Who Shot Rock & Roll – A photographic history (1955-Present)

Outside chaos. Inside calm. The hectic life of Bob Dylan.

Today I went to the Annenberg Space for Photography to check out their ‘Who Shot Rock & Roll’ exhibit. The exhibit is dedicated to all the photographers that have taken the iconic photos in rock history. It was free (but I paid $7.25 for parking) and it was awesome.

Due to no photography in the exhibit, I don’t have a lot of pictures. You can check them out here. I did sneak in a couple.

The history and stories behind each photo was simply amazing and just knowing where and why some of these photos were taken really gives me a bigger appreciation to photography. Plus they had a 45-minute documentary too. Very nice!

How to Shoot Your Kids: 8 Ways to Get Knock-Out Family Photos

Standing ovation. Instagrammers, fake photographers need to take note.

Field Notes From Fatherhood

One of the keys to success in taking photos of your kids is, simply, to take lots and lots of them. In these digital days that’s no longer a problem or an expense – shutter away like mad and discard all but the few best. If your camera has a continuous shooting mode so much the better, although you’ll have to wade through stacks of very similar shots to find the perfect one. Besides taking a ton of pictures, though, there are some simple techniques for getting interesting and flattering photos.

Use a shallow depth of field. If your camera allows you to set the f-stop, use a large aperture (small f-stop) like f/2.8 to blur the background, making your child stand out without all the clutter. A large zoom lens can achieve the same effect, particularly if your subject is fairly far away from the background. If your camera…

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Fun pictures from my Friday

Here are some pictures I took with my phone on Friday. Just a cool collection of the things I did today.

I was at Target looking for the holiday nuts. Couldn’t find them, but I found these.

My buddy got me this awesome new Miami Marlins cap.

Ethiopian food for dinner! Yay!!!

Annual Christmas in the Court block party at my buddy’s place.

The 45 most powerful images of 2011

I just came across this link last night and it was simply amazing. I really am a big fan of photography (and I wish I had the money to get into it). But looking at these pictures makes me think about what a crazy year this was.

Check it out.

Vancouver riot kissing couple is cool but could have been cooler if I knew nothing about it

The photographer's name is Richard Lam. Might be my cousin or something.

Had they not identified the two people in this photo and had they not told us the story, I would have been happy. The perception that these two were making out during a riot was really cool. But now they’ve revealed that they were pushed and he was trying to comfort her makes it not as cool.

But in the back of my mind, I knew that there had to be more than just two poeple making out during chaos. Oh well…

Customizing my Facebook profile into something cool

Took me a little while, but I finally got it right.

Ever since the new Facebook profile layout was released a while back in December, I already had took advantage of it by putting my own touch to it. With the five most recent tags placed across the top of the profile, I decided to toy around with it.

The first one I used was to have my catching a baseball with my outstretched left arm. That got some positive reviews but it wasn’t as good as I wanted. Since it looks like that I am the only one in my circle of friends that has done this, I changed it up again today with me swinging a baseball bat.

I must say, this turned out really good. Notice that the bat is behind a white wall, giving it the illusion that it’s part of the profile. And yes, I shot the picture by myself.

What would have been of me if I actually stuck with photography?

This is probably one of my favorite pictures I've ever taken. I color swapped, but I was glad I got two people walking on opposite sides. The one on the left was waiting for a ride. The guy on the right was a guy I had class with freshman year.

So I was talking with my buddy Henry about photography. He has a nice camera. I do not. But I like taking good photos. Anyway, we got to talking and it made me think about my photography skills. I got no good camera. It’s just a lousy Canon Powershot. But somehow, I feel that my photography skills are better than most… well, at least I know how to take a good picture.

I don’t overzoom or underzoom. I know the balance of colors, lighting and all that stuff. I took a photography class (kind of) at SJSU for one of my journalism requirements. I learned a few things. And even one time, I submitted photos to the Spartan Daily (the SJSU newspaper) and was even asked to join photography because my work looked good.

I don’t know. I like being a photographer, but it’s an expensive hobby. I don’t have the desire to make it a profession. Plus there are too many people out there trying to be photographers and even though their stuff is OK, I know that if I tried to get in the biznizz, I’d get drowned out.

I don’t know… I’ll post some of my favorite pictures… tell me what you think. (These pictures I have taken over the past few years just from my digital camera. Nothing fancy, but I don’t know. And I am just grabbing these off uploads that I had on Facebook, so the size and quality ain’t that great.)