Instagram Friends

Thanks for checkin' out Bsombin'! Over the years, I've met a lot of amazing people and made some good friends through Instagram. From the models and photographers that I have collaborated with to the entrepreneurs and businesses that have hired me, Instagram has helped me to connect to a lot of people who I probably wouldn't have met otherwise.

A few years ago I started following a photographer from Arkansa named Luke, after he followed me. Luke would share his favorite accounts with his followers, on his IG story. One of the accounts that he shares on his story belonged to a guy named Aaron. I think Aaron was living in Colorado at the time. But, Aaron and I also started following one another, thanks to Luke. After following him for a bit, I noticed Aaron was shooting in LA and around California. Mean while, Luke decided to take some time off of Instagram and went missing in action.

It had been a while since I had heard from Luke. But last week I got a message from him asking if I was still in LA and if I wanted to meet up with him and Aaron to shoot? He said they were going shooting the next day and then he was leaving back to Arkansa the following day. Fortunately, I was able to meet up with them. I had some stuff to take care of during the day. But I was able to meet up with them at night. I had asked them what they wanted to shoot, so I could plan a little tour for them. When I gave him some options, Luke was quick to answer rooftops and steel wool. So I wanted to take them on a tour of a couple of easy to access rooftops before heading into the LA river to spin wool. We started with a helipad on an rooftop close to the 110 freeway. We had good luck there. We all got shots we were really happy with and were able to get in and out without any problems. After that, I took them to another helipad on a rooftop that's just outside of Skid Row. That spot was a little more challenging due to a gate that had just been installed around the helipad. But we managed to get on the helipad and get some cool pics anyways. The next (and final) stop on the tour was the LA river. I wanted to take them to a spot on the train tracks where I had shot at about a year ago. The thing to keep in mind when showing people around downtown, though, is that things are always changing and they change pretty fast. So, the spot I took them to was gated off and we couldn't get in. I can be very persistent, when I make up my mind to do something, however. And I wasn't about to let Luke and Aaron go home without some steel wool shoots. So I started looking for another way in and was able to get us onto the train tracks after a walk around the block. The next problem we encountered were the newly installed flood lights that made the spot too bright for steel wool shots. I suggested going down into the river, to get out of the light, and shooting by the water so we could get a little bit of a reflection off the water's surface. We found a good spot and were able to shoot for a little bit before we got chased out of the river by some guy with a flashlight. Still, it was a successful mission. We got out safe and everyone got at least a few good steel wool shots before we had to call it a wrap. By the time we got back to the cars, it was a little past midnight. Luke and Aaron had a long drive back to Aaron's, and I had to be up early the next day, so we called it a night. After saying goodbye to the guys, I headed home to go through my pics. Not sure when I will see Luke again, since he's back in Arkansa. But, now that I know Aaron lives out here in Cali, we'll be shooting again soon. I didn't shoot a lot, that night, since I had already been to all of those spots several times. But I still managed to get some pictures worth sharing...

I feel very fortunate to have had all the great experiences and to have met all the amazing people that I have found through Instagram. I think it's important that we try to use our social media to connect with others in order to help one another grow and build. But I also want to remind everyone to be very careful when meeting people that you've met online. Not all the people who I've met have been as cool as Luke and Aaron. But that's another story for another time... I hope you enjoyed the pics, Thanks for checkin' out the blog. Please check back soon for more Bsombin'!

Poetry & Motion

"My Light Song"

I will sing my light &

Shine through the black of night

To the deaf, show the sounds of joy,

To the blind, sing the joy of sight

My shine will not mute,

My song can not fade,

For the meek and the broken,

Croon bright and parade,

For the lost and the lame

Glow a luminous serenade,

This song must beam bright,

This loud shine must be played

From now till the reaper,

My light song, I will sing

To lending sound and sight to the needy &,

To bring glory to my king!

-Bsomb4

Wreckage In The Shadows

Color Splash Black & White Ghost Spinner

Thanks for checkin' out the Bsombin' blog! I recently posted a few steel wool posts. In one of them, I mentioned some of the things I learned on my first "spinning" adventure with @xrissvlad. One of the things I mentioned was to not use your autofocus when shooting steel wool, because it can lead to blurry captures. I got a lot of blurry wool shots. I decided to try and use them, somehow, though. So I got to editing shots and got some pretty cool results. Below is one of the edits. ...a ghostly color splash black and white image of wool being spun on top of a flipped over Honda... I'll be posting a few more horrible shots that got edited into useable images, like this image and the image on the "Night Train on 1st St." Both images came from the throw-away folder and were edited back to life. Check back soon to see more edits, captures, poems, paintings, drawings, & more! 

