Joe McNally Photography

Okay, I ‘ll give you a hint. He’s at GPP in Dubai. He uses speed lights. And this is the 3rd time in this millennium he has worn long pants. Give up? Mystery man revealed here.

(I also went to his class on social media and if there is anybody on the planet who knows more about the role it is currently playing in our industry, I certainly don’t know them.)

Speaking of knowledgeable people in exotic places, my buds Eddie Soloway and Renie Haiduk are heading for Africa. Both are wonderful shooters and teachers. Eddie’s book, A Thousand Moons, is simply one of the most beautiful books I have ever held in my hands. Definitely check out his website, and Renie’s. Hit this link for info on the Africa trip……

Still in Dubai…..

Rolling along here. In classes last few days, not the desert. Had a seminar day yesterday, so wanted to show the gang the notion of doing a commercial looking, bright, open white background kind of shot that lots of clients love, ’cause it is in fact, bright, white, and they can load it up with logos and type. Also wanted to show you could do a shot like this with TTL small flash.

Cross lit the background, which means taking the right side lights and throwing them to the left and vice versa. Alessia, who is just terrific in front of the camera, is leaping up and basically into the light coming from a 3×3 Lastolite one stop diffuser panel, supported by a c-stand. And there’s a floor skip coming off a 3×6 silver panel laying on the floor, with one SB unit bounced straight down into it. Group A, B, C, all playing together well. We started real small in the seminar, showing options for one light, hot shoed to the camera, and then built scenarios up to this, with a bunch of SB units working together, not only to cover the set, but to give a pretty good recycle time at 1/250th @ 5.6.

And, in the “this just in category,” Syl Arena of the Pixsylated blog madness is the headliner over at sportsshooter.com. Seems somebody figured out Canon flashes:-)

Heading back stateside this weekend……more tk….

Gulf Photo Plus launches in Dubai in a couple of weeks, and I’m stoked to go back to the Middle East. This will be the 4th year for me, and the event just keeps getting better and better. Hats off to Mohamed Somji, Hala Salhi and the whole GPP crew for putting together what has become the premier photo conference and learning center in the Middle East.

Got a bunch of reasons to be stoked, principal among them the faculty who heads yearly to that strange and friendly conglomeration of concrete and glass that is Dubai. The talent and teaching that is offered at GPP simply makes me want to go to all the classes. The workshops run the gamut of skills, from photo-j, to lighting, post production, portraiture, you name it. If you got a jones about getting better at just about any aspect of picture making, this place beckons.

Also happy to participate in a group exhibit over there. My contribution is a bit of my admittedly odd dance photography. Just had the privilege of working with the magnificent dancers of the California Ballet Company, based in San Diego. Up top is Halim Seo, aboard the nuclear submarine Topeka, and below is Jenny Curry, atop the counter at the Night and Day Cafe, on Coronado Island. In the middle, and underwater, is the daring, redoubtable Samantha Knobloch, who plunged gracefully. Dancers are simply wonderful, hard working, creative people to engage with a camera. They literally leap at a creative notion, and somehow, physically transform a vaguely worded idea into something beautiful that belongs much more to them than to the person behind the camera. More blogs tk on this project.

There’s a bunch of events and shows and sponsors over there, to be sure, but the heart and soul of GPP remains the classes. David Hobby (aka St. David of Baltimore) goes every year. This year his classes cover portrait and lighting, but also still life and social media as a tool. Zack Arias brings the one light to Dubai, and Bobbi Lane does her “portraits unplugged” class, among others. (I’m hauling gear like crazy and she gets terrific pictures carrying around nothing more than a damn fill board. It’s not fair. I gotta take that class.) David Nightingale brings his HDR magic, and Matt Kloskowski bails outta Tampa for a few days to teach layers, about which he is the definitive word. (Though I have given him some pointers over the years:-)

Chris Hurtt does a great range of beginner type classes, and Joey L. weighs in on the pressures and processes of heavy duty commercial shooting.  Steve Simon takes his phojo gang out on the streets, and Vincent Laforet explains the transitions and mysteries of shifting from stills to video like no one else can. Melissa Rodwell shows the ways of the fashion world, and Robin Nichols takes folks from behind the lens to in front of the computer.

Did I mention this is a candy store in the desert? The individual classes held during the week are topped off by Photo Friday, which is like a buffet of photo topics, presented in two or so hour blocks, that anybody can drop in on. It’s a bit of a madhouse, but fun. GPP, in it’s short history, has created a definitive, energetic photo community that gathers from far afield every year.

A good example: Did a class last year on location lighting. Good bunch of folks. We got back late, and unfortunately, the bus door opened right at a point in the sidewalk where there was a hunk of metal from an old sign stand poking through the cement. Fadi, one of our stalwart, enthusiastic shooters, struggled out the door with his backpack, and he came right down on the unforgiving protrusion. Boom, broke his foot. He spent the time waiting for the ambulance laying on the sidewalk and worrying about his lighting, his take, and how he would get to class the next day. We tried to assure him his first worry was his foot, which was rapidly becoming the size of the Goodyear blimp.

