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The Camera to me.

My love for cameras came far much earlier than photography. Typically it is reversed, but that is not the case with me. My first camera was from my grandfather. It was a small blue plastic film camera that took packs of flash strips, each had 5 flashes for each. I don't ever remember taking a planned shot, or seeing a developed photograph. But I was obsessed with it's buttons. The way the flash blinded me the moment that plasticky click went off. I loved it.

The next camera I remember was my fathers. In the 80's a small compact 35mm film camera that had a electric zoom on it. I thought it was magic.

My first SLR was N70 that I had traded at a small pawn shop one cold afternoon. I was young and broke. Didn't have much to my name. One being a pretty nice shotgun. Cameras had held my heart, though I knew nothing about how to work one. I found the N70 came with a silver hard traveling case that also contained 3 different old beat up lenses. The shop owner thought I was crazy to want to trade the nice shotgun for the camera, but I insisted. The trade probably saved my life honestly. I shot for about a year. Always on automatic. Nobody really around to learn from in the country town I lived at. I knew I was in love with black and white photographs.

My first DSLR was a Nikon D200. I was still pretty fresh to cameras. Sure I kind'v knew how to exchange the lenses, but that was about it. I bought the camera with a 17-55 and a 10.5 fisheye. A photographer friend of mine told me to always buy pro level glass. "Bodies come and go, technology will always upgrade, but quality pro glass will always stay with you"

I moved to a D300 and then a D700. I loved the Nikon's to death. They fit so good I would constantly keep it in my hand because it felt so natural.

Video smacked the photography world like Hogan off the ropes. The question came, to mix video with photography? The king kong that only wielded the mighty sword of 1080p was the 5d mk II, the Nikon nemesis CANON.. DUN DUN DUNNNN. I switched and like Forest Gump says.....Thats all I have to say about that.

Picking up the camera now is a constant reminder of how much I love them. The weight says it was built tough, to go in all terrains, to document the history of the world. The buttons offer a world of possibilities to create visual interpretations. The glass shows the level of engineering invested in these amazing machines.

Why do you love cameras? Photography? Flash strobes or natural lighting. BW or rich color? HDR or single exposure. What do you feel passionate about?

Gear: Matthew's Muslin. Time Lapse

Recently did a commercial shoot involving some pretty amazing cars and their owners. Here is a Time Lapse Video of myself and Sean putting together the Matthews Muslin. Its basically a 20 x 20 frame that holds the muslin on HUGE Matthews roller HI HI stands. I would shoot through the muslin, using it as a giant diffuser to spread the light out evenly and softly over the car. Takes about an hour to put together.





HAVE FUN!

Have Fun

SEE IT LARGER HERE

Working Late at night often, you have to do funky stuff to keep your mind moving, thinking, creating. Sooooo sometimes I call up my cheapest model....myself. We have to remember to have fun. Don't take yourself too seriously. Life is too short for that. Laugh. Focus. Laugh Some more.

For the Lighting, Simple. (See Diagram Below) White background. AB1600 through a Beauty Dish that is diffused boomed camera left. You don't have to have a BD, you can use a soft box.
I used Lightroom 3 to make the gridded contact sheet. (You can do this in Lightroom 2 as well) Go to PRINT and lay out your grid preferences. Cheers



Have fun

Braun

BrianBraun.net
Dallas Texas Based.

Greatness

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly...who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause ; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who have never known neither victory nor defeat" - Teddy Roosevelt

Gallery and PARTY!

Over the years I have had many offers to show in various reputable galleries. This alone did not serve my interest as an artist. Urban Dog Coffee founder and owner, Brady, approached me that instead of a gallery commission for each sell, instead a chosen organization that is striving to better this world. THIS INTEREST ME AND I FOUND WORTH THE VENTURE.

So I'm finally having a fine art show. It features a lot of my personal work as well as commercial. I've always thought there is really a fine line between commercial art. I'M THROWING A SHOW EVENT-PARTY Saturday APRIL 10th, 2010! 2720 Oak Lawn ste A. Dallas! Bring all your friends and 3 strangers!

Recent Review: "Braun see's Dallas with an eye like no other photographer Ive met. A Dallas Native, Braun captures the cityscapes and scenery with depth and whimsey and seemingly without compromise to either. His work is really stunning, giving us a fresh way to view our city. His show benefits Sower Of Seeds Intl, an organization working to prevent sex trafficking."

This show goes to benefit Sower of Seeds International by giving 35% of all proceeds from each sale. Please take the time to learn more about this amazing organization.

