These pictures come from backup/Old My Pictures:

I had forgotten that I had done the wedding photography for Jesse’s mom’s wedding.

Jay designed this movie poster.






This picture is a perfect example of a picture people love, but wouldn’t do well at a photo contest.

Next week’s folder will be: backup

This “gold mine” of pictures came from:

Backup/Old My Pictures/McFriends

Most of these pictures came from a slide show I had to put together for an Evil Clown Empire “Crew Rally”, but there is inexplicably some Halloween images mixed into this folder.

Next week’s folder:

Backup/Old My Pictures/Minnesota Vacation

This is the end of the random NYC images. Please shed no tears.

Some of the pictures are from the Brooklyn Bridge:

Statue of Liberty


Lovers put a lock on the Brooklyn Bridge to seal their love and then throw the key over the side.




Steph and I


Steph and I


Sarah, Tim and I


Sarah and Jesse


Sarah and I


Manhattan Bridge


Jesse and I


Jesse and I

Some were taken at Grand Central Station…

The rest are from the exotic Roosevelt Island Tram…

Next week’s random Wednesday will be pictures from Iowa State’s Spring Game.

Self Evident Truth

Jesse and I knew that we weren’t spending a ton of time in New York and we were given a few suggestions by Sarah and Steph on places to visit. We both decided to choose one place we had to go see.

Jesse chose Central Park.

I chose the Statue of Liberty. In the 3.5 days that we were in New York City, I took approximately 800 photos. Close to half of those were on our Statue of Liberty adventure.

So here are more pictures from the Self Evident Truth Series:

There will be more pictures from the Self Evident Truth Series tomorrow.

Even though I only recently started the tradition of posting movie reviews on Wednesdays, I’m already walking away from that tradition. I want to keep this website about photography as much as possible, so I’m going to start posting my movie reviews on my collective blog:

If you were to follow that link, you would not find any movie reviews. You will find an explanation of why I do my movie reviews the way I do. You will also find a posting the 10 Things I Learned in NYC. In the near future, I should have a review of Cedar Rapids up.

Wednesdays now will be more of a random photography day. This way I get more photography on the photography website and more writing on the writing website.

Here are some random pictures from my trip to New York City:

The Carnegie Deli, our first stop after the hotel.


The Melo – That is what I am talking about!


Maybe the best cheesecake of my life.


Central Park


Central Park


Central Park Horse


Manhattan Skyline from Central Park


Broadway


David Letterman does not amuse me, but this was still kind of cool.


“Don’t want to be an American Idiot. Don’t want a nation under the new media. And can you hear the sound of hysteria? The subliminal mind (fudge) America….”


Want to know what 72 dollars worth of alcohol looks like in NYC? Sarah and Tim are showing it off.


Steph and I after American Idiot


Jesse and I after American Idiot


Amy’s Bread’s Red Velvet Cake. Tim said this would be the best red velvet cake of my life. Shhh…. My Mom’s is better!


Sarah and I outside of Amy’s Bread

More random New York City images will be coming your way next Wednesday and don’t forget to check out the other website for my list of 10 things I learned in NYC.

These pictures are from backup/Old My Pictures/Beaver Massacre

I’ve try to come up with a good reason for why these pictures exist, but I can’t really defend them.

I will just try to explain what the general idea was supposed to be. These were supposed to be “Production Stills” for a movie that didn’t exist, The Beaver Machete Massacre.

Why?

I don’t know. I think Beaver looks like the set of a horror movie and I owned a machete.

Here they are:

I believe Jay was the first person to fall under my blade. Sometimes when two great artists get together a creative synergy occurs and amazing things are done. Sometimes they do garbage like this…


Bill was next and by this time my maniacal hillbilly character had bought a new plaid shirt. I think it was quilted so he wouldn’t get cold during the long winter nights in the woods.


By the time Willy had come around, I had lost the machete. But I had found an axe. Locally there was a clothing sale at Big Bear and the maniacal hillbilly had picked up yet another quilted flannel shirt.


We drove all the way out to Ledges, we might as well take more than one shot.


Poor Steph. Why did she ever agree to such a thing.


Jesse was next. I think this was done on his lunch break. Apparently I had found a hammer by this point.


I think we found that bottle littered on the ground at Wakefield Woods.


Jesse used to have a similar look on his face when he saw that he was going to have to defend me on the basketball court.


I’m pretty sure that Jay took these cinematic shots.


Jesse must have really been into this little project.


I must have found the machete again. The look on Andy’s face almost makes this old project worthwhile.


Take that Old Navy!

Next week’s folder is backup/Old My Pictures/County Fair 2004

These pictures are from: backup/Old My Pictures/ Animals

In retrospect, I don’t know why I named this folder Animals. There aren’t that many animal pictures in it. I guess I must have considered it witty at the time.

