PIX Feed LA

Magnum IdeasTap Photographic Award 2013

Tue, 21 May 2013 10:00:32 -0700

The Magnum IdeasTap Photographic Award is the ultimate in photographic competitions, offering three winners £5,000 in prize money, £1,500 project funding, mentoring from Magnum photographers, staff and industry professionals and paid internships at Magnum’s offices in London or New York.

Now in its fourth year, The 2013 Photographic Award is bigger than ever, including a brand new over 30’s age category and mentoring sessions for alumni winners past and present.

Magnum Photos and IdeasTap are committed to supporting the new generation of visual story-tellers. We want to find brilliant image-makers who take creative, striking photographs that demonstrate photographic skill and understanding. There are five available submission themes; Journey, Human relationships, Climate, Conflict and Memory, which will be judged on talent, innovation, technique and interpretation of the brief.

Applications are open via IdeasTap until 31st May and the shortlisted eighteen photographers will be announced in early July 2013. Over 6 weeks the shortlisted individuals will develop their projects alongside a Magnum photographer, before submitting a selection for an exhibition with a written concept for their ‘dream project’. In September 2013 they will be cut to just nine photographers, who will pursue their dream projects and go on to compete for overall age category winners. The final competition submission includes photographic, written and multimedia elements to encourage the development of different means of storytelling.

Winners are announced March 2014.

Get more info HERE

Support Venice Arts When You Dine Out!

Thu, 16 May 2013 10:00:17 -0700

You can make a big difference in a low-income child’s life this summer by helping send them to Venice Arts’ Media Arts Camp, held during the month of July. Help us reach our goal of $900, which enables three kids to enjoy a full week of creative, challenging and inspiring art classes!You can make a big difference in a low-income child’s life this summer by helping send them to Venice Arts’ Media Arts Camp, held during the month of July. Help us reach our goal of $900, which enables three kids to enjoy a full week of creative, challenging and inspiring art classes!

Just Click Here

33rd Annual Spring Photography Contest sponsored by SIGMA

Tue, 14 May 2013 11:05:21 -0700

Check out this awesome Contest from PF Magazine. Who doesn’t like some extra cash in their pocket and being published in a magazine?

FIRST PLACE GRAND PRIZE
$2,000 cash award from Photographer’s ForumPLUS…

Sigma 35mm 1.4 DG HSM lens
(MSRP $1,400)
Anderson Ranch photo workshop
($2,000 value)

SECOND PLACE
$1,500 cash award from Photographer’s ForumPLUS…

Sigma 18-250mm lens (MSRP $800)
CRU Tough Tech Duo handheld RAID storage device (MSRP $579)

THIRD PLACE
$1,000 cash award from Photographer’s ForumPLUS…

Manfrotto 055XPROB Pro tripod and 498RC2 head. (MSRP $468)

FOURTH PLACE
Five $125 cash awards

100 HONORABLE MENTIONS
All Honorable Mentions will be listed in the November 2013 issue of Photographer’s Forummagazine and will receive a gold embossed certificate of outstanding merit fromPhotographer’s Forum.

PARTICIPATION GIFT All entrants from the U.S. and Canada receive 2 FREE ISSUES ofPhotographer’s Forum.

LAST CHANCE to see Paris Photo!

Sun, 28 Apr 2013 10:13:33 -0700

Today is the last day to check out Paris Photo at Paramount Picture Studios! The exhibitors are set up on two sound stages and throughout the New York City backlot. Go check out some great work; here are some highlights I saw at the show!

You can purchase tickets in advance HERE or at the door.

We even ran into an old friend of Pix, Miss Tierney Gearon

Photographer's Forum 33rd Anual Spring Photo Contest

Tue, 09 Apr 2013 12:53:38 -0700

Photographer’s Forum is having their 33rd anual Spring Photo Contest. Thousands of dollars in cash money prizes as well as a chance to be featured in their upcoming magazine. You best enter right away!

First deadline is April 15th with a registration fee of $4.95

Second deadline is May 13th with a registration fee of $5.95.

