Tag: san francisco

Rachel and Joe’s Annapolis Wedding

What an epic day! I’ve known Joseph for over fourteen years – we met just before I moved to San Francisco, he’s since moved to Prague, and then to Amsterdam with his lovely wife, Rachel. This was actually their third wedding – they had a catholic ceremony in the UK, and a smaller ceremony in Amsterdam. That’s one way to get a lot of use out of a wedding dress! I’m honored they chose me as their photographer for the stateside ceremony, and I’m so happy for both of them.

Click for the rest of Rachel and Joe’s lovely wedding day…

Continue reading “Rachel and Joe’s Annapolis Wedding”

Star St. Germain in Alamo Square

I know, I keep doing these shoots in the same park. But the light, it’s been so perfect! The weather, so lovely!

As previewed earlier, Star is an exceptional artist, a delight to photograph, and even more charming in person than any lens can capture. Although it certainly won’t keep us photographers from making the attempt.

click below for more…
Continue reading “Star St. Germain in Alamo Square”

Star St.Germain

I’m off to shoot a wedding among the beautiful redwoods of Mendocino this weekend, but I’ll leave you with a teaser of a portrait set I shot with insanely talented artist Star. I’ve been a big fan of Star’s artwork and design for a long time, she’s recently begun producing music as well with her band ‘This Can’t End Well’. Check out their latest music video, directed by another photographer/video producer acquaintance, Chad Michael Ward. (His site may not be safe for work!)

Why Not? Putting A Holga Lens On A DSLR

A few months back I was catching up on boingboing.net and came upon this post about putting a low-fi plastic camera ‘lens’ on a digital camera. I’ve used a Holga for years as a fun carry around medium format camera, although due to costs and lack of time to spend in the darkroom, digital has become my go-to solution. It has occurred to me to hack up a way to attach the Holga lens to my camera, but I’m not terribly handy with these kinds of things. I love the look of the soft focus and natural vignette you get, as well as the uncertain results.

Recently, David and I took a hike around the Pt. Reyes area, and I brought along my trusty old Canon 20D loaded up with this Holga lens to play around with. The results are not displeasing! Not sure I’d ever use this on a gig, but it’s kind of fun to recharge my creative batteries by not thinking about f-stop or perfect focus.

One of the most photographed bridges in the world, apparently.

Ice plants along the coast, in bloom.

The hills are filled with naturalized Iris flowers. It’s astoundingly beautiful.

Holga lenses are available for both Canon and Nikon cameras, available for a mere $25 from HolgaDirect. Pick one up! I’m having a lot of fun with mine.

Tattoo Story – Cindy Emch

Cindy Emch aka Emchy is an accordion player, poet and pop culture dork. She has three bands and you can learn all about them and her writing on her home page.

This tattoo was gotten for my wife on our anniversary. Always superstitious, I modified the grammar to read Love for the Life – incorporating a double meaning of love for life, and love for The Life – referencing the queer life. This to me makes it both universal and specific for who I am and who the tattoo was for. This tattoo was done by Mikal Gilmore at Black & Blue Tattoo in the Mission in San Francisco.

Wrist Stars
These were done by a friend who was just learning how to ink, they were her 3rd tattoo on actual human skin. They mark a moment where I chose to lead my life with more active choices and not just let life happen to me. These were done by Mikal Gilmore in a kitchen in an apartment in Noe Valley in San Francisco.

Grandparents Crest
This tattoo was specifically for my grandparents. I got it a couple of weeks after my grandmother had died. The heart with antlers represents the fact that I come from a family of hunters. The birds are my grandfather and grandmother’s favorite birds respectively. The acorns are a Michigan Red Oak and California Live Oak to represent where I am from and where I make home now. The stars number the months in a year. This is actually my favorite piece that I currently have. This tattoo was done by Scott Silvia at Black Heart Tattoo in the Mission in San Francisco.

Willem the spider was my first tattoo. Done in a closet made up to be a tattoo studio in the lower haight district of San Francisco, the image comes from the Lenore comic drawn by Roman Dirge. I had this image taped to my computer monitor of my day job for over a year before getting the ink done. I found the image charming and see Willem the spider as my protector. Willem was never named in the original comic strip, instead I named him based on a song from the Tom Waits / William Burroughs opera The Black Rider.

When I turned 30 I started taking my writing and my spoken word seriously. This was to remind me of who I am, and who I have been since I started writing poetry at age 7. This tattoo was done by Mikal Gilmore at Black & Blue Tattoo in the Mission in San Francisco.

Jamaica Dyer In Alamo Square Park

Sometimes everything just comes together, the weather, the location, and the model. This started out a simple headshot session but we decided to push it further and headed into the park to enjoy the perfect spring day. Believe it or not, this whole shoot only took about an hour.


Jamaica’s an extremely talented artist, and a longtime friend. We’ve begun collaborating on a super secret project, more about that as it develops.

Did Someone Say Romantic?

Oh Valentine’s day. What a strange holiday. I approve of what it symbolizes, but dislike the commercialization and pressure on certain members of a couple to ante up some kind of gesture representing their devotion.

It can be hard to be single, and happily so, in a world which emphasizes partnering up. As grateful as I am for my current relationship, I would never trade away the independence and self knowledge I gained from years of being on my own.

My partner and I don’t celebrate Valentine’s day, so these are absolutely not in any way Valentine’s day flowers. I just happened to walk past Prairie Collective on Divisadaro street and noticed that Studio Choo had put out a fresh batch of little bouquets. In my opinion, there’s never just one day to buy someone flowers – and don’t forget to get yourself something romantic once in a while.