"Because Art is so personal I wanted to give people options in how my prints could be purchased to match each buyer specifically. Bellow is my pricing for this show. I have decided to limited editions of each print because the value will only increase as investment as time passes. Thank you for being part of my journey as a photographer and artist. "
Each Print comes signed, numbered, and with a certificate of authenticity with the registered Limited Edition number for your records.

RSVP HERE!

I believe that the truly creative periods are those when you live with intensity

I don’t know what’s important to the people who look at my photos. What’s important to me is to make them. I work all the time, but there are only a few of my photos that I find really good. I am not even sure that I am really a good photographer. I think that anyone working as I do could do the same. But my purpose is not to prove my talent. I photograph almost every day, except when it’s too cold for traveling the way I do – as in this time of winter. Sometimes my photos are OK, other times they are not, but I think that eventually something will come out of my work. I don’t worry about it.

–Josef Koudelka

(Courtesy of A Photo Editor, one of my favorite blogs)

IPHONE APP: Brian Braun

It's Official! I'm now an IPhone App!! Or at least my Portfolio is.
(download it FREE from Itunes)

Why? (Some would say why not) Several Reason. Presence, communication, public relations, branding, and a lot of reasons but also it's fun. Mainly I wanted another avenue for my clients to keep up with me and see my newest work. There are great ways to keep in your client's mind, from postcards, email blasts to even sticky notes with your name on it. All are great. I believe in them all. Get out there and shine.

A great deal of my client's are in the advertising world. They Travel. What do you want to do while your plane is delayed? Play on your IPhone. If they are talking to their client or a colleague in the elevator or lobby, they want to show you off for a BIG JOB...Done. I'm not saying that this is the only place I want people to check out my work, but options to view my work are what I always want to provide for people.
(download it FREE from Itunes)

Functionality. Besides showing my work, there are some really cool things that the designer and I worked on for some time. (More than happy to share him to anybody that wants to contact me)
People can see my Blog, Twitter, Bio with website and Email right there on the app. The portfolio will automatically check for new images. (My new site will be out very soon as well!!)

The images can be viewed horizontally and vertically just by turning your IPhone, just like it does in the photos section of your Iphone. Also the App's photo can be scrolled through with the traditional finger flip through move, or you can use the arrows. ENJOY

(download it FREE from Itunes)



I'd love to hear your thoughts! Let me know!

Braun

A Hopeful New Year

2010. It's Here! Finally! We made it. 2009 Left us weary and tired. This year brings all levels of hopes and optimistic expectations. This year will be different. Of course this all from personal experiences which have carved this bright declaration.

Shot from a shoot for Bombardier Aerospace. I love this jet. Amazing Machine!
What have you created this year? What are your hopes? What will you push yourself to learn? For me, its master timelapse techniques and several software. Branding and rebranding myself once again. This effort is an ever and always evolving privilege. We must treat it as so.

What new tools will help you achieve your progression in creativity?
Let me know! I want to know!

Keep shooting

Braun

Drawing the War, Voices from Eastern Congo produced by Duckrabbit

Amazing images and stories. I love photography for the power it holds to describe is incalculable.

Drawing the War from duckrabbit on Vimeo.

(Courtesy of Stephen Alvarez's Blog)

Duckrabbit has produced a series of multimedia pieces on the Eastern Congo (website here). This particular piece is about children kidnaped by the Lords Resistance Army. As part of rehabilitation and counseling returned abductees are encouraged to draw their experiences. Eastern Congo is a hard place, suffering there is so common that it does not rate as news by the world media. The LRA in particular is a dark subject there is a reason that its leader is under indictment by the ICC.

-creative director of Duckrabbit,
"too often the photography world whirs around a sense of art and not people. Africa is the dark continent, but as I'm sure you know spend enough time there and your eyes adjust."

Well their eyes have adjusted well. They tell the story beyond the headlines -or lack of headlines- and bring back humanity. Theses are people suffering, people with names and stories.

Bahati's Story - Condition Critical from duckrabbit on Vimeo.

Commissioned by MSF Duckrabbit has put together fine pieces of advocacy and storytelling.

Keep Shooting.
-Braun

Help Portrait

Recently I had the great honor to be a part of a special project... Help Portrait. A crew of like minded and hearted UBER talented photographers got together and gave up their valuable time and amazing skills to shoot portraits of the south Dallas community centered around CornerStone Church....They let me tag along.

Help Portrait (Dallas) from jordan bellamy on Vimeo.

I left encouraged and moved after spending the day shooting a whole range of families and individuals. Some had never had their portrait taken....EVER. The Mom+Son+Aunt (shot below) hadn't had a family photo since Chris (the son) was 2 years old!