CLICK HERE for the dets!

Tachen Magazine App

Fri, 05 Apr 2013 14:23:05 -0700

I love Tachen books! I have 4! … and counting… So I was super excited to hear there is now a Tachen Magazine App. .. Can someone say freckin’ awesome? Yes, yes, I can :)

Click here and get this app right now!

Developing Change: Photography With a Humanitarian Focus A Fundraising Exhibition

Tue, 02 Apr 2013 12:51:27 -0700

I recently got an email from the peeps over at drkrm, letting me know about this crazy awesome exhibit opening April 20th. It’s dedicated purely towards the fundraising of the 11 NGO and NPO featured to promote change, viable living, and humanitarian pursuits. All with the use of photography.

This is an excellent chance to use our passions to insite positive change in the world. Go get more info: Here

I BETTER SEE EVERY LAST ONE OF YOU THERE!

MOPLA MOPLA MOPLA!

Fri, 29 Mar 2013 15:29:13 -0700

Get ready for a Month of Photography in Los Angeles! It’s that exciting time of year where students, emerging greats, and time-tested masters celebrate creativity in our diverse and expansive photo community.

There are so many events going on my head is spinning. Exhibitions, Book Signings, Galleries, Worthshops— Holy Cow!

Opening night was March 5th, but let me tell you there is still so much going on.

Including, tonight’s Women Make the World go Round. Starting at 5:30pm in Santa Monica: Click Here for dets.

Tomorrow night has 2 awesome events going on! One Shot: Spaces - Inside, Outside, The Space Between and Verge: Five Los Angeles Photographers on the Verge. Click Here

Go check out their website in case you’ve been living under a rock and haven’t had a chance to hear about these awesome going on’s

CLICK HERE

Zombie Bunny wants to let everyone know we’ll be closed...

Tue, 26 Mar 2013 15:17:29 -0700

Zombie Bunny wants to let everyone know we’ll be closed Easter Sunday with normal business hours Saturday, and Monday.

ADC Young Guns @ Apple Store Santa Monica: Tamar Levine

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 12:24:13 -0700

Our very own, beloved, Tamar Levine will be in the Santa Monica Apple store TOMORROW NIGHT from 7:30-8:30. Primarily a fashion, portait, and fine art photographer, she’ll be discussing the use of light and how it shapes emotion in photographs.

Did I mention it’s free??

Look forward to seeing you all there!

More dets: Here

Palm Springs Photo Festival Apirl 28th-May 3rd

Sat, 09 Mar 2013 10:00:17 -0800

It’s that time of year again! It’s time for the Palm Springs Photo Festival! Workshops, seminars, portfilio review, and so much more! This is a must for emerging semi-pros and professionals a like. They exhibit all the latest gear, critiques for your work, and offer great opportunities to network with the movies and shakers of the Los Angeles photo community.

You can even sign up to be an intern/volunteer. Applications are due by March 25th. Click here.

There is also a NO FEE contest you can enter. Click here.

For more information and registration, head to their website. Click here.

Have fun to and hope to see you there!

Medium Format Pinhole Camera

Sun, 03 Mar 2013 12:54:06 -0800

Who doesn’t love medium format? Someone crazy, that’s who. All lame jokes aside… I’ve often found myself wishing I had more opportunities to shoot 120 film, but acquiring the body, lens, film magazines, ect… well that stuff isn’t cheap.

That’s why, when I stumbled upon this Kick Start Page, I nearly flipped a gasket. What a clever, and interesting project to take on. Create your own medium format camera at home, complete with it’s own unique personality of dust, light leaks and fog.

Kelly Angood, the creator of the project, got the idea while still in school and from there it blew up. What started out as something fun and simple for herself grabbed the imagination of the world over. She quickly designed a 35mm version that is downloadable on her website. It can be constructed with Every day things you find at home.