Steel Wool Pt.1

I got bit by the "Instabug", and the infection is getting worse and worse. Instagram has lead me to do a lot of things that I wouldn't have thought to do without it. This past weekend I met up with a fellow Instagramer that goes by @xrissvlad. We headed out to downtown to go check out some freeway spots. But, we ended up spinning steel wool around East L.A. & the L.A. river, instead. Neither one of us had played with steel wool before, so we had to learn some things the hard way.

Lesson 1 - Steel wool can break off in large pieces that will set you on fire if they get on you. ...lucky for me, I was wearing an old sweater that I didn't mind messing up. I just didn't think I was gonna have to stop, drop, and roll with it on. Lol. Xris also got a little heated when some wool landed on his neck. Fortunately, it wasn't a large piece and he was okay, though. 

Lesson 2 - Autofocus is a bad idea when shooting steel wool. The extreme lighting in a dark setting makes the autofocus trip and potentially good shots become blurry messes. Some of the best opportunities of the night yielded fuzzy funk instead of amazing captures, because of my autofocus issues.  

Lesson 3 - Make sure to plan out your shots carefully. You might only get one chance to get the capture, depending on when and where you decide to shot fireballs all over the place. ...And that is what you'll be doing if you spin steel wool. Fireballs of various sizes fly all over the place and they go far and bounce off of things too! A get-away plan isn't a bad idea either, depending on where you'll be starting your fire storm. 

Last, but not least...

Lesson 4 - If you spin the wool with a whisk, it's a good idea to bring a spare or the tools you'll need to fix the whisk if it breaks. Good thing is, this one wasn't one of the hard learned lessons, since Xris came prepared for such an event. Otherwise, we would have had to end the light painting session early. But he fixed the broken whisk and we were able to go back to shooting the shooting fireballs again.   

Despite the fires and burns, we had a lot of fun spinning wool and I will be doing it again! Here are some of the light captures that I got during my first steel wool adventure. You can see Xris' captures on Instagram @xrissvlad. Dude is talented and definitely worth checkin' out!

Down by the river, lurking in the shadows, under the bridge...

Shooting Under The Stars - Pt.3

Here's some of what the Android captured on the mission...

Shooting Under The Stars - Pt.2

...So here's that spiral staircase I mentioned in the previous post...

Shooting Under The Stars - Pt.1

Thanks for hittin' up the Bsombin' blog! This is a series of images from a night shoot, off the 110fwy,  over the L.A. river. ...On previous missions, Jefroe and I had passed by a random spiraling staircase that appeared to be in the middle of a freeway junction, going from the 110N to the 5N. At a glance, it looked like there wasn't any way to get to it. So we began to wonder about the staircase and how to get to it. The next time we went out on a capture mission, we passed the staircase on our way home and I noticed it had a walkway leading out to it. After looking at Google maps, I realized that the staircase connected the Elysian Park Trails with the Arroyo Seco Pkwy, just above the Arroyo Seco Confluence. The confluence is the point where the Arroyo Seco meets the L.A. river. After seeing that there was a way to get out to the staircase we went looking for the entrance to the walkway, to go get some shots from the staircase. We stopped on Figueroa, under I-5, to get some shots there, as we began searching for the entrance.

 It proved to be a mission finding the entrance to the walkway on Arroyo Seco Pkwy. But, after circling the area in the truck, for a while, we finally got out on foot and found it. Once we got out onto the walkway, we began to shoot.

I didn't realize that the walkway would be as high as it was. Again, I found myself fighting with my fear of heights, as we walked toward the staricase, high above the L.A. river. But, again, I was so caught up in getting captures that I forced myself to push past my fears. I wanted to vomit the whole time I was on the bridge, but found peace once we made it to the staircase.

 It's funny... I just realized that I didn't even post a pic of the staircase. And, it was the main reason for going out on the Arroyo Seco walkway. ...Guess that will be part 2 of "Shooting Under The Stars"...

We were on the bridge for a good while, before heading back to the truck. When we got back to the truck, Jefroe and I were both starving. So, we decided to call it a night  and end things with a stop at a Los Angeles late night staple, the Original Tommy's hamburgers, for an early morning dose of chili cheese fries and heartburn! ...Chili cheese fries, the breakfast of champions!

I've gone out on a few more missions, since that night, and am working on getting through the edits to share here. ...Check back soon for more Bsombin'!