As I write this post I am getting ready to head off to bed so I can wake up bright and early for a camping trip. My buddy Paul is having his birthday so all the guys are camping out in Glen Rose at Dino Park for the weekend. Not sure if I will have a chance to take many pictures but I will do my best! Hopefully I’ll get to see some dinosaur tracks, and maybe some dramatic clouds to frame them with

TED Talks

Have you checked out the TED Talks section yet? If you have some time, head over there and get comfortable. TED is an incredible organization with some of the brightest thinkers and creators and dreamers around, and they are all giving the talks of their lives to a crowd full of people at the top of their fields. If you can’t make up your mind, I recommend two to start out – Jill Bolte Taylor’s talk is my all time favorite TED video. She is a brain researcher and she actually got to study herself while she was having a stroke! Not by choice of course, but it’s a really eye opening talk on the difference between right brain and left brain thinking. This weekend I plan on shutting my left brain down and leaving it at home! Another is Taryn Simon’s talk on “Photographing Secret Sights.” She spends months trying to get behind closed doors as different places to photograph things that most people never see, or even knew existed. Very interesting. If you get hooked on TED like I have, you won’t get much done this weekend. Cheers!

Snotty Nosed Elephant Seals at San Simeon

These images are near and dear to my heart. They was taken during the trip to California that got me hooked on photography. Now, I was already into photography at this point. I was an avid hobbyist and was searching for clients, but this trip sealed (pun intended) the deal. We were visiting my wife’s side of the family for her cousin Chelsey’s wedding and we made it out there a few days early to help prepare. They live in San Luis Obispo and it is absolutely gorgeous there! One day, my sister-in-laws boyfriend (now husband) Noah and I (are you confused yet?) decided to take off for an afternoon and go explore. We headed north and had to choose between seeing potential Elephant Seals, or paying to go see a definite Hearst Castle. We decided on the seals and it was a great choice! We got to the beach and there were literally hundreds upon hundreds of seals lounging on the shore! While I don’t condone this kind of behavior, we immediately climbed down to the beach, past the sign that said “Do not approach seals, federal fines up to somethin somethin.” In my experience, sometimes the best images involve a little rule breaking. We were very cautious to get a feel for how close the seals wanted us to get, and we figured out quickly that their bubble was about three feet. I took about 300 some odd photo’s before we decided we had better leave (some guy started yelling at us saying we would get in trouble). Here are the images that started it all

My favorite of the bunch

This girl might of had a cold, not sure

The moment I knew I might be too close…

The 3 foot rule, give or take

I try to keep things as fresh as possible here. I’ve been working really hard to add high quality, relevant content to the site for my readers and I think this is a good next step. Over the next few weeks or maybe months, I will be developing some online training videos for people interested in photography. I’m currently in the brainstorming phase of what videos to produce and what topics to expound on. I have a good idea of what I’d be interested in making, but what really matters is what interests you! So I am currently taking requests and recommendations for what videos to focus on. There are three main ways to cast your vote: Leave a comment below this post, send me an email to contact (at) jamesbrandon.cc, or you can send out a tweet that says something like this – @jamesdbrandon, I think you should create a tutorial for _______. I’ll tally up any votes I receive and use that to decide which videos to focus on first. Thanks in advance everyone!

The Historic Cowtown Coliseum in Fort Worth

Fort Worth is my home. I’ve been here all my life and the only time I want to leave is when I visit Hawaii. Despite the ridiculously hot weather, unreasonable humidity levels, and the occasional tornado, it’s actually quite a pleasant place to live. I live right between Fort Worth and Dallas, and on any given night if I have a choice, I’m going to Fort Worth. It’s just so much more laid back than Dallas. I could spend all day taking pictures in the Stock Yards, and all night hanging out at Sundance Square. Not that Dallas is bad, I just feel more uptight there, you know?

The image below is of the historic Cowtown Coliseum on East Exchange (the main street running through the stockyards). I’ve been there a few times over the years for the rodeo and even the occasional boxing matches they host. The whole area is rich in history and this place is no exception. It was built in 1907 and completed in 1908. The coliseum hosted the worlds first indoor rodeo, the first live rodeo broadcast, the first night time horse showing, and more. If you’re ever near Fort Worth, you’ve just got to come by the stock yards.

The Cowtown Coliseum
121 E. Exchange Ave.
Fort Worth, TX 76164
1-888-COWTOWN or Metro 817-625-1025

Guess what! You can now see my work hanging at the art251 gallery in Keller, Texas in the Art House complex. Art251 is a beautiful, very modern art gallery and it features only the best work from local and national artists. They also made it into the coveted “Best of the Best Big D” list for D (Dallas) Magazine. I am truly honored to have some of my work hanging on their walls! If you get a chance to stop by, be sure to check out the work of Sean Fitzgerald. He’s a fellow photographer and has been to some really cool places in Africa. Art251 has a gallery in Dallas that is more “earthy” and sells things besides art, while the Keller gallery is purely art focused, which I like. Check out the art251 website for directions, and you can check out my bio page there as well.