Now The 120 Pinhole Project wants to go back to the original design and create packaged kits so that everyone knows the joy of 120 film. All a matter of time before Urban Outfitters picks this up. (haha)

Stop by her kickstarted page and check it out! —> Here

I was lucky enough to email Colin Gray. I had a few questions...

Tue, 08 Jan 2013 12:30:00 -0800

I was lucky enough to email Colin Gray. I had a few questions for him after

I saw his images from Sandy in Wired Magazine.

PIXFEEDLA: What City do you reside in?

Colin D Gray: I currently live in Chelsea in Manhattan. It is a beautiful area to live and close to everything and I can walk to work which is amazing.

PIXFEEDLA: Where did you grow up?

Colin D Gray: I was an Army Brat so moved around a decent bit. North Carolina to Virginia to California to Hong Kong to New York to Virginia again, then down to Savannah to go to school. I spent the majority of grade school in Northern Virginia, right outside of DC. I consider Savannah, GA home though. My parents live there now and a lot of my best friends still live there.

PIXFEEDLA: When did you decide to photograph?

Colin D Gray: When I first when to SCAD I was planning on majoring in Film & Video and a minor in Computer Art. One of the required classes for Film students was Intro to Photography. The teacher was very encouraging and I really liked the photos that I made in that class so I kept taking photo classes. By my junior year I decided to do Photography as my major. Ive been doing it ever since

PIXFEEDLA: What are your favorite tools?

Colin D Gray: I use a Canon 5D 2. I love that camera. Someday Ill get the 3 but prob not anytime soon. For studio portraits I always use a beauty dish as my main light, and usually my only light. Ive simplified quite a lot since living in new york and try not to use too much equipment.

PIXFEEDLA: Hurricane Sandy shots?

Colin D Gray: That one was of the coolest shooting opportunities i could imagine. I just went out to shoot because i knew that i had to. I ended up staying up all night. I wasnt sure what the shots would be for, but hoped that they could get seen. By the end of the week i had a gallery up on my website, and shared the link on facebook, but that was about it. A few weeks later i contacted Jakob Schiller who writes for Wired’s webpage. I had seen a few other posts he had done and really like the work so shared my pics with him. We talked on the phone for a while and the following week they featured the images on their site. It was super awesome. I would still love to get them out there even more. I always thought it would be great to do a print sale of the images to raise money for some of the people that lost so much during the hurricane.

PIXFEEDLA:Portraits?

Colin D Gray:I like my landscape work but it is more of a personal record of the places that I go exploring. My portraits are what im most proud of. Ive been working for Vh1 and MTV for the last year and have gotten to shoot so many cool people in such a short amount of time. Ive always wanted to do portraits of celebs and musicians and this job as given me that opportunity. For the first few years in NYC i assisted Victoria Will who is an awesome celeb portrait photographer and got to learn a lot from working with her. The shoots go sooooo quickly which is actually a fun challenge. Now I can get a good shot super quick. I usually dont need more that 5 minutes, and many times i only have a minute or so. Another project i have loved working on for MTV is shooting at the NYC Comic Con. We bring the coolest costumed people into our makeshift studio and get cool shots of them for the website.

PIXFEEDLA: 5 Years?

Colin D Gray: 5 years from now i will most likely still be in NYC. I miss Savannah and I’d also love to live in California at some point, but for now I am going to stay in NYC for my career. I really love working at MTV, and like having a set schedule there and working around a lot of people. So I would like to work there for a while. Sometime soon though I need to get a rep who can promote my work more and deal with scheduling and pricing and all the business of photography which i really dont enjoy. At some point I would love to shoot for major magazines like Vogue, W, Esquire, Wired.. etc. Ive also never had a gallery show with my photos, so that would be awesome. Im also getting back into shooting video. And I do a lot of collage work. So i guess in 5 years i would like to be doing what I’m doing now, just on a somewhat bigger scale and hopefully making enough money that I’m not living check to check.

To see more of Colin’s Work Please Visit I<3ColinGray .com

Tis The Season for fun Holiday Photos by Hugh Turvey You can...