Their first family portrait! (below) So Why is this project so important? Well for one, History. These photo's will last generations. When a great great niece asks what Aunt Linda looked like, the family will have a photograph to show her. It's important for everybody to know that they are loved, beautiful, and worth remembering. Worth documenting their life.

This man helped start Cornerstone Church. The area is not in the best part of town. Pastor Chris told us stories about early days of drive by shootings and dead bodies found behind the building was a regular thing. This man shines love for his area. It was my great honor to take his portrait.

Here are the first video's of the founder of Help Portrait, Jeremy Cowart. Thank you Mr. Cowart for your heart.




Seeing great photographer like Chase Jarvis, Jeremy Cowart, and Austin Mann use their talents not just to pay the bills, but enrich other's lives out of the solid goodness of their hearts gives me a great hope for the future of photography. Keep Shooting.

Huge Thanks to everybody involved! Amazing job

Recently I had the chance to shoot one of my favorite Dallas Bands....ODIS. I've loved these guy's music for several years now, so I was pretty pumped when Larry, the lead singer, asked me to shoot them.

The direction from the guys is that they wanted this RAW.."just us".."this is me" kindv shots. No smoke or magic or uber lighting. If you are somewhat familiar with my work you know I like to explore the possibilities both in camera and in post. (computer software). WHAT NO PS, NO MASKS....NOPE. Oddly enough I felt liberated and challenged. It's good to be challenged.
Larry (Vocals)


Kindv kicking myself for not shooting some behind the scenes fun. Being the oldest of 3 brothers, makes me pretty at home with hanging with guys...doing guys stuff. Yes we had a nerf gun shoot out and Rob the guitar genius showed us how he could barely escape death while busting some sweet moves on the skateboard in the studio. My brothers and I all live pretty far away from each other now so just hanging out with these guys made me miss them quite a bit.
Mike (drummer)

While shooting we jabbered on about our favorite Bruce Lee Movies (Enter the Dragon...DUH) and the local Dallas music scene.
Rob (guitar)

Lighting: Imagine this!!! Subject 3-5 ft in front of the white backdrop.
An, AB1600 through a large octabox right behind me elevated pointed down. Another pointing at the back drop behind the subject. WOOWWWWW. 2 light was used.

Bristen (Bass)...(FYI Ashton Kutcher stole his sig look from Bristen)


HUGE THANKS TO Studman SEAN for all the help.

Have Fun and keep shooting!

Braun

I am...Moved!

Here some amazing video's that truly inspired me. Some technically, other's esthetically, and another competitively. Let me know what you think!
Land of Talk, "It's Ok"

Land of Talk - It's Okay from Saddle Creek on Vimeo.

One of my favorite photographers, Andrew Zuckerman's "BIRD Film".

BIRD film from Andrew Zuckerman Studio on Vimeo.

Behind the Scene of Andrew Zuckerman's BIRD Film

BIRD Behind the Scenes from Andrew Zuckerman Studio on Vimeo.

This cool vid from photographer Alexx Henry for a "future" Outside Magazine. Amazing!

Big Freeze + Creed

These past couple of months have been pretty crazy. Finally home for a little bit. Sorry I haven't blogged in so long. Let's catch up!!

Lately I've been working on huge projects with my mentor Robert Latorre with his camera system....THE BIGGGG FREEZE. Our latest adventure was a couple of shows for the band CREED.

Robert Latorre with his Big Freeze at the Houston Creed show. Can you count all 3 rigs??

Tech low down. We used 48 Nikon D700's, 42 Nikon D300's, and a ton of the original film freeze system. It just so happened to break a World Record of Most Camera's used in a live production. Total of 250!! (breaking Jusin Timberlake's of 42...Sorry JT) Here is a guy from the guinness book of world records they flew from London to verify the system. He liked it a lot.





The lead singer Scott showing off his skills on how to blow stuff up. "This is how I torch and melt Nikon cameras! AHHHH!!!!!"


The Real Rock Star....TRAVIS!!



The footage came out amazing...I will post after Creed's DVD comes out.
Photographer/Production tip #11...Never publish the work before the client can...takes all the surprise out of the fun.
Photographer/Prodcution tip #93...When the Pyro Tech's yells.....PRYO TEST!...Seriously watch where your standing!

THE ENTIRE FREEZE TEAM DID AN AMAZING JOB! It was my honor to work with everybody!

Video from my new Iphone 3gs. Love this thing!!


Keep Dreaming and Keep Shooting!

