos. A lot of the time the Girls of Geek came up with their own ideas for poses, props, and scenery and my only job was to capture the moments.
A big gauge of the success of a shoot comes down to how much fun is had during the process. If anyone, be it the photographer, the models or anyone else is in a sour mood it can effect the whole dynamic of the photos. Luckly this was never a problem. Energy was never low and it felt as if everyone was having a good time. I look forward to working with the Girls of Geek again in the future and possibly doing even bigger projects
You can find them online at girlsofgeek.com or follow them on twitter, facebook or instagram
Albuquerque Comic Con 2015 Preview: (ReEdits from 2014)
It’s a new year and what better way is there to kick it off than going to a Comic Convention? If you’re a humongous nerd like myself, there really isn’t any. It’s always fun to go to these conventions and spend time around people with similar interests and just celebrate our enthusiasm for nerd culture. I only got to make it to one day last year but this year I plan on taking the whole weekend in and sharing with you the visual goodness that I capture.
Now last year was one of my first outings for using my d600 and I can tell you, having a full frame camera was a godsend with how little light I was dealing with. It was dark, crowded, and I had to literally had to shoot wide open just to get anything. This year however they have changed locations to the Albuquerque Convention Center which think is great because 1. I’m familiar with the layout of that building from all my outings at ACE (The Albuquerque Comic Expo) 2. Lighting is so much better and 3.Crowding shouldn’t be an issue like it was last year. This year I will pretty much have the same gear and I’m hoping that the photos I get will show a years worth of improvement in my photo skills.
As always I will be focusing on the people who are attending the event and the creative costumes that many of them have come up with. Some of the things I’m expecting to be popular are characters from Guardians of the Galaxy considering how popular that movie became, and probably a ton of Harley Quinn (because that’s just how it is.)
Normally I don’t much care for the celebrity guest that come to these things but there are some notable ones like Sean Patrick Flarney of the Boondock Saints cult classic and Fabian Nicieza who wrote one of my favorite comic book series, Cable and Deadpool. Whether or not I get permission to get photos of the guests is still up in the air, but if that’s a No-No I’m not going to be heart broken about it.
Another really exciting thing about Albuquerque Comic Con is getting to see some awesome people who I don’t get see on a regular basis like the members of the 501st Legion: Dewback Ridge Garrison, some of my cosplay friends who are always bugging me for photo shoots.
Speaking of photo-shoots, I’m probably going to be doing quiet of few of those while I’m there. I’d like to get some new people in on them but if that doesn’t happen it won’t be for lack of effort. Posed shoots are always fun to do at conventions and it’s always great to give cosplayers who have spent so much time and effort a chance to show off their work everywhere and not just at the convention.
So here’s to what hopes to be a spectacular Albuquerque Comic Con and I hope I get plenty of stellar images to share with all of you.
Albuquerque Comic Expo 2014: Street Photography on the Show Floor.
The Albuquerque Comic Expo has now came and went and there are a tone of photos to share from the show floor. Like Most Conventions I spent most of my time shooting in a candid fashion carrying myself as a photojournalist. ACE was so kind as to present me with a press pass for the event giving me free range to shoot where ever whenever (within reason.)
For this event I shot exclusively with my 85mm 1.8 on my D600 Shooting at f2.5 and 1/400 of second, changing my ISO depending on where I was and the lighting that was present. On the show floor my ISO was at about 3200 and in the lobby it was dropped to about 800.
My 85mm has always been my workhorse lens. I like having the short telephoto length to where I don’t have to be getting up in people’s faces but I can still be present in the scene. Many street photographers like using a more standard focal length like a 50mm or a 35mm. For me those angles are a little to much on the wide side. If I was confined to a tighter space I would probably use a 50mm but I didn’t want to be getting into peoples faces with my camera. I wanted them to act natural at the convention.
The greatest thing about these conventions is the visual variety. People will dress up as their favorite comicbook, video game, Anime or movie characters, They’ll wander around the show and look at all the artist and vendors selling their merchandise and they’ll interact with each other in unique ways giving interesting Juxtaposition.
I always leave conventions 1. exhausted but 2. pleased with the experience. I always leave making a couple of friends, taken tons of good images that seem to get a lot of people’s attention. And that alone makes the exhausting 3 day work weekend all the more worth it.
Albuquerque Comic Expo 2014: Preview
We are now officially a week away from the Albuquerque Comic Expo (ACE) and just like last year I will be there all three days with my camera equipment on the show floor documenting everything the show has to offer.
Last year ACE was my introduction to shooting not only conventions but doing photography in a candid and unique way. One thing that I do differently from most photographers at conventions is that I take a run and gun approach. I move around, I don’t stop my subjects and I try to capture moments as opposed just posed portraits. It’s a fairly unconventional style of photography when it comes to comic conventions but people seem to always enjoy the results.
Though I enjoying shooting in a candid style at conventions it’s not uncommon for people to stop and pose when they see the camera pointed at them. I don’t mind this in the slightest. I try to take more of the street photographer mentality of capturing candid moments but obliging people who want to pose in their cosplays that they’ve worked so hard on.
On top of covering the show floor I also take posed portraits of my lovely cosplay friends. Most of them have worked very hard to put multiple outfits together for the convention and I’m always happy to oblige.
This year I’m hoping to show off how much I’ve improved as a photographer in the last year. I’ve learned a lot of different techniques, rules and concepts that I didn’t know a year ago. So if you thought the pictures from a year ago were good get ready. Because shit is about to get awesome.
See you all at ACE.
TCK-Media 
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