Kalona

For my 30th Birthday Party, I talked Andy and Jesse into dressing up like Sandmen from Logan’s Run and posing for pictures all over the awe-inspiring beauty of the Iowa State University campus. Jay was the photographer. I really need to watch Logan’s Run again sometime.

The notorious Black Angel in Iowa City.


Bill took this picture of Faust at our wedding.


Tulum


Tulum


Tulum


Kalona, in front of the now defunct Kalona Cupboard.


The poster for Steph’s Senior Recital.


Brandon as Henrik Ibsen.


Lost Lake.

Next week’s look at the archives will be: backup/Old My Pictures/Backgrounds

Still another week before I have to come up with a good excuse for the Beaver Machete Massacre Project.

These pictures are from: backup/Old My Pictures/2005 Calendar

I’m pretty sure these are the files from the 2nd year of the calendar, although it is possible that it was the 3rd or 1st year of the calendar. My records on such things are spotty at best.

In the early days of the calendar I made “individualized” calendars, but I only made 3 calendars back then, so it was somewhat easy to do. That is why there are more than 12 images in this folder.

These pictures would have been taken in 2004.

Until “Outburst of the Soul” this was the most popular picture I ever made. To this date, I believe it is the only picture I’ve ever taken that inspired a musical composition.






This is the first digital picture I ever took.






This picture was taken in Tulum near Cozumel. It was also fairly popular in its day.


This picture was taken between Upper Cullen Lake and Middle Cullen Lake in Minnesota.


This was the 1st (kind of feels like the last) picture I had accepted to the Iowa State Fair Photography Salon. Apparently I’ve regressed as a photographer since this photo, the peak of my photography “career”.








I once had this terrible idea called the Beaver Machete Project. I’ll probably have to explain this later, but I’m going to buy myself a week or so to think of a good excuse for why I thought this was a good idea.

Next week’s look at the archives will be: backup/Old My Pictures/Animals

A cursory glance of this folder reveals very few pictures of animals.

Small bookkeeping note, with this Journal Entry, Teresa becomes the 6th Person to be featured, mentioned, or alluded to in 100 entries. I’m sure she’ll put that on her resume.

This week we have a first time contributor in my sister Carla.  She did break the one and only rule of RWPE (the picture has to be taken the week of the project) but I’ll let it slide since it was her birthday last week.

This week’s submissions:

Michael Vest

Carla Stensland

Dawn Krause

Becky Perkovich

Julie Johnson (In Flight)

Christopher D. Bennett

Although as a general rule I don’t like to comment on my RWPE, I will point out this time that this picture is completely motivated by the fact that Stephanie Kasper would be abnormally freaked out by it.

Julie has started a blog and I wanted to include a link to her blog so you can enjoy much more of her photography, writing and just general Julieness. For those of you that are like me and can’t get enough Julie Johnson (despite being treated for the medical condition) click on the link below:

The Joy is in the Journey

Dawn’s Weekly Poem

Motion

The tenderness you want to convey
Revealed itself in your words today
It beckons me to come out to play
But lingers for you to lead the way

Why don’t you put your plan in motion
And show me your secure devotion
Seduce my mind with romantic notion
Your signal is that magic potion

The theme for this week is:

SIGNS

Hopefully we continue to get lots of contributors. This is a fairly accessible subject, but of course there is no reason to be literal. There are all sorts of different kinds of signs in the world. Maybe the CEO of the William McAlpine Excuse Factory will even grace us with a contribution.

For those who had the same idea that I had, I looked it up. Tesla isn’t touring right now. Darn the luck.  I guess I’ll have to look for another subject that will be “blocking out the scenery, breaking my mind. Do this, don’t do that, can’t you read the sign.”

Sometimes I forget that I cut an impressive figure. Sometimes I forget that when you are 6’3 inches tall and are rippling with muscles, attitude and intensity to spare you can unintentionally strike fear in to the hearts of others.

Back when I was running Campus it was not uncommon for me to cause an employee to burst into tears with just one glare. I was giving the nickname “The Intimidator” by some of my employees.

Stephanie made buttons for most of the employees at Campus. My button said “The Intimidator” and had a picture of a ferocious bear on it. I don’t know the current location of that button, but I tell this story to setup the following.

My final birthday present recently wound up in my mailbox. Stephanie got me a subscription to American Photo. An awesome present, but I worry that she bought me this present because she still fears me a bit. Even if she recently described me as “Former Supervisor, Friend, Mentor” on a recent application. I wonder because of the mailing label on the magazine.

At least the mailman will know not to mess with me.