Don’t Let The Wildlife Get Your Goat
May 23rd, 2009
The wild creatures in Glacier are in the majority. We’ve seen all sorts of animals. It’s been great. And we haven’t had to use our bear spray yet.
Yesterday we did see a couple bears. A mother black bear and her cub were right beside the road when we drove slowly by in the Many Glacier area. They were about 10 feet from the truck. We didn’t stop or take any photos because momma bear did not look like she was happy to see us.
We’ve also seen elk and, of course, more
deer. _G_ saw a moose, but Brooke and I missed it in the woods as we drove by. Today we saw a bald eagle fly low right over the truck as we were driving.
We had seen mountain goats high up on the cliffs above Avalanche Lake on our first day here, but yesterday we managed to get a lot closer look at a whole herd of them, as you can see here. What a great place this is.
We leave in the morning and start the drive, first to Dave Swanson’s place, then on back home 
after our visit with him. But Glacier is a place I’ll want to return to. It’s beautiful and wild and wonderful. And uncrowded compared to places like Yellowstone.
Icing the Models
May 20th, 2009
It’s cold today. And windy. And cloudy. And rainy. Great weather for photos, unless you happen to be a nude model. Then it’s bad news. But I work with the very best, bravest, toughest figure models in the world. And they proved that again today.
We met Montana model Tinytina at 8 a.m. and headed to a location she had chosen for us on Flathead Lake. It was totally exposed to the wind and to the rain that was falling. It was also beautiful in a very different way from what we had been seeing up in Glacier National Park.
Tinytina is a great model and a great person. It was a pleasure to meet and work with her. I highly recommend her to anyone who is looking for a model in northwest Montana. You couldn’t do better.
I contacted 14 Montana models through Model Mayhem to find someone local to work with on this trip. Only three responded. Two of those said they didn’t do nude work. That left Tinytina. What a great stroke of luck to have connected with her for this one day.
It was a short shoot. Each model took a couple turns braving the cold and wind. And I couldn’t resist doing a shot with all three of them together, as you can see above. In more reasonable temperatures we would have spent several hours shooting at this great location, but that would have been far beyond a safe level of exposure on a day like today. In a very short period of time we were able to make a number of fine photographs.
And below is a photo just to show what the glamorous exciting world of figure modeling looks like between shots.
Thank you ladies for all the suffering you do for my art. I really, really appreciate it. You are the best.
Cold, Wet and Dirty
May 19th, 2009
I often tell my models that they will get cold and wet and dirty if they work with me. That’s what happened to Brooke today. At least for a short while in the morning.
It was cold and raining this morning. We got up early and drove to the park to shoot at a spot we saw yesterday that Brooke wanted to return to for a shot. It was along a very popular trail. But by arriving early in the morning in a pouring rain we saw no one else at all on the trail and we got the shot. At that point Brooke was pretty cold and Gaea was sure she wasn’t interested in getting naked in that weather.
But we didn’t give up completely. We went to the visitor center to see what the weather was doing on the other side of the park. The weather often differs from one side of the mountains to the other. The web cam showed it was raining hard there too and the forecast was for more of the same all day.
So we went back to the condo and napped and relaxed. Tomorrow it’s up early again and off to meet a local model for a shoot at a different location that she has suggested for us. The weather is supposed to improve and stay good for the rest of the week. I’d actually rather shoot in overcast, but it sounds like it will be sunny and warm the rest of the time we are here. And today it was just too cold, even though the light was very nice. So I’m going to try to schedule things for Thursday and Friday that will put us in the shade of the mountains each day while we are shooting. We’ll see if that works out.
We’ve been getting some good photos. The trip is already a success, even if we didn’t take another shot. But we have lots more shooting to do in a bunch of locations that we have yet to visit. That’s Brooke up above, of course, from Monday’s day of shooting near McDonald Lake. And below is Gaea by Avalanche Creek on the hike up to the lake when we were sweating in 80 degree heat yesterday.
