I just wanted to point you to a cool series of posts from some notable photographers on Robert Hanashiro’s SportsShooter site that he’s been sucessfully publishing (and sharing generously) with others out there for a decade.

Here is an excerpt of my post:

I’ve always found it interesting to study how a career takes shape. It’s a very interesting mix of things you try to make happen, things that fail to happen, and a convergence of events often completely out of your control that many call luck.

When I was 15, I was naïve enough to send my work over to Cornel Capa at ICP to ask him for his advice on what to do with my career. He sent me a very kind handwritten letter basically telling me to keep at it – and that things would inevitably happen. I cherish the letter to this day.

At the age of 19 I was rejected thirteen consecutive times during my first round of internship applications. I then sent out a half-hearted application to the Reuters News Pictures Photo Desk in Washington DC – to work as an editor – at the behest of my placement counselor late in spring – only to have it turn out to be one of the most important internships of my career.

Many of the other breaks that have happened in my career were more picture-driven. I’ve made maybe a dozen images throughout my 20-year career that I am proud of, of which maybe 3-4 are sports images.

Most of them were a result of a very special secret formula that I have learned by watching many of the very best sports photographers out there…

Please continue to read this article on SportsShooter here.

[vimeo video_id=”8341236″ width=”700″ height=”398″ title=”Yes” byline=”Yes” portrait=”Yes” autoplay=”No” loop=”No” color=”00adef”]

I’m very, very, VERY excited about this!

I’ve been working with Canon & Vimeo for close to six months on getting this going and they’ve responded with a pretty resounding show of support!

I shot an ad for Canon a little over six months ago and got to talking with some of the creatives on the team at Grey Advertising.  I told them that 2009 had been a pretty amazing year for me following the release of Reverie – and that I wanted to find a way to share some of that excitement and energy with others.   We came to the conclusion that launching a nationwide film contest would do the trick.

As we all know – there are a LOT of film contests out there – but I believe this one is DIFFERENT.

There is A LOT OF POTENTIAL here for something very special to come out at the end…  each video chapter will start with and end with a still image… you need to interpret the previous photographer/filmmaker’s still to start the (your) subsequent chapter (those are pretty much the ONLY rules/guidelines (outside of the obvious))… should make for a pretty unique series of chapters in the end!

So watch the video above and find out more!  I’m on vacation with family and I’ll get rolling with regular updates and much much more information early next week!  For now – start charging those batteries… it’s your turn!

Judges for the contest include:

Philip Bloom – Director/DP

Russell Carpenter – DP – “Titanic”

Rodney Charters – Director/DP – “24”

Nick Childs – Director/Producer /VP Grey Advertising

Shane Hurlbut – DP – “Terminator Salvation”

Stu Maschwitz – Senior Visual FX Supervisor – “The Spirit”

Rick McCallum – Producer – “Star Wars”

Blake Whitman – Director/Editor – Mr. Vimeo himself.

I’ll be a judge as well of course.

Nocturne is up on Canon USA's site - Vimeo & SmugMug

Just in time for the Holidays – Nocturne is up for all to see.   You can see it on Canon’s site, Vimeo, or in full 1080p on SmugMug.  Also tonight marks the PREMIERE of the Behind The Scenes video of the shoot.

Expect an even bigger announcement within the next 48 hours – that will involve you all! (hint…it’s a BIG film contest…)

The entire short film was shot with available light (practical lights) in an industrial part of downtown Los Angeles over two nights.  Not a single artificial light was added.  The footage was shot at 6400 ASA. (We did use a reflector just for kicks on the shot of the little girl – to see if we could bounce sodium-vapor light 😉

A HUGE Thank you to my co-directors Stu Maschwitz and David Nelson and the amazing crew run by Road Trip Films for an WONDERFUL job!  Thank you as well for the amazing post-production work by Pictures in a Row and the score by Jeff MacDonald at Louder Productions.

Enjoy!

Behind the Scenes video by my friend Joseph Linaschke:

[vimeo video_id=”7152063″ width=”700″ height=”398″ title=”Yes” byline=”Yes” portrait=”Yes” autoplay=”No” loop=”No” color=”00adef”]