Bryce Duffy

I did a week long shoot at the Toronto International Film Festival a few years ago and I got a lot of really great portraits but what I keep coming back to is this board of polaroids that I sent to the lab as color reference and that has been taped up in my office ever since.  There's something about each of these frames of these actors that was captured on polaroid but not on the film.  I got great shots of them on film, but something is different in these polaroids.  I'm not sure what exactly it is that sets these images apart from the "official" shoot.  Maybe it was the fact that we all knew we were shooting polaroids and that put the subject at ease and that's what you're seeing?  I know a lot of photographers can relate to having something on a polaroid that you don't have on film.  You always tell yourself you don't want that to happen.  But it does. This doesn't really relate to shooting digitally because when you're shooting digital your "polaroids" are the same as your finals (they're files, after all). 

Actually he does, he's an awesome surfer, but that's another story.  We're in Texas working on a job right now and I couldn't help but think of Apocalypse Now as we were flying over the desert countryside with the doors wide open and shooting out of this Vientam era Bell UH-1H "Huey" helicopter today.  The pilot who took us up has a collection of 4 absolutely pristine restored choppers from the era.  Definitely a once in a lifetime experience.  I can't even imagine what it would have been like if people were shooting at us and I'm glad I've never had to find out.

Had an opportunity to shoot Jeffrey Katzenberg at Dreamworks a couple of weeks ago for Bloomberg Businessweek.  David Carthas and the rest of the photo department have been dong an awesome job with the re-designed magazine.  I find myself picking it up at newsstands when I'm passing through airports now as it's a great read.  I had a feeling that our meeting with Mr. Katzenberg was going to be intense and I was right.  We were fighting all kinds of logistical challenges with the location, trying to set up what was essentially a fairly intricate studio lighting scenario in a not ideal location and were getting closer and closer to our call time with the subject.  We made the last lighting tweak seconds before Jeffrey appeared exactly (to the minute) at the time that I was told he'd be ready.  He walked into the "studio" that we had built in an empty corner of the backlot (actually a large outdoor patio) and sat down right in the middle of the set.  It took a bit to connect with him and get him to not break into his stock "photo smile" but we talked about Malibu a bit and that loosened him up and then I got him actually laughing about something (an ridiculous idea for an animated movie) and then things were looking up.  What I really was looking for, though, was a rather serious portrait.  This is one of my favorite.

Very shortly after I shot this frame Jeffrey said "ok, locked and loaded" and I knew what that meant.  I put the camera down, shook his hand and told him I'd see him at the beach, and he walked off the set.  Total elapsed time?  About 8 minutes.

Did a killer shoot with Alex Varkatvas from the band Atreyu for one my (favorite) regular clients not too long ago and just found out that the story isn't going to end up running.  It's a little known fact for those outside of the magazine world that this kind of thing happens from time to time.  At some publications that publish more regularly (ie weekly) and cover timely events it actually happens quite frequently.  Sometimes stories get scooped by other publications (check, that happened to me after a 4 day project I worked on last year) or due to internal decisions at the magazine (such as was the case with this story).  I've been pretty lucky over the years and I haven't had to many shoots get "killed" but it's a real disappointment when you've worked really hard and produced some great pictures and for reasons beyond your control they don't end up making it out there into the world.  So here's a second chance at life for these images.  Alex is a very focused mixed martial arts athlete (as well as frontman for the band) and we spent the day with him at his Ju-Jutsu Dojo and while he went through a work-out with his boxing trainer.  He really opened up to us and gave us access into a private  part of his life and I think that's a big reason why it worked out so well.