The alligator in waiting

I set up this quick image at a restaurant called Lorenzillo’s in Cancun, Mexico. I was trying my best to capture the beautiful light filling up the trees from the orbs. I knew I had to move quick because a storm was rolling in quickly (you can see the dark sky creeping in from the right side of the image). I set up my tripod and started firing off shots but I kept running into trouble with ghosting because the storm was bringing high winds that were causing the tree to sway as well as the umbrellas on the deck. I had to of been there for about 5 minutes before my wife Kristin suddenly realized there was a freaking alligator laying beneath us! I didn’t even notice it there because I was focused on the lights in the tree, I never thought to look down. Once we saw, we both thought it was fake. I was convinced that there wouldn’t be some random, blue platform floating in the water that some alligator could come crawl up on. I figured the alligator was there to scare customers and was built on the platform and tossed into the water. Makes sense right!? This guy didn’t move an inch the whole time we were there. While Kristin was totally convinced it was a fake, I kept starring at it to see if it moved. Then I noticed something; the small waves that were hitting the shore from boats where causing the alligators tail to sway in the water! It wasn’t plaster! I was then filled with a deep sense of panic because I had been taking pictures about 20 feet from an alligator and didn’t know it was there the whole time. What if it was hungry?

About the image | Laguna Beach at High Tide

I took this image at a somewhat secluded cove in Laguna Beach, below the famous (and incredibly expensive) Montage Beach Resort. In fact it was so secluded that some photographer felt comfortable enough to photograph his half naked girlfriend and was right in the way of my shots for a while. After they finally left, I was free to create images of the sunset! Kristin and I waited at this cove for an hour or so waiting for the sun to go down, and for naked people to leave. During the sunset, I took tons of images from different angles. And when it just started dipping below the horizon we started to leave to find a vantage point on top of the cliffs. Right when I got the end of the cove we were in, I found this spot and fired off 6 exposures from my 5D Mark II.

Canon EOS 5D Mark II, Canon 15mm Fisheye f/2.8, 15mm, f/14, ISO 200, 1/13th

I took this image with a Canon 5D Mark II (I’ve got a review here), and a Canon 24-70mm lens (review here). I kept the aperture fairly low here to freeze the waves as much as possible. The lower your aperture, the faster your shutter speed. Shots like these have several obstacles, including waves, birds in the air, people walking by on crowded beaches, and so on. Some people can’t figure out how you would be able to freeze birds in the air when you’re taking 3-7 frames of a scene. To concur this obstacle, you can either mask in one of the lower light frames (which always have the fastest shutter speeds of the set, or shoot a single RAW image and convert it into a pseudo HDR.

This afternoon I was looking through my images for today’s post and I stopped on the -2 exposure of this set of brackets. I instantly fell in love when I saw the finished product in my mind! Before taking this image into Photoshop it was under exposed quite a bit. In Lightroom, I added some fill light here and there, and then took by “blacks” slider and pulled them back until the histogram showed details in all of the shadows. At that point I pulled the image into Photoshop, added a detail adjustment from Topaz Labs, added a noise reduction filter, did a few more touch ups, and voila!

Canon EOS 1Ds Mark III, Canon 24-70mm f/2.8, 34mm, f/8, ISO 100, 1/100th

I get a lot of questions regarding what gear I use. Sometimes I welcome this, sometimes I go about it differently. I decided to add a gear page that goes over all of the gear I use on a day to day basis. I also blurb on my thoughts on gear and its importance. I think you’ll like it, I even added links to purchase the items if your interested, along with short descriptions of each item.

Therapeutic Hawaiian lava Massage 

Life is tough when you live on an active volcanic lava field. The locals have to get creative to attract customers to their businesses, and who knows if their business will be there tomorrow? The image below is literally an active lava field on the Big Island of Hawaii. You can see the steam rising from beneath the dried lava in the distance, forming clouds above. About a mile up the road there was fresh lava flowing over the road and barriers keeping tourists away. What amazes me is that this used to be lush, tropical rain forest. The locals refused to move away because they still own the land. It’s just covered in lava now. So a select few decided to simply rebuild their places and keep living as usual. I can’t imagine how much that would suck. It’s like building your house in the middle of a huge asphalt parking lot. The black color causes heat to radiate all around, and to make matters worse there is lava underneath causing heat to rise from the ground as well.

While I didn’t meet the lady with all these signs, I knew I liked her. Not sure if you can read that second sign from the right, but it says, “(this land) NOT FOR SALE – But if you are a great, single, fit, middle aged man, buy one of the places across the road. MAAHALO!” After reading this I couldn’t help but set up my tripod and fire off some exposures. She also offers a variety of other services, from lava beds (?) to massages, to accupressure (?), lymphatic drainage (?) and more. I have no idea what any of that is but it sounds interesting!

For this shot, I reached for my 70-200mm lens. The steam in the background adds a lot to the image and I wanted to bring that into the frame as much as I could. These longer lenses add something called compression to the image which brings the background into the frame more. With a wide angle lens, that steam would be tiny and irrelevant in the image.

