I love it when an unexpected assignment comes along, and everything falls into place like magic. While in Las Vegas this past weekend, I was tasked with writing and directing a short video. I had roughly thirty minutes to shoot everything, but I found myself needing far less.
I would expect nothing less when working with The Most Interesting Man in the World.
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I have no idea where I began with this little project. One day I was trying on a Thor helmet, and just a Prime shipping days later I had several costumes that I just had to be photographed wearing. Why be one Avenger when you can be them all, right? Without telling anyone other than my studio assistant, I threw this little photo shoot together.
Here’s how my Avengers got assembled:
I grew out my beard for a few days until it seemed good enough for Thor, and then picked a quiet night in the studio to knock out the photos. (Studio setup photos below) Read More
It’s a slippery slope, buying vinyl Funko figures. They’re so affordable, ubiquitous, and highly collectible. As a geek, it’s near impossible to avoid having one. Recently, I’ve fallen off the deep end and snatched-up pretty much the entire run of American Horror Story and The Walking Dead Funko Pop! Vinyl collections for my office at work.
Luckily, I can turn this obsession into something more productive – such as doing some fun videos for the new action figure review site, GoFigure. I won’t usually post the videos here, but I wanted to share the news. This week I’m showing off the completely badass Daryl Dixon’s Chopper (terrible sound effect not included).
Here’s some snaps I took while we were roadtrippin’ across the country, driving parallel to Route 66. There were dozens of other people there, but I somehow got some snaps without anyone in there.
I snapped a ton of photos from my recent trip to Kennedy Space Center, while riding shuttle buses and waiting in lines, I glitched out some of my favorite iPhone pics (using Decim8). The first one I rendered was, by far my favorite of the batch – and probably the best glitch I’ve ever done.
Here’s two snaps from our annual (and somewhat required) visit to the pumpkin patch for Fall photos. I’m thrilled that the best photos don’t actually feature any pumpkin, but rather this rusty, weird tree that was nearby.
Here’s some photos I shot from my friends, Ginny and John Sweeney (whom I worked with in Houston) a few months back. I just delivered the final batch (slow, I know) of wedding pics and decided to post a few here.
My boss really let me go all out when redesigning The Daily Buzz studio. We don’t have a huge budget, so it’s very DIY. I rolled the dice and hired my favorite Orlando artist (and now friend) Andrew Spear to ninja-punch our bare studio wall into something spectacular.
As you know, I love getting marketing kits and promotional materials and then laying everything out for a photograph. And it is extremely rare that I’m disappointed by anything from The CW network, as their kits are always gorgeous and well planned out. Today I received advance screeners of many of the new fall shows. These aren’t review copies, so I really shouldn’t say anything other than I was really surprised by some of the charming and clever new shows. I haven’t watched Arrow yet, in case you’re wondering.
cam: Fuji X100
This past weekend, my family finally made it out to Legoland Florida. My daughter had a great time on all the rides, and we all enjoyed all the fun, little details in the Lego cities at Miniland, USA. I especially like how television news vans were well represented. Here’s a few shots of the mini news media in action.
Here’s an important press conference at City Hall. I think I see a miniature Lenslinger in there amongst the Lego photogs.
Here’s a news crew being hassled by the police (or possibly getting directions) on the National Mall.
And I found this news van headed to an important news conference in Miami’s South Beach.
Cam: Fuji X100
Loc: Legoland, USA
The Daily Buzz received an oddly labeled box today which had some (fictional) Republic of Wadiya currency taped to the top. Once ripped open, there was a wealth of “become your own Dictator” items, and what I presume are beer kegger cups. We’ve already started taking photos of staff members as ruthless Wadiya dictators, and will – no doubt – be featuring this stuff on the show.
Camera: Fuji X100
Flickr: Unboxing Press Kits (Photoset)
This weekend we braved the crows and heat, returning to The Magic Kingdom so that Eliza and her buddy could ride the Barnstormer roller coaster (and so that I can get more trading cards for the Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom game). I took this snap while enduring the ups and down and general nausea of riding a roller coaster with acute motion sickness.
Camera: Fuji X100
Location: Disney's Magic Kindgom
Flickr: Riding the Barnstormer
With the release of the Avengers this weekend, I decided to get The Daily Buzz hosts all assembled in various Hasbro gear for this fun photo for the show’s Facebook fan page.
Camera: Fuji X100
Team: The Daily Buzzvengers
I’m loving my FujiX100. It’s made me return to carrying a camera again at the theme parks (the whole giant DSLR things wasn’t working for me). Here’s two Disney snaps that I took this past week.
The first, being the lobby wall at the soon-to-open Disney’s Art of Animation Resort – which is crazy colorful. It feels like being in a Mass Effect night club.
And then there’s this shot, right at the base of Spaceship Earth at Epcot – which looks spectacular from just about any angle.
camera: FujiX100
I wandered around the deck of the Disney Fantasy on Tuesday morning, trying to capture a decent shot of this guy inspecting the AquaDuck tube. I nearly fell into the pool, and I ran into a desk that seated two guys doing a live radio broadcast. I have some cool, raw shots of this guy, but the best moment was the following day, when I glanced up and he was right above me and all I had was my iPhone. It made for a perfect Instagram moment!
camera: iPhone 4
instagram: littlelostrobot
I snapped a ton of photos with my new camera this weekend, which because I wanted to get back to ‘street photography’ without carrying around my expensive DSLR. (Instead, I’m now carrying around an expensive faux-rangefinder, the Fujifilm X100.) I spent the weekend in New Orleans, where I traveled to photograph my friends John and Ginny’s wedding.
The above photo I shot at “Sweenypalooza” – the wedding after-reception. It was directly across from a strip club, which added an extra layer of depravity to the already extreme behavior below. We all hung out on the balcony of Fat Tuesday, throwing beads onto the heads of partygoers below. Think of it as an elaborate game of human ring toss.
Here’s a segment I shot for The Daily Buzz and Galtime, demonstrating how to get your preschooler involved in cooking family meals. It’s worth noting that MY WIFE is the reporter on this piece, and her subject is our adorable kid.
Turn Your Preschooler Into A Little Chef from JL Watkins on Vimeo.
Fearful that your kids will make a mess? They will. Worried it will take extra time? Yeah, it does. Think they can’t handle it? They can, really! You don’t have to wait until they’re older to get them involved. Preschool aged kids can do a lot in the kitchen.
KyAnn and I both made New Year resolutions to each start our own foodie blogs. We both did, but she’s the only one of us to actually do more than two posts, and she’s well on her way to making it a habit. You can follow our little family cooking adventures at Happy Fun Food.
We made a quick trip up North, into The South to catch-up with some old friends and revisit some of the restaurants and haunts we used to frequent several year ago. Here’s a sassy snap of Eliza and her pal Kensie. It’s damn near impossible to get a photo of these kids not moving.
gear: canon 5D mark II
loc: greenville, sc
