As I begin the great migration of images to the newly designed blog (BIG THANK YOU TO SUZIE JURADO), you will see they are removed from this site.  So if you are returning to the blog to find an image and it’s not where you left it?  I moved it over for ya’ and you can see an updated copy of the series.  Thanks so much for clicking on my blog and I can’t wait to see you over at the new address.  It’s so sweet, too!  Suzie let me guide the design with a mindful eye.  The result, a new, crisp, functioning website with more updates arriving each month.  Current projects Suzie is spearheading for the site: a useful, free plug in for my shopping cart customers.  We will be able to order some of the popular images from the new site in a variety of sizes, formats, and paper options.  Meanwhile, I will be setting up a secure Paypal checkout so that you can continue to be confident in the security of all your e-commerce!  This is also going to save me my monthly (costly) cloud services we hired from Intuit’s Small Business services.  Instead of continuing to spend monthly fees whether I am selling often or it’s a slower time of year, I can just allow PayPal to do what they do best: handle it for me.  It’ll be SO easy to have a great piece of my art in your home!

Further updates to the site will be posted on the new blog address, so check it out and rejoin the fun, facts and folklore-in-the-making with me!

-Joey Gallahan

I don’t consider myself tri-coastal or anything hip and worthy like that. I do, however, take exceptional pride that my family in New Orleans allows me to snore their house into the Richter Scale and tromp in and out at all hours, making it possible for me to share the fun times we have in the Crescent City. This is a trip I make more than once a year, but still always manage to land during 100% humidity. Coincidence? No. It’s a swamp. SWWWAAAAAAAMP. If you go to New Oleans, just keep trying to remind yourself it was the playground for the French and aristocratic white male land owners for hundreds of years. Look through the current stickiness of the underwater wonder of the French Quarter during an absolute downpour and you can appreciate that once more, into the sticky icky, my trustee 5D and I waddle, stumbling forward on dirty bananas and hand grenades.

We had an absolute blast out there and can’t wait to see what fun we will have next visit. For now, here is what I am able to share with the public. Remember that at least 30% of the photos have been culled from this publicly viewable forum. Additionally, being in New Orleans typically requires a bit more… participation over observation. This cool Polish cat, Joseph Jurowski, teaching me the skills of the darkroom at the Pinnacle Campus of ACC, reminded me that sometimes to get the shot you want, you have to jump in.
Well, jump I did, indeed. Finally, I am posting fewer and fewer images so that the new website www.jwgphotography.com which is linked throughout this blog server may load with ease.  While there my eventually be less photos for each post, I feel like this will lead to more frequent posting!

Losing JonyRose before I ever had the chance to work with her has always sort of haunted me, and in a way made me feel a bit separated from small clique of people with whom she often worked.  There was sort of a missing bridge between me and some of the West Austin shooters who have begun making names for themselves in the local markets.  I am not saying that I haven’t been networking because of our loss.  Simply that such a butterfly effect from never working with JonyRose is evident that I am often curious if these tiny “misses” are to blame for my more and more frequently occurring creative draught.

Ashley Filip’s invitation to the Art of the Rose Benefit hit me differently than the other 10-15 requests for donations I receive every month from people who must think photography is some uber-lucrative profession that can tolerate constant philanthropy.  I was immediately interested and jumped at the opportunity to submit work to the benefit which is aimed at Sepsis Awareness and recognizing JonyRose as a victim.  Almost immediately I felt the connection between my series celebrating the lives of those before us with the Silvia Ji inspired sugar skull compositions, Dias de los Muertos.  It was nothing short of an emotional epiphany.  I scheduled a shoot within the week with Dana Ricks and my favorite make up miracle worker, Tavia Williams.  So now I present the first image of my project to be auctioned off at the event on April 2nd, 2011 at Enzo, Austin, Texas.  I hope you approve.

I want to thank Dana Ricks, Tavia Williams, Bethany Weigl, Suzie Jurado, Andrew Miller, and for those of you who continue to inspire me, coax the next great idea from my thick skull, and celebrate my tiny successes until the big ones finally arrive.