Braun

Recent Update.

Nike: Exploit Yourself

Amazing new Nike video. "Exploit Yourself". Here is the commercial and the "Making of" short. (reminds me of my morning runs ;) ) Enjoy!

The Runner -Exploit yourself- from BLR_VFX on Vimeo.

MakingOf -Exploit Yourself- from BLR_VFX on Vimeo.

Keep Moving Forward!

Recently I've been asked, How's Business? How are things?
Is this out of general conversation manner or genuine interest? Sure.

Anybody that is watching the news, or (like I do) read headlines of papers as you walk by, they know that the economy is suffering. Budgets are being cut. Money isn't flowing like wine anymore...right now. Is this the end? A lot of people are hanging up their hats as creative professionals. I get it. Things are hard.

OK what do we do? Maybe Nike isn't blowing your phone up? Are you at the point where they should? maybe so, maybe no. But what this little "time out" lets us take a moment to be still, to look at us, our profession, our skills....with a little more clear mind. USE IT.

One of my favorite sayings is from Walt Disney (the man), KEEP MOVING FORWARD...._________________(fill in the blank with any excuse) KEEP MOVING FORWARD, but ____________________(another excuse) KEEP MOVING FORWARD, another _____, another ______. Are we getting it? KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

The only real currency in this world is time. Ask any Billionaire laying on his death bed, and I promise he will trade his fortune for more time. Luck favors the prepared. I truly believe that. I can't tell you how many time I should learned that (the hard way).

Keep Moving Forward. Get Creative. Maybe clients aren't paying big money all the time. But think about this. When the time comes, Are they gonna spend their money on the guy that has been sitting in his room all day waiting on them. OR will they go with the person constantly putting out new work, fresh ideas, creative concepts. Which professional do you think will stick in their mind? Build your brand, your name, your work. I believe in you!

Have fun. Keep the faith

(SNEAK PREVIEW to one of my new personal projects)

Sam THE Magic Man

Recently I had the great privilege of shooting an amazing entertainer. Sam the Magic Man. A VERY gifted magician. Seriously, when the guy makes you flip your card up (facing the floor) and its one, snaps his fingers, and then its another... that will make you think twice about what is real in this world. But besides his fantastic gifts, he is as funny a person as I have found.

Recently Sam has turned his attention to modeling....and being a not so horribly ugly guy...I'm sure he'll turn heads doing that as well. The above photo was shot with my favorite car in the world. My Dad's 1982 Porsche 911. I grew up in that car, and somehow it show's me my dad more than any picture could. He loaned (hesitantly) the sweet German to me for the shoot. Sadly we didn't have much time to really spend much time shooting it. But I'm not done with it yet. ;)

Contact Sam: 214.384.5049

Find the joy in all that you do. Be a blessing.

Braun

AMAZING DSLR Vid by Timescapes!

Everybody knows I'm a super sucker for creative ways of making video with DSLR's. This takes the cake!!!!!

I love love love this video that Timescapes did with the 5d markII. Truly amazing. ENJOY. (WATCH IN HD IF YOU CAN!)

Timescapes Timelapse: Learning to Fly from Tom @ Timescapes on Vimeo.

Here is his magical genius rig!

Timescapes: Timelapse Dolly Project from Tom @ Timescapes on Vimeo.

Stay Inspired! Keep Creating!

Braun

Stay inspired!

When I was a kid, we always watched movies. Always. I love them. I'm still addicted to them. If you rolled over to my Mom's there was (still is) a solid 96.459% chance a Disney movie was on. In her eyes they were the best. We all loved them. (too many short sentences Braun, get to the point) Recently I had the chance to go see UP in 3d. Great movie, but more importantly (to me) is what came on before the movie started. The opening title with the Disney castle. Few things throw me back to childhood like that little melody. I sat there excited in bewilderment.

THE POINT IS....being a professional creative in this UBER connected world is hard and dangerous. Meaning, you can "numb out" to being inspired really quick. Don't misunderstand me, I love this time we live in....has there ever been a more exciting period? Always search for new inspirations. Look for what gives you butterflies like when the world first hit you as such a magical place. Before you figured out what CNN was talking about. Inspire yourself. Try these

• Create your own world.
• Get around people that are better than you...iron sharpens iron.
• Spend time alone.
• Be still.
• Explore.
• Listen.
• Try a new creative outlet.
• Go to the wrong side of town.
• Go to the right side of town.
• Get out of town.
• Go in to town.
• Get lost
• Have fun
• Do something random
• Do something kind unexpected
• Talk to a stranger
• make your own list
  

Braun