Next morning, we gather for class, and in comes Fadi, in pain and on wheels, but ready to talk Channel One, Group A. As a teacher, you just have to stand in service of that kind of passion. More tk….

Louis Pang and his Wedshooter TV gang have fixed up our workshop with wonderfully talented folks to be in front of the lens. Evon has worked with us for a couple days now. Suffice it to say, photographing her is a damn sight different experience than photographing this particular devotee at Thaipusam the other day.

The above was shot by Johan Sopiee, a terrific Malaysian shooter based here in KL. It’s been a pretty wild ride since we landed Friday night. Mid-week now. We’ll be cranking right through the weekend. Having fun. Malaysia’s a great place, friendly people, lotsa talented shooters. More tk…

Or, as Einar Erlendssen, the originator and caretaker of the Focus on Nature Workshops says, heading up to join the stark raving mad Vikings. I always wanted to go to Iceland. It seems a land of true intensity, color, and personality. It’ll be a small workshop, and thus very hands on. Our merry band of speed lighters will evidently careen around the countryside (the place ain’t that big) looking, lighting, and shooting. At night we will gather over various Nordic intoxicants and commune with the pixel spirits, and discuss the successes and failures of the day. This will be a slightly different workshop for me, in that I will be pushing myself both as a teacher and a shooter. As I said, I have never been there before, and de facto that is fuel for the fire. As a group, together, we will go all week for portfolio images. Here’s the link. My pack will be a bit different, too. Cameras, lenses, SB units, Quadra flash, stands, soft boxes, horned helmet, broadsword.

I have been sent North before. Below is my bud, George Divokey, an ornithologist who lives on Cooper Island part of each summer, studying a bird colony and watching it respond to the effects of warming. Coop, as it is referred to, is a small stretch of earth and ice just a touch north of the northernmost tip of the continental United States, Barrow, Alaska. They have this sign just outside town that you can visit and thus know you have done the truly northern thing. Why you need a sign to tell you that you are standing on icebound nothingness and your travel agent deserves a serious ass kicking, I’m not sure. But it’s there, for those truly compulsive, check the box type folks.

Geographic has sent me to Siberia (in more ways than one) on a couple of occasions. For a story called The Power of Light, I of course had to photographically experience the total lack thereof, which is certainly a contradiction of purpose and terms, if not outright stupid. (Journalists are always sent to the extremes of things, so sometimes what looks like a dumb move is exactly what you should be doing for a story.)  Below is noontime on Lake Lavozero on the Murmansk Penninsula, in February. I have never been quite as cold as that day on that frozen stretch of near total whiteout.

The cold didn’t seem to bother these Russian fellas, but then ingesting an entire bottle of rotgut vodka will certainly calm the spirit and deaden the nerve endings. I have to think these guys stay on the ice as long as possible just to avoid the old lady. The women up there were tough, I tell ya. I stayed at this collection of cinder blocks billed as a hotel, and while in my room, I heard this tremendous, repetitive smashing noise just down the hall. I went to look, and there was an enormous Russian female chef with a pry bar, knocking loose chicken parts locked in blocks of ice out of  a large freezer bin. She would then hoist the frozen chunks over her head with both hands, and smash them down onto the ancient linoleum. Legs and breasts would skitter everywhere.  At least I knew ahead of time what was being served that night.

You know, I accept the fact at this point in my career that the phone call sending me to do a voluptuous spread on the beaches of Tahiti ain’t comin’ in. Hell, at this point, I’d settle for the Jersey shore, but that’s probably not in my future, either. No, historically I’ve been sent to icy backwaters in search of even the faintest glimmer of light. I got so used to this for a bit that I after I got fired from LIFE I gave myself a shooting job in Norilsk, which historically was a gulag old Josef used to send anyone who disagreed with him. When I visited, it was largely an economic gulag, and home to one of the largest nickel mining operations in the world.

Average life expentancy for a male working in this factory is 50, mostly because they breathe carbon dioxide gas all day. Needless to say, they haven’t heard of OSHA up there.

So–I’m looking forward to Iceland, needless to say. There will be light, color and life. Very excited…….more tk….

First stop of the year for Moose and the gang…..San Francisco, Golden Gate Bridge. One SB900, camera left, Tri-Grip one stop diffuser, minus 2 EV programmed into the camera, plus one EV into the flash. Lots of folks shot some nice stuff of the bridge itself, but, being a people shooter, I just look at the bridge as a nice backdrop to put somebody against. Josh obliged, and we did a quick flash lesson out on the rocks for the group.

Knocked around the bridge before, of course, as has just about anybody who’s come this way with a camera in their hands. Tony Bennett and I went up into the headlands on the Marin side a few years back, just to place him where he left his heart.

More tk….