In most cases, the photographer has an obligation to gush a bit over the subjects in the photography they post.  Since we typically work with people we know as much as we can afford, it’s often genuine.  In this case, I have to say it’s sincere to the core.  I love working with Tavia, Travis and their beautiful girls.  More than a couple of times, Tavia’s work has been such a strong element in my photography that it nearly shadows my composition with creative technique.  Additionally, Travis is always just a great sport about helping out with these projects.  My child photography project in college was turning into a huge mess before Travis brought these two cuties over to the ACC Stonehollow studio for me to photograph.  Now in the Pedernales studios for the start of my second year, a simple boomed soft box and a background light was all we needed to make some of the most playful and expressive portraits I have done in some time.  Thanks so much to the Williams family for participating.  Enjoy!

It’s hard to believe there was I time when you could get me to photograph anything, anytime, anywhere…  so long as it was black and white.  Like the early Model T, my photography was for the black and white film lover.  Geared up with my father’s AE-1 and rolls and rolls of fresh out the cooler Ilford Delta 400 film.  Loved it.  The grain, the cool temperature, the response to ambient light, and the convenience of less-than-finicky developing made it my mainstay.

The other day I was in a meeting and a colleague showed me some photos she liked.  To my amazement, it was a simple site with black and white available light snapshots.  So for my weekly dive into my portfolio, I decided to grab a few snaps from what I have been shooting as the assistant to Travis Tank’s weddings.  These are treated with a simple grey scale and loaded at a low resolution to keep anyone from utilizing these images.  If are interested in any images you see hear, contact Travis at Travistank.com for orders.

I wasn’t necessarily impressed with the composition or style of the photography I was observing, I could clearly appreciate the tonal range of the photos that became such an obvious element in the black and white image.  I selected these images and made the batch conversion in LR3 to grey-scale, making a minor tweak to the clarity slider to +10.

While you will see a little less photos of the bride when I am assisting, it’s a priority for me to maintain a constant workflow of capturing details like the cake, center pieces, rings, shoes, and most importantly the groomsmen.  Too often we have a load of pics of the bride and brides’ maids.  Without making a workable schedule and having an experienced second shooter, you can lose coverage of the groom and groomsmen.  While it’s the unsaid rule to keep your camera on the bride as much as possible, she will be counting on you to capture those few precious moments of the groom being relaxed and charming in his tux.  To the bride, his photos are super important, and to the groom’s family they are a must.  Don’t make the mistake of assuming it’s only about the bride after the fact!  Most guys will lie and say they don’t have an opinion about any choices regarding the wedding.  This laissez faire outlook expires immediately after the honeymoon and suddenly expects to see their the full coverage you promised them!  So enjoy the images and let me know if you are interested in our updated wedding services, whether you are a bride in Central Texas or a photographer who knows the value of a professional photo assistant for these important jobs.

Instead, I was unproductive and moody after a huge fall out with… well, doesn’t matter who.  Point is I didn’t go out and I likely am not going to play with my camera until this weekend when I shoot with Travis Tank at another wedding.  Instead I decided to do what I have been talking about for weeks:  going back to revisit what made me the artist I am today.  Here’s an example of a simple photo, single light, taken in the small study of our old house in South Austin.  Coco Vargas, perhaps the “cutest” face I know, stops in for a beauty and style session with Tavia Williams and Anna Alvarez.

While lighting schemes and gear have upgraded, the simple elegance of single light portraiture featuring a stunningly cute model, great styling by Anna, and Tavia’s impeccable taste for color and shade make for timeless images.  Additionally, this image was captured long before my photoshop skills had taken root, so the is out of the camera like brownies out da’ oven.  Enjoy.

Firstly, I want to thank everyone who has been so supportive and patient while I split my business in half and start with the second tricky venture of taking over All American Photo.  Things within that original venture have quickly changed and we are now changing to All Star Photo in March and continuing the youth sports photography services.  Nothing changes other than the name and the amount I owe for newer, better equipment for my staff.