Thu, 20 Dec 2012 14:37:34 -0800

Tis The Season for fun Holiday Photos by Hugh Turvey

You can see more of his work here

Over the past week I was able to touch base with PIX customer UK...

Mon, 29 Oct 2012 08:26:54 -0700

Jimi Hendrix ©MicahelBerkofsky

USCHI OBERMAIER ©Michael Berkofsky

Over the past week I was able to touch base with PIX customer UK Born photographer Michael Berkofsky. He took some time to answer a few questions for us!

PIXFEEDLA:When did you first begin to taking your photography seriously and decide to push yourself and turn it into a profession?

MBERKOFSKY:When I was 16, Princess Margaret was engaged to society photographer Anthony Armstrong-Jones. I saw Tony’s great pictures in huge spreads in the The Daily Mirror. They were inspirational. I wanted to be a photographer from day one. I had no back up plan though my fiancé’s father wanted me to drive a London cab. I got an apprenticeship as a darkroom printer the summer of 1960 when I was 16 in London’s East End.

Every day I dreamed of being a better printer, a top printer in the West End and one day soon, a photographer, a fashion photographer. I learnt most of my photography from a 1950’s Ilford Manual. The rest from printing for some photographers who knew what they were doing and working wonders for others who didn’t.

PIXFEEDLA: Since you have been photographing what trend have you seen repeat itself?

MBERKOFSKY:Everything comes and goes and comes back. Even direct flash.

PIXFEEDLA: Do you feel that a photographer can successfully be in both stills and the motion world?

MBERKOFSKY:My American producers told me to not even to mention to the ad agencies that I was a photographer. (1985) In Europe especially France it’s OK. I’m talking about TV Commercials. Many photographers shoot beauty and cosmetics for TV commercials

PIXFEEDLA: What is your favorite thing about the image of Jimi Hendrix? Can you tell me a little bit about the time you spent with him that day?

MBERKOFSKY:Jimi had ‘Hey Joe’ at no. 34 in the UK charts January 1967. I had just heard the record on the radio. Rave magazine asked me if I could shoot it in 20 minutes. Jimi wore a very stong perfume (Petunia)

He was 24, I was 22. He was polite, shy and throught the lens he was serene. The magazine mad a hash of the reproduction -on cheap paper. I kept only 1 frame of 6x6 Ektachrome - shot on a Hasselblad.

The magazine lost the the rest of the film as well as the whole of their ’60s Rock collection including early Beatles and Stones pictures in a flood and ate by rats. I lost / mislaid my one frame and searched for it for 40 years and it was found it in a 35mm plastic holder in my old assistants garage in Santa Monica, only just salvageable in 2010.

PIXFEEDLA: Can you give aspiring Photographers tips on making their photography into a profession?

MBERKOFSKY:Don’t go to college. Get a job as a 3rd assistant, make tea or coffee, whatever it takes to learn from a professional not a school teacher.

What Film and Photo Colleges don’t tell you.

1 There are no paid jobs in the Film or Stills business - it’s all freelance.

2 A BFA or MFA will not get you a job as a Film maker or Photographer. You have to set up your own production company
and show your work folio to get jobs. You will need to know how to compete for jobs - something you probably won’t be taught.

3 Production Company’s do not like students.

4 Colleges are plagued by tenured teachers they can’t get rid of. These people have been away from the business so long
they are out of date. New professionals wanting to teach are kept out.

5 Many teachers were taught by other teachers and have no experience in the field.
Some teach from for example from The American Cinematographers Manual that you can buy for $25.

6 Almost all Colleges and their tenured teachers believe you have to make a 25 minute film to become a film director.
Most tenured teachers hate TV Commercials and the Web. They do not believe that Movie directors like Spike Jonz, David Fincher, Tarsem Singh, Michael Bay, Ridley and my friend the late Tony Scott were all TV Commercial and Video Directors.

I would like to thank Michael Berkofsky for his time.

To see more of his work visit www.MichaelBerkofsky.com

Photogrpaher: Jonathan Weiner Born in: Baltimore, MD Lives...

