Upcoming Adverts

I'm gearing up for the summer wedding season, and as part of that, I'm pleased to announce two new ads that will be running in short order. The first is found in the Bridal Premier magazine published by the Lacrosse (WI) Tribune and the Winona Daily News. The other will run in the Weddings North magazine published by the Brainerd Dispatch. Additionally, Weddings North will feature photos from the Johnson/Pettis wedding that I shot on New Years Eve on the cover and front page.

Both Winona and Brainerd are great areas and I enjoy working in them a great deal - if you're getting married in either Brainerd or Winona I'd love to talk with you about your big day.

I'll only post the Bridal Premier ad for now, but check back to see the other - and more! Thanks, John.

Tools of the Trade v1.0

Happy Tuesday evening everyone. Today was filled with filling orders (hah! funny!) and catching up on some routine tasks - not the most exciting, but I'd rather be doing busy work for myself than someone else. Which reminds me - I heard a saying a while back that I find pretty funny after having just finished my first full year of self-employment. It goes something like this:

'Being self-employed is working 80 hours a week for yourself so you don't have to work 40 for someone else.'


Ok, Ok, so I don't work 80 hours a week very often, but it still rings true. I thought I'd post the Tools of the Trade poster that I did for the Sandstone Ice Festival, I'm going to start working on the next one soon - I'm thinking about doing an equestrian themed piece or possibly an homage to fixed gear bikes - we'll see.

I'll post larger views of each shot so you can check them out better. I used a technique called light painting, which I've been playing with after learning about the discipline on Dave Black's website - he's a hero of mine - he shoots sports like no one else.








Well, that's enough for tonight - Ha det bra!
John.

A few more things...

I ran out of steam while writing my last post, so I figured I'd fill you all in on a few more developments now that I've got a few spare minutes.


I'm happy to announce that The Lake Country Journal, a very nicely produced magazine from the Brainerd Lakes area featured some of my work in the January/February issue. In fact, they chose to run a shot of Aaron Sales (Slingshot Kites) on the cover as well as a really nice two page spread of local-boy Nathan Borer, followed by two more pages including photos of several more local heros including Tighe Belden of Lakawa.com. Vivian Clark wrote a nice piece to accompany the photos...or maybe the other way around... Check it out if you get the chance.

I'm looking forward to my upcoming trip out to Colorado in a couple of weeks - it's a pleasure trip, but I may see if I can hook up with some of the Colorado kiters for a day of shooting - I haven't gotten to shoot enough kiting yet this winter and it would be great to shoot in the mountains. Let's hope for the remainder of the winter to be full of sun, snow and good times on the ice.

Well, I figure that's enough for now. Bom dia!

I'm back...

Greetings all,

Yes, it's true - it's been two months since I last posted an update - shame on me. I had a nice holiday season, not too busy, lots of family and friends and even a bit of work to fill the hours.

I'll list a few of the projects I've been working on since my last post, starting with participating in the first annual Sandstone Ice Festival. Local climber (and photographer) Tony Vavricka took the bull by the horns and oganized the festival, which I was happy to help sponsor. The event was a two-day celebration of MN ice climbing, held at Robinson Park in Sandstone, MN. The park is a former quarry and has just been officially opened to climbing by the city after the great efforts of Tony, the Minnesota Climbers Association and many others. The people of Sandstone were gracious hosts, providing great hospitality, food and even fireworks for the festival-goers. I can't wait for Next year's event...

Here's a shot of Andrew Mears, Minneapolis resident and Midwest Mountaineering's ace whitewater canoeist, show how he handles frozen water.



As part of my sponsorship for the event, I donated two limited edition 'art prints' from my new series Tools of the Trade which are detail shots of the equipment used in various different sporting pursuits. The ice climbing prints (which I'll post soon) are the first in what I hope will be a series that includes many sports. If you are interested in ordering a print of this poster, please send me an email for more details.

On New Years Eve, I had the priveledge to photographing the wedding of Tena Johson and Preston Pettis in the Brainerd lakes Area. Tena planned a great wedding, complete with flowers from Petals and Beans in Nisswa and a make your own Fajita bar at Piney Ridge Lodge near Pine River. I really enjoyed her bold choice of hot pink as the accent color - nice! Here's a few shots:







That'll do it for me now - I'll post more recent stuff in the very near future. Thanks for checking in.

John.