The Human Face of Big Data – The Book & the Film…

I got an email this afternoon reminding me that ‘The Human Face of Big Data’…Rick Smolan’s look at how the rapid emergence of digital devices is affecting our lives…will be airing tonight at 10:00PM Eastern on PBS (check local listings). And that reminded me that I actually did one of the shots that was featured in the book. Rick had me shoot Josh Koppel, the CEO of ScrollMotion…an App developer that has created mobile content for most of the world’s largest publishers. ScrollMotion basically ‘teaches’ Old Media how to use New Media. The funny thing is that when you enter their offices, it’s like going to a museum of Pre-Digital Technology! Every single inch of the wall space is filled with magazine cover, record albums, movie posters and newspaper clippings…

…and especially Josh’s office…

My mission was clear…show what the place was like and the rest would fall in place. We figured that couch with the wall full of Nostalgia behind it was the place to start. Since Josh lives on his iPad, I wanted to play that off the wall of old printed material. But I needed to make the iPad the hero. It kind of had to be the focal point of the photo. It had to shine…and I had just the right thing…my little battery powered Morris Mini Slave units…

The Mini Slaves are small…really small…and if he held one in his hand at just the right angle it would appear that the iPad was lighting his face while also giving me a nice halo-glow. This is how we set it up…

I did a lot of cross-filtering with CTO and CTB tells to add to the mood. The Ring Light and Mini Slave were both wrapped in blue, while the beauty dish had a full CTO to warm up his skin and the wall behind him. There was a huge wall of windows on the left side that also let a lot of cool, blue light in. My first test was kind of right on…

Once we added Josh to the shot, all we had to do was get him to master holding the Mini Slave in the right place…

Here’s the final image in the book…

So anyway…you should check out the documentary tonight…watch the trailer here:

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When you listen to The Hipstones, you get transported back to an era where jazzy horns, buttery guitar licks and smooth vocal harmonies ruled the day. Mark Palmer and Anthea White play off each other backed by a swirl of Steely Dan-like horn arrangements and the result is a loving wet kiss homage to 60’s soul and R&B. And next Monday, October 17th , they’ll be bringing the full 8 piece band…including a 3 piece horn section…for a special show (no door charge!) at the Rockwood Music Hall where they’re giving away an iPad 2 to the person who brings the most friends to the show! That’s right…you bring a bunch of your little pals out for a night of cool jazz and go home with an iPad! How do I get in on this deal, you ask? All you hafta do is pre-register a minimum of five (5) friends names and email addresses by 1:00PM Monday on the Hipstones Website and make sure they plant their asses in chairs at Rockwood for the show. Obviously, you wanna get as many of your friends as possible to turn up, but since the club only has 160 seats, your chances of walking away with a shiny new iPad are pretty good! So what are you waiting for?!! You can either drop them an E-mail or click HERE to enter, then jump over to their Facebook Page and hit the ‘LIKE’ button, and if ‘Spread It All Around’ makes you smile, you can pick up the album Dreamers on iTunes.

The iPad Portfolio Era Begins…

As some of you already know, the past couple of months have had me furiously redesigning my current website with the folks at APhotoFolio.com and yesterday Rob Haggart, Mr. APhotoFolio himself, informed me that they have become the first photography website company to deliver custom designed iPad sites, built using HTML5, for all of their customers. Check it out…

A Photo Folio – First To Deliver iPad Sites

As I sit here resizing TIFFS down to JPEGs for my new site, I hafta wonder if the next thing I’m gonna be doing is purchasing a carload of iPads to act as my portfolios?!! Given how labor intensive, not to mention expensive, printed portfolios can be, having everything on an iPad just might make sense! I dunno…it’s all very early in the game, but if I can get over not having a printed book of BIG prints to show an art director, who knows?!!

And now, here’s a quick look at a sample page from my new website, which will be up as soon as I finish resizing those damned JPEGs…

Click on image for Full-Size
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iPad…Day Two…

Thank God for the BlendTec Total Blender, Tom Dickson and the fabulous folks at ‘Will It Blend’…

Dont’cha just love the interweb?!!

iPad…Day One…

Have we really reached the point in human existence where this is what kids think of new technology?!!

On the other hand, even though it cost ’em 500 bones, I guess the little bastards are YouTube Superstars…