All Star Photo will have a new website, a new feel and (thanks the Gods) a new workflow that outsources the bulk of the data entry to the great guys at IP Imaging.  They have been an amazing team member since the transition began and have promised their continued support of our venture.

Many of you noticed that I have been out of town three to four days a week the past month, and that’s because I am getting outside the box and soliciting areas outside the Austin Metro area.  We have been well received and are creating great new business relationships with the leagues we meet.

Also, I am not neglecting JWG Photography!  We are laying the ground work for a facelift for the company, including a modernization of the logo, the website, and bring in a new photography style I have been developing over the fall.  Before we unveil, I will be revisiting older images with a fresh look at retouching, presentation, and some previously unreleased collections.  I will be shooting some portfolio work to add to my client portfolios to show this spring.  While I am chasing fewer weddings and aimed at more intimate photography for my clients, I still have a few weddings on the books and will accept four more large events this spring and five more this summer, so book with me quickly!

The Daily Luchador is still a fun side project, an outlet to keep me remembering that this is all for fun, all for art, all for my sanity.  Thanks to Laurie and Karen, Andrew and Bryce and everyone else who has participated in the fun!

The Dias de los Muertos show at Paradise in October is still on the books.  More photography needs to be done on that project, as well.  Hopefully I will be able to coax Tavia Williams out of retirement for a few more sessions.  I am accepting limited TFP work with models to participate in this project.  If you or anyone you know (who isn’t flaky) is interested, send them my way.

On deck, another Mash-Up with Shawn Collie and Kristine Dupuis for an ArtErotica entry to support a local charity.  We have one session under our belts and look forward to an additional shoot tomorrow to catch us up on “sexy” ideas.

Holler at your boy when you can.  Today the phone is dead, but a replacement is on the way, so text me (please god don’t leave a voicemail).  Email and text me your questions and to book your Valentine’s day special listed in the flier below!

Valentine's Day sessions still available!

If there were ever a time that I would always say simple is more, it’s got to be working with the female form.  When in studio, I (and many photographers with whom I work) start to go a little gadget crazy.  We want a great exposure that outlines the form so we use side lighting schemes that are the product of creativity and down-time in the studio with lights at our disposal.  Then, of course, you need to actually SEE the person you are photographing.  Using side/hatchet/split lighting on a female?  Sure, go ahead, and keep posting on Craigslist under “Free Portraiture to Expand My Portfolio.”  As an experienced photographer, I know I need to fill the shadows.  But I need to do it was a lower Exposure Value than my side lighting, so I narrow my soft boxes on the sides and pop in my fill from the front.  Problem is now that I am losing the model in the back drop, so I need to light the background.  So separate, I add a hair light (or a “kicker”) aimed at the head and shoulders of the model.  Now, before I have taken a single photograph, I have two strip boxed strobes, a gridded, snooted kicker, a reflector and background light, a fill behind me, and I will likely add a secure reflector to fill in light into her occipital cavity.  I won’t be able to move the model much because of the balanced EV’s from my side-lighting and the background light go-bo’ed off the subject.  If you are keeping count, I have about eight different light stands, possibly a boom.  Wow.  Really?  I keep going back to a seminar I attended about three years back sponsored by Precision-Camera Austin and the Bogen sponsored photographer Steven Katzman here in Austin, Texas.  The only thing he used was a (very large) bounce umbrella radio slaved to his Nikon in his trips to New Orleans, .  He reviewed a few single light portraits with us in the lab at Austin Community College’s Photographic Technology department, but when the exercise began at the Texas Special Olympics bowling party, we had (no surprise) a fixed-ratio light scheme with a fill, main, and background light.  What I am saying here is this:  Find YOUR balance.  I know that I tend to shoot with fewer lights and a deeper ratio than most would, but that’s part of my branding.  There is rarely a surprise when I present my clientele with images full of contrast, shadows, and depth because I almost always always always keep it to two lights:  Two Key/Main strobes and a boomed in fill reflector to influence both the subject fill and the background.