Canon EOS 1Ds Mark III, Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L, 75mm, f/13, ISO 125, 1/60th

Graduating from High School is one of the most important moments in a young adult’s life. The transition from child-hood to adult-hood is defined when a student walks across the stage to accept their diploma. If you are an upcoming senior, your year as an upperclassman is about to begin, and you will be the one that the new freshman look up to, rely on, and aspire to become. This is your year; the year in which you discover who you are and which path you will take in life.

Though the summer is in full swing, now is the time to begin the traditions that come with being a High School senior. One of those traditions includes Senior Pictures. Most senior portraits are boring, monotonous, and just one of those things you have to do. Ditch the portrait studio and book with us! Whether we shoot your session at a trashed barn on your property, the Fort Worth Stock Yards, the streets of Dallas, the train yards in Grapevine, or anywhere else you can think of; rest assured that we will have a great time!

For more information or to book your session, visit our  contact page or call us at 817-366-0491 today!

Our Destination Wedding in Cancun, Mexico

Hey there fellow James Brandon Photography fans

My name is Lauren Starnes and James asked me to write and share with you all what I loved about having a destination wedding and why we chose this route! So here we go…

Before Daniel and I got engaged, we always talked about how wonderful it would be if we could have a wedding on a beach somewhere. Ever since I could remember, I’ve always dreamed of having a beach wedding—barefoot with our toes in the sand and sealing our vows with a kiss at sunset in front of our closest family and friends. When we started doing some research and realized how it was actually cheaper to have a wedding in Mexico than having it here in Keller, our thoughts were, “Let’s do it!!” We chose the Gran Caribe Real, one of the four all-inclusive Real Resorts. I was so impressed with how easy everything was, and how stress free the entire process was. Not once did I have a bridezilla moment! That’s how simple they made everything for us!

We were assigned a wedding coordinator who kept in contact with me from October to May, answering any questions or concerns I had, and bent over backwards to make sure our wedding day was perfect. We were able to pick from several different wedding packages, which included: a decorated wedding ceremony, bouquet and boutonniere, flower petals for our flower girl, champagne for a toast after the ceremony, a semi-private wedding reception with a three course meal, a wedding cake to feed all 28 people, and a decorated suite the night of our honeymoon. WOW! And the best part was, all of that was less than $2,000. We were absolutely blown away! We originally wanted to have our ceremony right on the beach under a small tent right next to the ocean, until I started thinking of the “what ifs”. What if it rained? What if it was too hot? What if it was too windy? Like any bride, I played all sorts of different scenarios in my head and decided a beach front gazebo was the best idea. Everything turned out absolutely beautiful and better than I could have ever dreamed.

Seeing each other before the ceremony | The First Look

Daniel and I also chose to see each other before the wedding. Most people say it is bad luck for the groom to see the bride before the ceremony, but because we were only given so much time for our ceremony and reception at the resort, we wanted to make sure we had plenty of shots, before and after. James and Kristin wanted Daniel and I to be able to have time just the two of us before we took pictures with our family and friends, which made it that more intimate. They had me stand at the bottom of the stairs with my back to Daniel as he came down them to see me for the first time. When James counted to three and had me turn around to see my future husband, I’ll never forget that look in his eyes. I didn’t have to ask him what he thought of the dress, or if he thought I looked pretty. The smile on his face said it all. They were able to capture the intense, intimate moments between us before the ceremony, and the crazy, fun pictures with all of our family and friends as well. It took away all the nervous feelings I had been having for weeks and allowed me to enjoy every moment of our day, and I was able to soak it all in. I’d do it all again in a heart beat!

Our experience with James and Kristin

I wanted to tell you why we picked James Brandon Photography to do our engagement and wedding photos. As a couple and individually, James and his wife, Kristin, are two of the closest friends my husband and I have. We are so honored to know them both, and blessed to have them in our lives. They are full of energy and life and work so well together as a team. Not only did they captivate each little moment that was part of one of our most important days we’ll ever experience in our lifetime, they also captured how we are as a couple. We didn’t get the normal, traditional photos. We got memories of Daniel and I being us together- goofy, crazy, silly, and 100% madly in love with each other. -Lauren Starnes

Thanks Lauren! Destination weddings are a blast, and most of the time, they are cheaper than having a wedding in your home town! They are also more intimate, as you are usually going to invite just close friends and family (very close). And you get to tie the knot in some of the most beautiful places in the world. My wife and I are expert travelers, we’ve been to a lot of places both foreign and domestic and we know the travel regulations and how to make everything go smoothly. We are always more than happy to help answer any questions or concerns about destination weddings and the details that go with them. With that said, here are some of my favorite images from Lauren and Daniels wedding. Enjoy!

The Gran Caribe Real Resort and Spa
Blvd. Kukulcan Km. 11.5, Hotel Zone
Cancun, 77500, Q. Roo, México
USA & Canada: 1.800.760.0944

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