Tue, 25 Sep 2012 13:20:00 -0700

AP/Jonathan Weiner

Photogrpaher: Jonathan Weiner

Born in: Baltimore, MD

Lives in: Echo Park (Los Angeles), CA
Photographs: Portraits, Music and Entertainment

Pixfeedla :When did you start playing with photography?

Jweiner: My first camera was as a freshman in highschool. A Pentax K1000, I was 14 I believe. I learned to shoot film and process in the darkroom. I honestly never put it down once I started.

Pixfeedla: What was the first assignment you were nervous and excited for?

Jweiner: To be completely honest, I am nervous and excited for every assignment I ever have, in the past and still to this day. I feel if you aren’t nervous to some extent, then it means you do not care about the outcome. There is a lot riding on my shoulders, my vision being what everybody is banking on coming to light.

I’d say my first cover shoot would be a good choice for this example. I was sent to NYC to shoot New Found Glory for a cover story with 10 page feature. At the time I was still assisting larger photographers on a regular basis. This was the first time I was being sent somewhere on somebody else’s dime to shoot my own stuff. Having to find locations, gear, studios, ect when on the other side of the country is a daunting task. Then realizing that an entire magazine is banking on your vision. It is quite exciting and terrifying all the same.

Every shoot, large or small, I normally stay up the night before going over every detail in my head. When I don’t feel that anxiety before a shoot, that’s when I’m really going to be nervous.

Pixfeedla: Where do you see your work heading? (this is general, are you sticking

to music?)

Jweiner: I love music, there is a reason that I am in that world. It’s what I know, it makes sense to me. Photography wise, my favorite thing about photographing people is the ability to pull personalities out of them in a way others may never see. I plan on continuing in music, as well as expanding to more entertainment/personality fields in the future. As long as I’m making a living making art, I am well ahead of the curve.

Click here to see more of Jonathan Weiners work

Click here to check out AP Magazines latest

Who would of ever thought that a hipstamitc camera phone image...

Tue, 11 Sep 2012 16:22:43 -0700

Who would of ever thought that a hipstamitc camera phone image could be transfered to a tangible polaroid? The impossible Project is ahead of the game and already has the ball rolling to create an updated version of an older process to the masses. The original polaroid transfer utilizes slide film or negative film, Polaroid and a Daylab. Which is still available to purchase and specific instructions for various methods are available here.

The ICON :www.iconla.com: @theiconLA I had a chance to talk...

Sun, 12 Aug 2012 12:36:00 -0700

The ICON :www.iconla.com: @theiconLA

I had a chance to talk to both LA artist here is what they had to say.

Joe Schmelzer:http://www.joeschmelzer.com/: @treasurbite

PixFeedLA: When did photography become apart of your career path?

Joe S: I pretty much knew I was going to be a photographer - after taking a photo class in junior high school. It all just clicked, and than that is the path that I chose and pursued. I then went on to earn by BFA at Rochester Institute of Technology (where I actually met David Vincent Wolf - who is doing the show with me.) So we have known each other over 20 years, then I also earned by MFA at California Institute of the Arts.

PixFeedLA:I hear you have a show coming up at the Icon in LA on the 18th. Does the work your show mirror your commercial work or is it more for a personal endeavor?

Joe S: The work in the show - at least my portion - is all new work - produced only this year (2012). I wouldn’t say it mirrors my commercial work - it is definitely more personal and quirky - which much more mirrors my personal work of the past. Many images were taken on the side on some travel assignments - but I think in the end the work definitely feels more autobiographical to me - but maintaining the compositional and color aspects of my personal work - and certainly the use of natural light and natural - if not, banal moments.

PixFeedLA: Tell me about your process in putting together a body of work.

Joe S: Putting together and editing work is just as much of the process as actually making the photographs. I guess I always have strived to make my personal work feel like some sort of non-linear narrative - with clues and moments of my life. Its always hard to know which pictures to show and how to present them - but it just works like a puzzle - and I keep shifting and changing them until it comes to together and feels right. The big difference is that without a client to please - all the ideas have to come from within - and as with most artists - am my own worst enemy and critic. Certainly will be interesting to see the response.

