Category Archives: Photography

Austin (or, “If you can beat them, join them!”)

November 8, 2011 by Jeff C | Comments Off

_JJC7795 Reasoner Kids for Xmas Card.jpg

I’ve watched OU play the Longhorns at least a dozen times. But it’s always in Dallas, so I’d never been to a game in Austin. By happy coincidence, I was in Austin to go to a reception at the law school honoring Robin Gibbs (the founder of my law firm) on the night before a UT/Texas Tech game. Robin had tickets galore, so I got to see my first Longhorn ballgame in Austin. Actually the most striking thing about it was how eerily similar it was to games in Norman — just change the colors.

Notice my hideous orange costume — I was undercover and/or trying to be at least modestly gracious to my burnt orange hosts, who somehow love their ‘horns every bit as much as we love the Sooners (Reminds me of the Police song from the 1980s — “The Russians Love Their Children, Too”.). The “couple” in the stands is a friend and Gibbs & Bruns partner Jeff Kubin, with his sister Jennifer. The happy family pics are the Reasoners; the pretty girl in the picture with me is my goddaughter, Olivia Reasoner. By the way, the Longhorns won the game easily; but the Texas Tech band killed the Orange band.

Cowboy James in Moab

November 6, 2011 by Jeff C | Comments Off

I had a little bit of landscape fatigue after four days at the Moab workshop, so for about 20 minutes I wandered over to the “ranch” next to the lodge where we were staying. I met James, who had worked there as a wrangler/outfitter most of his life. When James isn’t taking Japanese tourists on dude-ranch style outings along the Colorado River, he’s doing the real cowboy work of taking care of the horses. He never stood still, but I got some decent shots.

(Photo nerds: I used an off-camera flash on the ground in a small Lastolite softbox to get a little light up under that hat.)

Moab Photography Workshop

November 5, 2011 by Jeff C | Comments Off

As this site surely implies, in the past year I’ve resumed one of my teen-years hobbies: photography. My skills may not have advanced much in the last 25 years, but the capabilities of modern cameras are indistinguishable from magic.

I was privileged to be a part of the last-ever Digital Landscape Workshop, led by a couple of famous photographers: Moose Peterson and Joe McNally. Google them — or take a look at www.moosepeterson.com or www.joemcnally.com. Those guys rock. And they really know their, uh, stuff. So for 15 hours a day, I tried to soak up as much as I could. As much as anything, I learned that I have much to learn. Here are some of my pictures from the workshop.

_JJC7052 Happy Couple on Double Arch Rocks.jpg

_JJC7088 Girl walking under double arch.jpg

Moose also has an aviation photography website: www.warbirdimages.com. Two other instructors (the longtime right-hand-men for Joe and Moose, respectively, have photography websites at www.drewgurian.com and www.chasingthelight.com.

A few friends from the workshop have their pictures online here, http://www.fifty-twopeople.blogspot.com/ (Dan) and here, http://www.flickr.com/photos/indyfan31/ (Fausto) and here http://www.dbpazianphotography.com/ (Barry). Here’s a picture Fausto took on the last day of the workshop. I’m sure he considers it the masterpiece of his lifetime — attributable primarily to the impromptu model.

Finally, here are “portraits” I took of Moose (with the moustache) and Joe (in glasses). They were kind enough to dedicate a good 20 seconds each to posing for these.

Hidden Canyon – Moab Mountain Biking

October 30, 2011 by Jeff C | Comments Off

I came to Moab primarily for a photo workshop (more to come on that), but of course I brought my mountain bike. It’s Moab, after all (mountain bike mecca). These are just pocket camera pictures — but sometimes equipment quality is less important than LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION. This is a place called “Hidden Canyon.” It’s about a one hour mountain bike ride (over tons of slickrock!) off the road, not too far from the Canyonlands airport. Maybe someday I’ll get a ‘real’ camera up there.

IMG_0523 Bike on Ledge Hidden Canyon Moab.jpg

(Actually, one of these pics — with more trees — is from a trail near downtown Moab). And: (1) Yes, that’s my bike; (2) Yes, I took that picture of myself; (3) Yes, Mother, I know I probably shouldn’t be an hour’s ride into the wilderness by myself.

Alaska with Joyce and J.B.

June 29, 2011 by Jeff C | Comments Off

My first post-retirement priority was to take a trip with my Mom and Dad. Most Alaska tourists apparently spend their time on cruise ships. I had raised this option with my Dad. Predictably, his response to the cruise ship idea included a good bit of profantity and the word “prison.” So we flew to Anchorage in mid-June, rented an SUV, and for two weeks traveled the majority of the relatively-few roads that exist in that section of Alaska.

Along the way, we chartered a small boat for a private glacier cruise, took a horseback ride in the Kenai peninsula, took a ‘flightseeing’ plane trip to McKinley (including a landing on the Glacier), and spent a day on those terrible old school buses that are the only way to actually go into Denali National Park.

If you get off the tourist-beaten path, you can really have the place to yourself. One day, for example, we drove into Wrangell-St. Elias National Park — the largest national park in U.S. at 13 million acres. There are only two roads in, so we picked one and drove 2 hours, which was as far as you could go in a vehicle. In that time, we saw maybe one or two other cars of sightseers. Meanwhile, most of the visitors to Alaska were sharing a boat with 2,000 other tourists, or at best sharing bus with 40. I think my Dad was right.