some reflections

here are some moments that were captured on film in the past couple months, since I cannot sleep…

“We suffer to get well.
We surrender to win.
We die to live.
We give it away to keep it.” – Richard Rohr

The last couple of weeks

Happy Easter!

Very grateful for my little family.

Happy Easter friends!

Am I the Only One?

I have two speeds in my life. Full speed where I can accomplish anything. And ‘the other’ speed. You know the one that’s just that little hour glass that spins indefinitely?

I heard a phrase years ago from a very successful business guy. He was probably one of the most wealthy people I’ve known in my years. And he said something that I thought of again, “Coffee is for closers.” — Which in the business world means closing the sale. You reward yourself once you’ve achieved the thing.

Another more humorous quote that I connect with for some reason is from Cosmo Kramer and he says to Jerry, “I really like depriving myself of things. It’s fun! Very monastic.”

I’m human. I have seasons and it’s a healthy and normal thing. But one thing that I need to keep reminding myself is that I can’t skip right to the reward. Discipline is key when moving the needle. — I’m making this post as a pledge to myself to not ‘deprive myself’ like Kramer, but only rewarding myself with things that truly help me. Things that don’t feed The Resistance.

Thanks for reading this entry. Enjoy some film scans from my most recent roll…

Winter ’24 Ending

Keeping a personal blog in 2024 is like having a random pen pal. No one really cares, but it’s still pretty fun.

I have started getting more work as the ‘winter season’ with freelance work has warmed up a bit.

A couple of weekends ago I enjoyed my time working with my friends at LEAP supporting an event in Amelia Island, FL. The car show there is absolutely breathtaking. Here’s a little slideshow of images from my time during that weekend…

A few weeks ago, my friend gifted me her medium format film camera. With it she included several rolls of film, but wasn’t sure the condition. I shot a couple of test rolls from that batch and I’m currently shooting a ‘new’ roll purchased in ’24 to see how the quality differs.

I had a headshot/portrait session last week with 2 professionals. It was a lot of fun. I did shoot a couple of ‘not sure how these will turn out.’ I’ll share my favorites so far below…

Side note. Last month I was featured on a Jose Briones’ Moving Offline podcast. He is an author and voice in the dumbphone and offline movement. He featured me and we talked about my use of the Light Phone II the past couple of years. You can listen to that episode, by clicking the preview image below…

Thankful for people like Jose who have inspired so many to reconsider their relationship with technology, social media and the like.

I will share other photos below from the past several weeks. I hope you have a great weekend. Happy St. Patrick’s day. Also happy birthday to my nephew today…

Kbye!

January 2024

I left my 9-5 job back in October after 5.5 years as a Marketing Manager and then the final 2 as Media Manager, essentially a one man video department. I learned a lot in that time period and decided to take the plunge into the unknown trying to make more connections with brands and companies that need content created for them. And ultimately working for myself again which is both freeing and trying.

This is not the ideal time to try something different or put myself out there from a finances stand point, but it’s something that I felt I had to do to break a mold I was stuck in. To be frank, we didn’t align on values any more. And that’s ok. As you grow and learn you have to do something with the knowledge you gain.

January and the winter in general is always a tough time. I don’t think it’s ever been a smooth sailing part of our year. You’d think at my age I would be better prepared mentally for it, but it always catches me by surprise.

My pledge to myself is to continue to make time to create. Just for the sake of creating.
It is what keeps my mind and will power up!

more to come….

August 2023

I used the money that was gifted to me recently from turning 35 (I’m old now guys) to purchase this Kodak half-frame camera. It’s just a little point and shoot that exposes half a frame each time you snap essentially making 2 photos for each frame (probably didn’t need to explain that to you, but here we are.)

I thought I’d share all the exposures with you. I don’t have the physical prints yet, but the scans came back. There are only 70 scans for some reason which means there’s probably 2 more garbage photos in the abyss. But I really enjoyed snapping these.

I’m still learning what it can/can’t do so forgive some of the under exposed moments 🙂

Wizard Recap

I wanted to share some highlights from the past few months in regards to my involvement with Curtain’s Up Theater Company‘s production of The Wizard of Oz.

First some video moments including this promo that I shared 4 weeks before opening night…

Next is a ‘Behind the Curtain’ episode with Evan Totsch. I met Evan when we did School of Rock last year. His father, Andrew and I have become great friends and I think the world of their family.

He (Evan) is a truly gifted actor as well as a passionate individual who I am so proud to know. We worked so well together for both ‘Behind the Curtain’ episodes. He has such a knack for improv and creating fun moments on screen:

The last video segment I’ll share was from the show itself. I have to be really careful here as always with Copyright Infringement and not to cross any lines. This next segment is not from the original movie or anything like that. This was a montage sequence that I made to play when Dorothy goes back to Kansas. The curtain closes for about 2 minutes of music and then resumes with Uncle Henry looking for Dorothy is beginning to wake up.

I had the pleasure of making some Wizard segments too where the Great Oz is speaking and all the fanfare is happening. I was so impressed with the cast and their ability to sync up their lines perfectly with the prerecorded video. But I will save those for the show goers because there’s something special about the live performance and those moments living where they did <3.

Lastly, some stills captured during rehearsals and after performances. I’m a big fan of catching special moments and I hope you enjoy a glimpse of what the show was like…

Such wonderful folks in these photos and I am so proud of them and all of the hard work they put in.

The sentiment I heard several times from unbiased sources was ‘this was the best community theater production I’ve ever seen.’

Bravo to the Cast and Crew

Love,
OP

Vannah Leigh – An Artist to Follow

I met Vannah Leigh last month. She is an up and coming artist based in Belleville, Illinois. I’m really excited about the imagery that was captured to help promote her new EP that’s on its way.

I try not to share content that clients haven’t shared yet, but this one is public now and I’m excited to reshare it here…

Having heard her sing and meeting her, I think she is just remarkable and worth keeping an eye on. — And buying her EP when it comes out!

Go follow Vannah Leigh on the socials:

Instagram | Facebook | TikTok

Shout out to my son Cash with the photo assist.

Highlights from Yesterday: BarK & Shakespeare in the Park

My team at Rent One got to go spend some time together outside of our office’s four walls for a drink and our team was encouraged to bring any four-legged friends. I sadly have none, and only one person successfully brought theirs. BarK is actually free to visit if you don’t have animals with you. And people just let you pet their dogs. For free. Pretty incredible…

After the fun I jetted over to Forest Park for our yearly tradition of Shakespeare in the Park (just another delightful perk of living in the St. Louis Metro area — always high quality, and free, things to do if you look for them!)

You can still catch Twelfth Night in Forest Park now through Sunday!

Full disclosure: I flunked all the things in school including Shakespeare related matters. I made a pledge that next year I will do more work to enjoy the performance which was absolutely wonderful. And the thing I most enjoy is just being close to friends for a few hours.