David Vincent Wolf: www.davidvincentwolf.com/:@allofthisforyou

PixFeedLA: When did photography become apart of your career path?

David VW: Photography has always been a part of my life, so it’s hard to say, really.

I started taking pictures when I was around 8 or 9. My dad gave me his old Yashica 126, and I set up still-lifes in the backyard using things I had collected.

The first elective I took in high school was Graphic Arts because I knew it was the earliest I could get my hands on a camera. I was fortunate enough to have an incredible photography teacher in high school, who encouraged me to experiment…. I ended up making prints in the darkroom using acetate overlays with original handwritten poetry on them to mask areas of the prints I was making…. For years, I’d think back on them and cringe, but now I realize how privileged I was to be able to do such a thing, and be encouraged in the process. I’d give nearly anything to see them again.

My oldest memories are tied to Polaroids my mom keeps in a shoebox…. I literally can’t remember anything before those pictures.

Through the years, every job I’ve held has had a photography component in varying degrees. Shooting, art directing, art buying… I’ve kind of done it all.

It will sound morbid to some - but I hope to photograph from my deathbed!

PixFeedLA:I hear you have a show coming up at the Icon in LA on the 18th. Does the work your show mirror your commercial work or is it more for a personal endeavor?

David VW: My commercial work is different than the work in the show - but mostly because it comes from a completely different place.

There are definite crossovers between the two, but ultimately, commercial work just isn’t as “pure” as fine art, because it has to serve a larger goal, which is: to make people buy shit.

When working for a client, my task is to give them what they need, and assuming a best case scenario: I get to do my thing.
With my personal work, I am free to do whatever I like…. so, I’m showing the work I love to make, in the hopes that I get hired to do “my thing,” as idiosyncratic as it may be.

Anyone with half a brain can throw someone in front of a seamless and shoot them… I’m not interested in making easy photographs.

PixFeedLA: Tell me about your process in putting together a body of work.

David VW: I’ve been thinking a lot about this lately, and here’s is where I’m at:

I believe that beyond a certain level of technical proficiency, photography is nothing more than editing. When I shoot, I am cutting things away, and hopefully, what remains are moments of truth and beauty. That probably sounds ridiculous, but it’s how I genuinely feel.

I haven’t exhibited in Los Angeles before, so I wasn’t sure if I wanted to show a single body of work, or show selections from several projects. I eventually opted for the latter in the hopes that it speaks to a larger audience. I picked some of my favorites over the past few years and used them as anchors, building the rest of the show around them.

My photographs let me say what my words can not. The best result I can hope for is that my work, in some small way, speaks to someone.

**I would like to thank both Joe and David for their time. I hope to see you all there!!!

Definitely a documentary to check out. Beauty is Embarrasing...

Sun, 05 Aug 2012 11:48:00 -0700

Definitely a documentary to check out. Beauty is Embarrasing will be premiering theatrically at the new Sundance Cinema in West Hollywood, 9/7 - 9/13.

http://beautyisembarrassing.com

WIth Beauty Is Embarrassing, a documentary about his career opening in theaters this September, we spoke with Wayne White about creating the look ofPee-wee’s Playhouse, New York in the 1980s, and why freedom is oxygen to an artist. Via

“So when people ask me what it has been like making this movie, the first thing I tell

them is that it has been the time of my life. I hope audiences get that sense of joy that

Wayne has about what he does everyday. That’s the lesson I learned from him…spend

every day doing work that makes you happy. That’s what I’ve been doing for the past

three years, and I can’t wait for everyone to see what I’ve been up to.”

Neil Berkeley, Los Angeles CA

via All images created by Andreas Franke. To see more of his...

Thu, 26 Jul 2012 09:52:23 -0700

via

All images created by Andreas Franke. To see more of his work please visit

http://www.staudinger-franke.com/