The art of Hurry up... and Wait...

Seven and a half hours of waiting, for six seconds of excitement... That is what Saturday boiled down to. It was the classic scenario of "hurry up and wait... and wait... and wait," where all I was told was that "We know this is going to happen some time today, but we're not sure when," but when didn't really matter it was the what and why that made this a fun hunt.

The movie "Death Sentence" is being filmed in Columbia, and on Saturday they were going to drop a car off of the top floor of a parking garage in the middle of Main St. In LosAngeles, the fact that they were doing a movie stunt wouldn't have even gotten a blip on the radar, but in Columbia, S.C. its big news, so I had to do something big with it. I talked my way into the South Carolina Health and Human Services building, which sits adjacent to the parking garage, and picked my location, the 9th floor mens restroom. As the crew was setting the car and cameras below me, I began placing remote cameras in the windows, covering the lenses with gaffers tape to cut down on glare, and making sure everything was set. Its one of those shots that you don't get a second chance with, so no screwing up.

Reggie, the head of security who had let me into the building, poked his head in the door around 2pm and said "They just called the 30 minute warning." After seven-hours of standing around on the street corner, the parking lot across the street, and in the mens restroom, every movement on the parking garage below got my coplete attention. Through the tinted windows I could hear the director call "Stand By" and a few seconds later "Action". As the car began to roll I fired both cameras simultaneously, and didn't stop until I heard the car crash on the asphalt below. See the Sequence I guess there is something about dropping stuff off of high places that excites us as people, not to mention the fact that when the movie comes out, I can say "hey I saw that happen" and I have the pictures to prove it.

Peace

Sometimes the pictures you don't take seriously are the ones you need to be taking...

Lately I've been taking my job a little to seriously, and it is becoming something I do to have an income, instead of something I love to do. But then again lately I've been taking life a little to seriously. I suppose that is the curse of making something that you love to do your career. In some ways its inevitable to just take something lightly as you get older, because you begin to realize that you need to be able to make a car payment, rent, insurance, food, etc... But when you worry about all of that stuff you tend to forget why you really started doing this in the first place. Perhaps its just time to stop taking everything so seriously, and start having fun again. Maybe then things will just fall into place. Who knows how everything will work out in the long run, and if we did know that... what would be the fun in living life. Its time to get up off of the couch and go explore the world, have some fun, and see what happens. Its time to take the point and shoot out, like I did at the beach the other day, because its more about the journey than the resullts. In that moment when I wasn't thinking about shutter speeds, f-stops, and iso, so I get to remember the sunrise, instead of how I photographed the sunrise. I think the line from the movie is "Don't take life to seriously, you'll never get out alive."

Peace