SPWF2011 Fashion Pics

Finishing up photos from the 2nd Annual Steampunk World's Fair. All I have left is the designs from Redfield Design.

2nd Annual Steampunk World's Fair

This past weekend was the 2nd Annual Steampunk World's Fair, held at The Crowne Plaza Hotel, in Somerset, NJ. I only attended Saturday and Sunday, skipping out on Friday. There were some setbacks from what I heard, but the convention moved on despite that all! Kudos to the organizers for forging on ahead, like the old railroad workers of times past. If there's an obstacle, either blow it up with dynamite or go around it.

I'm still going through photos, but here's a quick sampling:

Sakura Matsuri

This past weekend was Sakura Matsuri at the Brooklyn Botanical Garden. The weather was great, aside from the lighting constantly changing on Saturday. Lots of people, some great costumes.

Here's some photo highlights!

Dracula's Ball

Went down to Philadelphia this past weekend for Dracula's Ball, featuring Ayria and Angelspit.

Oops! Been Forgetful!

Sorry I've been busy lately, so I haven't updated in a while, but now with the warmer weather approaching (theoretically), things are getting more active!

Did a shoot this past Saturday with one of my friends, Kaitlyn. Here's a shot in infrared with some tweaking in post:

Also covered the "Legends of Synthpop" tour at Rebel NYC for VampireFreaks on Sunday. Here's a pic of De/Vision from the show:

Click Here For More!

Here's a teaser pic from "Fairy Tales" by Geek Girl Productions:

In other news, "Knightmare6" is now officially trademarked! I also recently purchased a Tamron SP AF28-75mm F/2.8 XR Di LD Aspherical (IF) Macro lens, which I'm loving, but it started malfunctioning after a few hundred photos, but luckily I got a replacement in time for "Fairy Tales." So here's the hoping the replacement lens is free of any issues.

formspring.me

Ask anything, whether I answer is a different story. http://formspring.me/knightmare6

Emilie Autumn Overview

The Emilie Autumn concert at the Gramercy Theatre started off pretty late, due to the tour bus breaking down in New Jersey, but it eventually started. The sound and lighting were pretty bad at the venue. I also wasn't near the stage, instead sitting in the seats about two-hundred feet away (thanks to the idiot security guard placing us in the wrong section!) - wish I knew, so I could bring my telescoping lens instead...

Anywho, pics:

Feb. 11th - Emilie Autumn

Just an FYI, I'll be shooting photos at the upcoming Emilie Autumn concert next week (February 11th), at the Blender Theatre in Gramercy (aka Gramercy Theatre).

At least I hope so! You never know if they forget to put your name on the press list...

Really, why?! Everything has a freakin' camera on it nowadays! It annoys me that I need to get permission to shoot, just because I can afford a better camera than some ass using their cellphone to shoot a photo, or worse, video. Damn no-nonsense photo policies that are now outdated!

Infrared Testing

Here's some photos from a photo shoot this past weekend with Alison, as well as a photo from one of the after-show shoots from Brooklyn Indie Market: Steampunk III with Staci, wearing Berit New York and La China Loca.

As you can see, I got to try out my infrared-modded Canon EOS Digital Rebel XTI.

Steampunks In My Car!

Still uploading photos from Brooklyn Indie Market: Steampunk III's fashion show, but I'm done with pics from the Gary Numan concert!

New York Comic Con & Anime Festival

Well, the first mega-convention of New York Comic Con and New York Anime Festival is over! Crazy weekend overall! I ended up missing a few panels due to last minute schedule changes creating a couple of conflicts, while a few other panels were cancelled the last minute. I didn't have any scheduled photo shoots, which was a good thing in the end, I think, since it was so crowded, especially on Saturday.

Overall I just focused on panels and hallway shoots. Still going through photos from Sunday, but Friday and Saturday are now done with.

You can view the photos on my Flickr, but here's a few samples:

Buying Another Camera

So I decided to purchase another Canon Rebel XTI, but with a different body color. I'm going to have this one converted to do infrared and ultraviolet photography. The conversion process is $350 for just infrared, but for an additional $50 I can have it also do ultraviolet, so why the hell not?!!!

I was going to just use my old camera, but I'd rather have a backup in case my Canon 5D Mark II malfunctions.

Speaking of which, I'm still finding issues with the 5D's LCD giving me false readings. I've adjusted the LCD's brightness to match what the photos I get are like on the computer screen, but I still get off-colors and brightness. So for the time being I'm trying to uder-expose shots if possible, until I can see if there's some sort of firmware update.

Taking A Momentary Breath

Photography has been a little bit crazy lately...

I just finished covering the Triton Festival held by Vampirefreaks this past weekend. It basically went from Thursday night to Monday morning. I clubbed on Thursday, since that was the pre-party, but snapped photos like crazy from Friday to Sunday. Sadly due to the conflicting time schedules I never made it to the second annual The Bank Reunion :(

The Triton Festival was great! A lot of bands I liked, as well as some new ones. The only sad thing is I spent a good portion on Saturday night talking to one of the guest performers who sung along on one of the acts for like 15 minutes... however on Monday, I finally recognized her and realized that the woman I was talking to, Miss FD, used to go by the stage name, Frightdoll, and was someone I had loved the music of from years back, so now I'm kicking myself for not having pieced it sooner and taken a pic with her :(

Exhaustion, that's what it is... Really, no joke! Saturday morning I was so tired that I parked my car and didn't realize where I parked when I left my house on Saturday afternoon to go back to the festival. I spent ten minutes walking around trying to remember where I parked my car.

