Sharing The Roijoy

I was out walking and taking photos with Jazzluv on Ocean Beach a couple of weekends ago. At first it was quite dull and hazy but being San Francico, we knew that the weather and light could change at any moment. And it did. As the sky turned blue along came a brand new Beach Patrol unit. It stopped on the beach about 50 yards from us and screamed out to me, "I'm a stock photo opportunity, please photograph me." So I did. The driver watched me as I approached and seemingly ignored him to go and crouch by the front of the truck. I didn't want to miss the moment so I said hello to him after I had got my shot. I submitted the photo to a Stock Image library and was please to see that within an hour of it appearing on their site it started selling. I found it interesting that the very first sale was in India. Below are some of my other images that I know started to sell within an hour of being available online.

Dykes on Bikes traditionally leading the parade The San Francisco annual Pride Parade took place in June and I made my way to line Market Street in good time to get a front row position to the parade. I managed to get quite a few shots which have been taken up by image libraries for their editorial content. Unfortunately the great shots that I could see coming together in the street often got ruined by the very zealous and enthusiastic security guy who kept stepping out into the center of my camera frame so that he could either, cheer, collect freebies, or see what was going on in the distance. Moving would have meant losing my front row advantage and I suppose he wanted to have fun too while he was doing his job. Anyway, I did manage to get enough usable shots and was able to get them accepted into the image libraries. While on the subject of stock imagery, here are the first and last images I had sold for the month of June. As well as regular family shoots and portrait session...

Donner Lake Last weekend we had the pleasure of driving up to Reno to spend time with and photograph Errol Kerr of the Jamaica Ski Team . When we arrived at his home we were also introduced to Filip Flisar who is a member of the Slovenia Ski Cross Team. Both these athletes competed at the last Winter Olympic games and competed against each other recently at the Winter X Games in Aspen, Colorado . As friends as well as competitors, Filip was spending some time visiting the USA. Before reaching Errol's home, we had spent an afternoon lounging around and picnicking on the shores of Lake Tahoe, before continuing on to spend the first night at a hotel in Downtown Reno. An experience that was balanced by a surprisingly pleasant walk by the river and tea at Java Jungle . There was even an incident during the night when someone, a little worst for wear, fell down the hotel stairwell and landed on the 8th floor! But, the real fun was hanging out with Errol and his friends and meet...

I've just had a wonderful time in the tiny Central American country of Belize . The weather was great and the beaches were wonderful making the whole experience worthy of being called Paradise. A tree whose branches are right up by the house, regularly plays host to many birds. Especially a flock of green parrots who visit it 2 or 3 times a day to eat the fruit buds that sprout from the trees branches. We stay at a fairly remote location when in Belize which allows us the possibility of encountering all types of wildlife. So as well as pelicans, herons, frigates, hawks and all kinds of other birds, there were armadillos, snakes, raccoons, and many other animals including a visit from a puma one night. My stock images sold well and here you can see my first and last image sale for the month of May. Finally, I'm also happy to report that my Tamron Di lens is repaired and back with me after 2 months at the repair center. I had dropped the lens onto a wooden floor and the ...

Our mango tower on the verandah These past few days the weather has been typically tropical with glorious sunshine. We've been stocking up on fresh food and water and have been doing lots of lounging around before we start any real sightseeing. To get our provisions, we drove north to Dangriga , a Garifuna town, to the market there. A neighbor of ours asked us to pick up a couple of things for him. We successfully found one of the items, but for today at least, there is no cottage cheese in Hopkins Village or Dangriga! One point already worthy of note is that it is now mango season here in Belize and we have our first batch of freshly picked specimens to eat our way through. I ate one just before writing this - delicious!

Just a brief status at after a very busy month. Stock continues to go well and I've shown my first stock image sold in April and my last one sold in April. The first image was shot in my studio in February 2010. Although this particular image has only sold 4 times, there are also variants from the same session also selling through the stock libraries. The other image has sold 6 times and also has 2 similar images from the same shoot which have also bolstered the sales from the shoot. The model here is a fitness instructor and the shoot took place at a gym in the San Francisco financial district. The first working day of May is here now so I'm hopefully that sales will resume after the weekend with the demand for my images that I've grown used to.

The Photokore stock photography library in Asia, is using another of my images on their homepage in the revolving header graphic. The image is a 2 part comp. I set up the room shot and then went up to Twin Peaks to get the shot that you can see as the city scene in the background. The Model is Raymond Lee from San Francisco. You can see the un-cropped image below.