Costa Rica

On a recent trip to Costa Rica, I was inspired by the absolute beauty of the landscape and flora. The goal of the images was to capture something more unique than the typical vacation photos and create something that could stand-alone as a piece of artwork.

Japan House

Located at the University of Illinois, the Japan House is a large botanical garden in the middle of campus. This shoot was an experiment with a macro lens to capture lighting effects on flowers close up. I attempted to capture a narrow depth of field to emphasize the details in the flowers and distinguish them from the background.

Photojournalism

The goal of these photos was to capture a candid moment of time. They are images that could be used in the local section of a newspaper to accompany a story about community evens. The photos are made to seem as natural as possible whiles still maintaining a professional quality that distinguishes them from snapshots.

Spoon River Drive

These photos were an experiment in trying to create very high contrast black and white images of the local countryside and farmland. They are meant to seem as though they may have been taken decades ago and include the addition of noise and vignettes in the final editing process in order to emphasize that feeling.

Candy and Flowers

This shoot was an attempt to set up a studio lighting type environment. I used a single, directional light source to cast the dark shadows and played with the reflections of the objects off of a mirrored base. The bright colors of the subject matter contrast with the black background and the low light environment to make them stand out.

Starved Rock

One of my favorite summer activities is hiking in the local parks. I always take my camera to see what kind of images I can capture. It gives me the opportunity to practice with the different lighting conditions the sun and weather provide as well as the different skills needed for landscape or macro photography.