Old McDonald Had A Lake, Gaea, Gaea, Oh!
May 18th, 2009
Our first day of shooting in Glacier went very well, as you can see. Temperatures were in the upper 70s. We ended the day by hiking to Avalanche Lake. We hadn’t intended that to be the last thing we did, but the hike was more strenuous and took longer than we had expected, so we were ready to call it a day when we got back down.
Here is Gaea at McDonald Lake:
And this is Brooke at McDonald Lake:
The closest thing we saw to a grizzly was an old guy with a “Griz” t-shirt. But the deer are still after me. I figured they were looking for revenge for what happened with their sister on the way here. But we were prepared with Bear Spray, so we were able to fend them off. As you can see this vicious beast was just looking for an opening to attack:
People often ask me about the hazards of working in the wilderness, which is my favorite thing to do. There are hazards to be concerned about, of course. But I’ve been doing this all my life so I’ve picked up a few tricks.
Of course it’s always important to make sure you stay on the trail so you don’t get lost. Missing a turn can be deadly. As you can see in this photo, one could easily lose the trail, become hopelessly lost and provide a meal for a bear:
But, as I say, I’ve been doing this for a long time and I’ve learned to read the signs you find along the trail. Some of these are hard to notice, but for the trained woodsman it isn’t difficult and learning to read them will keep you from getting lost. Here’s an example of the sort of obscure things the novice might fail to notice when hiking in the wilderness:
OK…I’m tired and I’ve had some beer. Sorry.
Oh, Deer!
May 17th, 2009
First, it was 1,310 miles. In one day. We left Minneapolis at 3:45 a.m. Central Time and arrived in Columbia Falls at 11:30 p.m. Mountain Time. The last 100 miles was through small towns on a 2-lane road around a beautiful lake. Of course it got dark while we were on that road, not helping with making good time.
Note to self: Don’t do any more 1,300 mile days of driving.
Before that last stretch it was high speed driving on the super slabs of I-94 and I-90. It was while going along I-90 at about 85 mph that I saw a deer cross the road in front of me. Knowing that there is always at least one more deer, I stepped on the brake and looked for the second deer. It was there, and despite my best efforts it managed to encounter the front of my truck. Fortunately I had slowed down quite a bit by then, so it was more of a bump than a collision. Very little damage to my truck. I’m not sure about the deer. She wasn’t to be found after I stopped to check for damage.
The center of the truck’s “grill” met up with the hind quarter of the deer. That so called grill is thin cheap plastic. It has a bunch of cracks in it now, though from a distance you can’t really tell anything happened. The force of the impact was absorbed by the hood latch mechanism behind that grill. It’s bent and as a result I can’t get the hood open now. I decided not to try too hard for fear that I’ll get it unlatched and it won’t latch again…a much more serious problem in the middle of a trip. The truck doesn’t use any oil, so I just don’t plan to open the hood until I get home and figure out how I’m going to fix this.
While fooling around with the grill I did manage to get a cut on my hand from the sharp pieces of broken plastic, so now I’m probably going to get some weird disease from the deer and she will have her revenge on me.
Another minor event yesterday was courtesy of my credit card company. They decided that 4 tanks of gas in a 12-hour period was suspicious usage and turned my card off. Fortunately I had a second card for the last two fill-ups, and the check-in at the condo. I got on the phone this morning and fixed that little issue.
Today I’m fried. I expected that, so I planned nothing for today. I’m relaxing in the condo and sometime in the afternoon I’ll go drive around and check out the ranger stations for both Glacier National Park and the Forest Service. The weather forecast is calling for highs in the 80s most of the coming week, so it’s looking like we are in luck and Gaea and Brooke won’t be too terribly frozen by the time we leave.
Oh…and there is no wifi in the condo. We have to go to another building to get a signal. So updates will depend on time and inclination to make that trudge to check e-mail and upload blog posts. But I’m sure I’ll be posting now and then throughout the week.
