New Summer Work + Thesis

Hello loyal blog followers!

I have two new things for you today!

First and foremost, I recently completed my BFA Thesis. It's called "Neighbor" and you can find it on my website (link at the bottom!)

Second off, I am starting my summer off the right way with a new project! Not sure if I am continuing this on with other locations but I do like where this one has taken me. The project is called "Mill" and can be found on my website as well. However, I wanted to leave you with something that isn't on my website. I shot this while working on "Mill", and I like it a lot as a single piece since it is unrelated to the series. Hope you enjoy!

The rest of my new work can be found at: http://www.david-velasco.com

Keep checking back for more updates!
--David

New Series: Assembly

Today I went out to start a new personal series called "Assembly". I'll be working on it throughout this winter while I'm home in Wilmette. I'm shooting this one entirely on 35mm film. This is one of the outtakes (for now, it might make more sense once I work through more of the series).

The rest of the series and a lot more of my work can be found at my website which you can find right here.

--David

Work in Progress - Architectural Studies Book

For the past couple of weeks I've been expanding my work with architecture and diptychs in an effort to put together a full book. It's nowhere near complete, but I have put together a few things at this point. Here's a quick preview of what's to come:

Will post a link to the finished book once it's complete (although because it's being done through a custom book publishing site the price will be outrageous).

--David

Portra Test

Over the summer I picked up a pack of Porta VC160 and did a little bit of shooting locally. Worked with a Crown Graphic field camera. These were a couple of the shots:




--David

TIme Traveler

A diptych combining shots taken over four years apart from each other. The bottom was shot in 2007, after a house at the end of my block had been condemned and was boarded up. The top shot was taken this year, after the old house had been demolished and a new house was built up, recently seeing its tenants.

--David

Borderless

Continuing with the thematic elements of "Dixie", created a new piece based around the recently closed Borders in my area. Click through for larger view.

--David

Moses

Moses is a triptych made from found imagery. A while back I found a strip of photos sitting in a photo booth, left by the previous user. I was bothered by the fact that the previous users were in fact two parents with their newborn. I scanned in these photos and clipped only the face of their child.

I chose to focus on the child's face as his expression wasn't forced, even if his place in the photo was. The name Moses is used because in a sense the parents left the child for whoever found him next by leaving their photos in a photo booth.

--David

Trader/Traitor

New idea, playing with the framing still. Thoughts?

--David

Crown

Shot on my late Uncle's Crown Graphic, in my dad's home studio.

While my dad was pulling together all of the backs, we found that there was still film in the Polaroid back. Not entirely sure how old the film was, but it's still working pretty smoothly. This is one of the first shots I've taken on this camera. I feel very honored to be able to use my Uncle's camera.

--David

50mm Diptych

Quick testing my new lens today! :D

--David

Towers - A Work in Progress

I'm continuing this series of shots with the 500mm. Here's the current lineup, I may or may not add two more into this.

--David

Tower

Taking fun shots with the 500mm.
© David Velasco 2010.
--David

Digital II - Photoshop Exercises

Just finished these up this past week, we've been working on editing through ACR (Adobe Camera Raw) and retouching in general. Of course, the assignment was to use a self-portrait to learn how to retouch. Let me explain why I took this in the direction I did.

When we first started, I did the standard fashion retouching: I removed blemishes, smoothed out my pores, etc...and afterward it kinda made me feel sick to my stomach. I didn't like the idea of fixing myself up in that sense with Photoshop. So, instead I took it in this direction, creating things that were a bit beyond what retouching entails.

First image is edited soley in ACR:

Second image is 90% ACR, 10% Photoshop CS5 (pretty much used it to fix up things with more precision and added the vignette.)

I'm really enjoying this class, I think I'm really enjoying compositing and retouching.

--David

Networking Narratives

First Assignment for Digital II, an exercise in compositing and pixel management. Pretty happy with how this turned out, even if it did drive me crazy near the end.



Will post more as the year goes on.

© David Velasco 2010.

--David

Alt Processes - Semester Work

Alright, so here's all of my Alt. Processes work from the semester. The first project I didn't put into frames. Posted in chronological order.

Cyanotypes









Platinum Palladium



Tintypes



Final Portfolio (Pinhole Paper Negatives to Digital Negatives to Cyanotype)













All work © David Velasco 2010. Please don't steal, borrow, or display my images without my permission.

I'll post more work throughout the summer when I find time for it.

--David

Location Lighting - Best + Final

Alright, so the year is over, and it's time to post work!

First off, here's location Lighting. The first five are some of my best shots from the semester.

After that is my final 6 page spread.












And now the 6 page spread







Models in order of first appearance:
Paul, Autumn, Nicole, Ally

I was definitely happiest with the final spread. All images © David Velasco 2010. Please don't steal, borrow, or display my work without my permission.

I'll be posting Alt. Process work soon!

--David

Not Photography - Adam's Floating Head

More Adam digital painting practice. I forgot to draw a body out this time :P Slowly I improve with this whole dealio.

Oh, and once again, the original line drawing of fail:


I'll try this digital painting thing again later.

--David

Photo Show

Last night was the Photo Show, a student run exhibition of the Photography Dept. Here at Ringling. I was fortunate enough to have 4 pieces out of one of my series selected for the event. Not only was this a huge honor to have my work selected for this big of an event, but I was excited to be able to share the walls with some of the best photographers in our school, who I have a great deal of respect for. I had a wonderful time at the show, and if you haven't already walked around, I believe it will be up for a week still.

I apologize for the horrible quality of the photos, I forgot to change the ISO on my point and shoot, so get ready for noisy photos!

My work on the walls


Here's me making my awesome face and embarassing Nicole! :D


I'll be posting new work when I have it all ready and hunky dory.

--David

One for the lulz

"Happy Snappy" (2010)

--David

Wilson

Recently I documented another performance piece for Chris Degrér. This one was loosely based on Tom Hanks in the movie "Castaway". It also coincided with another performance piece.

Here's a few highlights out of the images I took, just to give you an idea.











All images © David Velasco 2010, performance by Chris Degrér and narrator. Please don't steal my images or post them elsewhere without my permission.

--David