Putz-ing with the camera around on my train home. Some photos turned out cool, others were mostly blurry and pretty lame. Still had fun! I’ll post the ones I like.

Here are more photos from my dancerBLUEprint project with Carolina Dance Initiative (see post below about Ek Taal). These dancers are part of a hip hop team called “Misconception.” They are fierce!

“Keeping Things Whole” by Mark Strand

In a field

I am the absence

of field.

This is

always the case.

Wherever I am

I am what is missing.

When I walk

I part the air

and always 

the air moves in

to fill the spaces

where my body’s been.

We all have reasons

for moving.

I move

to keep things whole.

For my final project in JOMC 180, I produced the above photo story. The first slide gives a general prologue and I have posted the respective captions below:

1. Bob becomes visibly upset after Robby showed him pictures of his car accident. Bob was on his way to a local methadone clinic when he ran Robby’s jeep into a telephone pole and totaled it. He was sent to the Intensive Care Unit at Baptist Medical Center in Winston Salem but was released a week later. Robby claims that it was his dad who first got him hooked on the opiate pain killer, methadone. He remembers having a headache when he was about 16 and his dad gave him a pill and promised he would feel better. Both of them have had stints in rehab centers in recent years.
2. Robby and Gonga discuss where they will have Christmas this year. They worry, for one, that will there not be enough room for the whole extended family in Gonga’s house, but also that not everyone will want to come because of their disapproval of Robby’s and Bob’s lifestyle choices which have for years caused tension within the family.
3. Gonga scolds Bob for putting salt on an already sodium-packed meal that she has prepared for him. Bob retorts, claiming he knows when enough salt is enough salt.
4. Since her husband passed away in 2009, Gonga spends a lot of time in her room sleeping. She keeps what was his side of the bed made while she sleeps on the other side.
5. A note hangs on Robby’s wall from Gonga. Most days, Robby, Bob, and Gonga stay in. None of them are currently employed and they live off of Bob’s disability checks.
6. Outside the living room hangs a sign that reads, “Pa & Gonga’s Place: Open 24 Hours.” When his Pa, Gonga’s husband and Bob’s dad, passed away from Alzheimer’s in 2009, Gonga moved in with her oldest daughter and Bob lived alone in the house and pulled from disability benefits which he qualifies for based on the Degenerative Disc Disease he has in his back.
7. Bob takes his medication before heading to bed the night he returns home from the hospital.
8. Brooke, the youngest of Pa and Gonga’s grandchildren, plays with a nerf ball in the back yard on Thanksgiving while Robby sips wine and smokes a cigarette.

It has been way too long since I’ve uploaded anything and since I do not currently have time to weed through loads and loads of photos from the past few weeks, I will post a few from what I like to call my “Still-Life Therapy Session Plus Candid Mary.” This is just my fiddling around with a 70-200 lens to take a homework break. The lights look nice, no?! Alright, back to productivity..

Portrait session for my cousins Jimmy & Kim and their beautiful kids.

These are photos I did yesterday for my friend, Karsten, and his band. They are “Iron Will and the Chain Gang.” 

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to photograph some amazing UNC students who are involved with dance on campus. I was beyond thrilled to get to work on this project which combines my first love, dance, with my second, photography.

Carolina Dance Initiative (CDI), formerly known as Just Class, has been working over the past few years to promote dance as an extra-curricular at UNC by providing free student-taught classes and by bringing big name choreographers to host workshops. Additionally, they have been striving to make dance an option for a minor. If students can come to UNC and major or minor in other artistic areas, why can’t they in dance?

Many students at UNC are both academically and artistically talented but because of the school’s heavy academic load, they feel they cannot fully pursue their artistic interests. CDI is working to change that. They hope that by doing these photoshoots with different UNC dance teams, they can prove that the spirit of dance is alive and well on campus, to prove that our artistic presence is just as important as that of studio art students or other performing arts majors such as vocalists and dramatists. Let us show you who we are!

I’m posting a couple of photos from my shoot with Ek Taal, a lively dance team that specializes in a dance style from Southern India. They are stunning models as well as fabulous dancers. I was absolutely enamored by their costumes and makeup. Gorgeous, gorgeous girls. 

Today we had a family reunion in Wilkesboro, NC. My mom, my sister, my cousin and I went up there and ate great food and met up with some long lost relatives!

Then we headed up to Boone and then to Valle Crucis to visit the original Mast General Store and buy some delicious candy. The weather was to die for and the mountain colors were breathtaking. 

I took a lot of pictures but I noticed that I preserved a lot of adorable moments between Brooke (my younger sister) and Anna-Grace (our cousin).

Even though Brooke is 6 months younger and a grade behind Anna-Grace, they are best friends. Our moms are twins so really the two of them have grown up like sisters; it’s so cute. Here are a few samples. I haven’t edited any of these yet. I don’t think I want to!