Dustin Diaz Photography

356/365. The commute — join me on a walk

Yesterday I did a shoot for a friend in the evening, but realized I didn't request permission ahead of time to post any... so that's where that day went.

Anyway, I've had Sublime's Don't push on repeat for what seems like 5 days straight (It's even playing as I type this). Not entirely sure why.... but it's fun to quote it randomly.

In other news, 9 days left. Hell yes.

And if you're wondering what I'm going to do on the 365th day... I still haven't a clue... only in that I've been thinking about it every day since day 1.

Moving right along.... to the important stuff. This shot was a simple setup (all things considered).

setup, camera, strobist info: see here

349/365. Love — be spontaneous

Everyone, meet Megan, Claude, and their Moms. They just got married.

Continuing along with the end of the year favorite photographers, I wanted to call out Maxime Villalonga, a Paris based Photographer from whom I've also gathered much inspiration and has heavily influenced my own photography. Give his work a look and click back a few pages.

strobist: SB-900 @ 1/16 @ 17mm w/ 1/2 CTO thru 50" big mama softbox. front left of frame.

293/365. Hero of Darkness — join the evening

I brought my camera to work this morning in hopes to catch some nice downtownish shots. It was too foggy. So I waited until after work and let what the D3 does best.

Regarding this shot, believe it or not, only took about 5 takes.

However the best part is that you're usually not allowed to do commercial photography in this area, yet I was able to get the security guard to take my setup shot!

Kay. Let's do this...

setup, camera, strobist info: see here

279/365. The Hero of Time — is just a boy

This is Link, The Hero of Time, whom remains one of my all-time fantasy heroes. Over time, I've found many similarities between myself, and this fictional character. Thus the reason my profile avatar has remained unchanged for the last seven years. But for time reasons, I won't go into detail on that stuffs now.

Anyhow, still a day behind and basically need to do another shot tonight before falling asleep (still jet laggin').

and now for lighting geeks...

setup, camera, strobist info: see here

258/365. Meet Mr. Flickr — he's a friendly guy

Kay, so I'm not actually claiming to be Mr. Flickr, but I am wearing my Flickr t-shirt. This shot was taken after at least 20 shots and 5 light adjustments... much past the point of sanity at 1am.

Let's do this...

setup, camera, strobist info: see here

251/365 These are my words — You can see them visually here

It's posts like these that I don't really enjoy, but things must be said again.

Somehow, my work has been awkwardly placed at the center of attention of which became yet another heated debate amongst the strobist community. I normally ignore these, but since my name was attached to it (sigh), I have to say something :/

I received a very kind, unobtrusive message from a moderator letting me know that my photos would no longer be accepted to the strobist pool due to new rules.

This is fine.

Groups grow, rules change, exceptions shouldn't be made for one person.

(side note: i can't believe i'm actually talking about this, my eyes are rolling as i'm typing this)

The fact of the matter is, I'm not going to change my format. I hold the right for my stream to keep photos as photos, and setup shots as setup shots. This way it's easier to discuss each 'separately' — and clearly, it's been working for me, and more importntly, for you. It was my strobist info setup shots that landed me the strobist interview to begin with.

Regarding "'text info' only" posts, I often get confused even reading my own — which is why I started these setup images to begin with because it helped 'me' refer to what the hell I've been doing the whole time.

So, for the end of this story, I'll keep doin' what I'm doin', you just won't find 'em in the massive group pool. And thass cool (really).

Ok, enough with these silly words, let's get on with stuff that's more fun....

setup, camera, strobist info: see here

237/365. San Francisco — in Yerba Buena Park

Yeah, wasn't so creative with the title, so ended up going post card style with it.

This was shot on the way to work (which I rarely do these days). I mainly brought it to try out the HDMI connection to our massive "who knows how many inches" TV in the Twoffice. The display of the images looked beautiful.

Anyhow, no strobist info — just a massive blast from the sky through some soft clouds on the right. Good timing actually :)

Will return to your regular scheduled strobist photos tomorrow. cheers.

230/365. Shiny Happy People ~ R.E.M. — Throw your love around

So it took a day to finally sort things from the Getty incident. Anyone still interested in that can check out that thread.

Anyhow, this toy is a pretty common guy. He rocks out in the sunlight (batteries not included)... so I'm sure he didn't mind me taking photos with the flash (tee hee).

And believe it or not, this is pretty much straight out of the camera aside from the crop, text, and framing. That small sharpening halo is an artifact of how damn sharp this lens is.

Also, I kinda got lucky with the composition. I fired away a few since I was handholding with a locked focus (AF-L). That massive ball in the back made it seem like he's wearing a helmet. Fun :)

And finally, clickity split...

setup, camera, strobist info: see here

216/365. Famous-sounding words make your head feel light ~ Don't you evah (Spoon) — Never be down

These are Erin's new kicks. Pretty sweet eh? And I don't know why, but this Spoon reference seemed to fit well.

Also, for those wondering, the deed has been done regarding @joemcnallyphoto.

Also, if anyone hasn't noticed — I've near gave up in trying to answer every flickr mail. It's impossible. But for the record — I still read them all, and I appreciate everyones extremely kindness and encouragement.

On the note of emails, I've been getting a growing number of requests for a DVD, or a book, or a workshop... or something that will allow people to have and/or experience something tangible and hands-on pertaining to flash photography.

Well, your voices has been heard, and Erin and I are making a Movie!

Haha. Ok, maybe not that, but we've definitely considered the SF FlashBullet workshop. We'll continue to discuss.

And alas...

setup, camera, strobist info: see here

223/365. Familiar places — around the neighborhood

For some of you, this area looks familiar, since time progresses and my will to go farther from the house decreases... yeah.

Anyhow, tried doing some stuff here with ungelled flash as the key, and CTO as the rim (which is opposite of most of my other evening shots).

The t-shirt was from my Google days when "Gmail offline" launched. Pretty fun.

As for the Hollywood premiere photos, I'm still editing them and I'll let y'all know when they're up via the twitter.

lightomaniacoholics, clickity click.

setup, camera, strobist info: see here