That photo up there is LuxxxNoir from our shoot in Chicago last month. We were just playing around with the light from the motel window and her magnificent, beautiful hair. Something a little different for me, but it seems to reflect my burned out state of being today. Thanks Luxxx.
On the road again, doan cha know
May 15th, 2009
The past week has been insanely busy, but it has now transitioned to a new form of insanely busy. I’m on the road, on the way to Glacier National Park and vicinity for a week of shooting with Brooke and _G_. It promises to be a lot of fun and should be productive if the models don’t get hypothermia or the bears just coming out of hibernation don’t eat us.
This afternoon we’ll be visiting with Stephen Haynes in Minneapolis. Tomorrow we will leave at 4 a.m. and make a 1300-mile drive in one day and arrive at Columbia Falls sometime late in the evening.
In the past week I’ve hung a short-notice exhibit at the Cannery in Dayton, put together a set of prints for the Erotic Signature touring show and shipped them off to Miami, went over to Columbus to see the MFA show of one of my favorite people, visited with both my daughters…one home from college for the summer with her appendectomy scar healing up nicely and the other with my grandson in tow. Plus getting everything ready for this trip. The 1300-mile drive tomorrow almost sounds relaxing by comparison…almost, but not quite.
Oh…and in there I also managed to do a shoot with Angie at a local waterfall that I’ve had my eye on for some time. That’s the result up above. Thanks Angie.
I’ll try to post some things as this trip goes on, if I get time and if we manage to come up with anything I’m happy to share. Or I might just go silent for a couple weeks…largely depends on what sort of internet connections I find along the road.
"There is a crack in everything…"
May 10th, 2009
-Leonard Cohen
Cannery Snaps
May 2nd, 2009
Here are a few snaps from the Cannery gallery during the art walk last night.
There was a surprisingly large turnout despite the intermittent torrential rain. I think my little corner in the gallery turned out to look pretty good in spite of pulling it all together in two days.
I didn’t expect so many people to be there. I had planned to go when it started at 5 p.m. and hang around for a couple hours, then go home. But I ended up talking to so many people that I lost track of time and looked at my watch and it was 10 p.m., time for the gallery to close. Oh…and there was beer…not to mention free food.
One of my models came by to say hello and, of course, wanted her picture taken standing beside her picture.
My photos will be on display at the Cannery through the month. The semi-annual Urban Nights art event happens in the middle of the month, so my work will be up for that. Unfortunately I’ll be out of town doing a photo shoot on that day, so I won’t be able to be at the gallery. But the photos will be there if you’d like to go by and have a look or even buy a print.
Cannery Show
April 29th, 2009
A quick post to let you all know that I’ll have some prints on display at the Cannery Gallery in downtown Dayton for the month of May. This opportunity came up suddenly, so what I’m putting up is what was framed and ready to go. Some old and some new. But at least they will be out where they can be seen instead of just hanging in my studio.
There’s an art walk this Friday, May 1. The gallery will be open for that from 5 to 10 p.m. I’ll be there at least part of that time. There will be food and drink available. So if you are in the Dayton area and looking for something to do Friday night why don’t you come on by the Cannery and say hi.
Cannery Art and Design Center
434 East Third Street
Dayton, OH
937-313-9883
www.canneryarts.com
The photo up there is something new I just shot a few days ago with _G_ in an old building in downtown Springfield. I expect to be shooting in that building a lot in the future.
More Claudine
April 26th, 2009
More of Claudine at the beach. It was cold. It was very windy. Claudine was a total trooper, though she did have to close her eyes because of all the sand blowing around in this spot, just off the beach on Lake Michigan. I’m loving those shadows and all the lines and angles along with Claudine’s lovely curves.
We got a lot of good photos that morning. More to come. But I also have more to show you from the shoot with Luxxx. And I did a new shoot today with Gaea in a special location. Those photos will be coming soon too…and maybe one of these days some information on why the location is special. But you’ll just have to be patient for that.