I still have Sunday's photos to go through and upload.

Geek Girl University & Triton Festival

Lots of photos to be taken this week, starting off with Geek Girl University. Nothing like a school-themed burlesque show to kick off the week!

This weekend is the three-day Triton Festival (from VampireFreaks) in Brooklyn (Brighton Beach), followed literally right afterwards by the 2nd Annual The Bank Reunion in Manhattan! There's also a pre-party for Triton Festival in Manhattan, so I'll probably make it to that too, since I scheduled myself to be off on Friday.

Fashion Show Photos Are Up! Strike A Pose!

Photos from the 2nd Annual Sugar & Spikes Rock 'N' Roll Fashion Show at the Knitting Factory|Brooklyn are now up on my Flickr - http://www.flickr.com/knightmare6.

Trademarked? Possibly!

Spent this morning going through the legal jargon of the U.S. Trademark Office to file my trademark claim for "Knightmare6" for section 41 (goods & services). Hopefully it goes well. Using their search engine, I didn't discover anything similar to my claim, so hopefully it'll go well. Just have to wait for them to conduct their own search and then their ruling.

One of the fields on the application asked for earliest usage, so I did a quick Google search and discovered one of my earliest uses of the "Knightmare6" handle was back in June 13th, 2000, on someone's guest book, LOL!

Google search... that bitch be scary sometimes!

Sugar & Spikes

Sorry for the lack of update, but been pretty busy running around. I'm still waiting to hear back from either the Nokia Theatre or Sony Music about getting a photo pass for the upcoming Dir En Grey and Apocalyptica concert next week, unless the venue will just allow DSLR cameras for that showing, as they sometimes do...

Tomorrow night I'll be covering the Sugar & Spikes Fashion Show at The Knitting Factory. Of course this is the Brooklyn location, not the old location in Manhattan. I haven't checked out the new location yet. My friend's band, Hate In The Box, will also be playing, so check them out if you attend!

Also just finishing up some pics from a shoot this past weekend on the sands of Coney Island :)

Saturday Is Done!

Finally finished with the photos from Saturday of AnimeNext! Now onto Sunday's photos!

Aside from that been playing some Transformers: War For Cybertron and Crackdown 2 on my Xbox, when time permits :)

AnimeNext 2010

Sorry for the lack of update, but I've been grinding on photos from AnimeNext since it ended. I took WAAYYY too many photos, LOL.

Saturday was the longest day for me, as I was pretty much shooting non-stop from 6am to 8pm. That's fourteen hours! I also shot two events, the Cosplay Burlesque performances on Friday night, as well as the Hangry & Angry Fashion Show on Saturday. Still unsure of how many shoots I did total, but I had a few no-shows, a few reschedules and a couple of shoots that were added on later. Met a lot of new people, as well as hung out with friends who were there. Ran into a few faces I didn't expect to see. A few people recognized my alias, as soon as I gave them my card, so I'm happy about that! :)

Anywho here's a few teasers with more on my Flickr. Remember, I'm still on Friday's photos!

Just to point out, this was my second time using my Canon 5D Mark II, and after getting the pics back, I can still see I need to do a little more fine-tuning on my end. The LCD of my camera shows the pics to be way brighter than the pics actually are, so I ended up adjusting my F-stops and ISO based on that, which in the end, gave me much darker pics. So now I know, and knowing is half the battle! Yo Joe! ;)

Movie Review: "The Karate Kid" (2010)

Got to check out a special sneak-preview of "The Karate Kid" yesterday from work and I was surprised at it being a pretty good movie. I went into it not hoping for much.

The acting for Jaden wasn't too bad, though at times he came off as a whiny little brat, but then again he's also a lot younger than Ralph Macchio 's character, Daniel, was. I enjoyed his acting for the most part, at least until the end, when a few lines felt forced, but this was after this version's "sweep the leg" moment.

A lot more frenetic, blurred choreography sequences than I was hoping for - mainly used to hide Jaden's lack of martial arts, while he did do many of his own sequences, he's not perfect for having only so much time to train.

I actually enjoyed the music selection for this! I know it's close-minded to think this, but I was seriously expecting a lot more hip-hop, but the movie had more pop and instrumental music than anything else. The few hip-hop/R&B songs were well-chosen, more of the lighter varieties, which I don't mind.

Pacing-wise, there are some slow moments, all during the training sequences. Like any U.S.-produced movie in China, you'll get a lot of scenes depicting the beauty of China's landscapes. I don't think this is primarily the studio's fault, so much as it is for the assistance of China's film commission. Still, it made the movie a little slower and longer in parts that it didn't need to be.

I gave the movie an 8/10 overall.

Also, guess who showed up :P