Purple Penguin Productions, LLC » Purplepenguin

Dir en grey @ Nokia Theater Times Square

Purplepenguin — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 00:56:32 +0000

I got a little courageous with this show. After the great stuff that came out of the 135mm F2 lens, I decided to try out the 85mm F1.2. Results were pretty fantastic. I didn’t chance it so much with Dir en grey; I switched back to my 24-70 a song in. I did use the 85 for most of Apocalyptica and it helped that they tended to cluster together. You can now see some of these photos over at Prefix Mag too!

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Apocalyptica @ Nokia Theater Times Square

Purplepenguin — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 21:31:52 +0000

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Not D’espairsRay

Purplepenguin — Fri, 13 Aug 2010 04:48:56 +0000

Today I trekked out to the Studio at Webster Hall to photograph D’espairsRay. I was going to lobby Prefix to get the photos up and give the band some publicity. But when I arrived I found out there was a strict no photo policy even after I had checked a few times with their management and promoter beforehand. I’m testing out the Canon 135mm 2.0 L lens, so I brought it along. Am I annoyed? Yes, mostly because I passed up another (paid) shoot. Yet another reason to just pass on the smaller Japanese bands that come play NYC. Here’s a photo of the opening band and my cat, both shot with the Canon 135mm 2.0 L lens. I’m quite happy with how sharpy sharp the lens is. In a small venue setting, the lens isn’t very usable, since you need alot of space to maneuver and compose your shots. It’s just too long and the 85mm would be a much better all around prime for a small venue.

h.Naoto Fashion Show @ Otakon 2010

Purplepenguin — Sun, 01 Aug 2010 23:12:16 +0000

The h.Naoto fashion show was long. I love his designs, but no matter how slowly you make your models trudge down the runway, most folks are too far away to notice the details that really make h.Naoto’s designs so fantastic. His little details, like the patterns on a shirt or the tiny buttons down a coat, are meticulous and symbolic.

I got there late, so this may not be all the designs he showed. There were two videos for the Hangry & Angry sub-line and Sixh. Both lines are basically the same concept of music and fashion melding together, intertwined so much that one can’t tell which influences the other and vice versa. They were both a little boring and not up to par with the work that went down the runway.

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Otakon 2010

Purplepenguin — Sun, 01 Aug 2010 18:58:34 +0000

Every year Baltimore gets to host a little event called Otakon. Just imagine thousands of nerdy children, their parents, random hipsters and the occasional sane human converging at the giant glass walled Baltimore convention center dressed in every imaginable costume from Japanese animation, popular science fiction, fantasy and video games. It’s an insane amount of color, noise and BO.

This year featured quite a bit of Japanese fashion with the Ultimate Lolita Fashion Show and the h.Naoto Runway Show & Panel. The Lolita Show features work from local designers in North America. I was asked to walk for Morrigan NYC. I’m not a runway model, but luckily I can walk straight and keep my posture. I didn’t faceplant into the floor and that’s good.

I think these types of conventions are great venues for budding photographers to work with natural light and also work on posing people. There’s tons of folks walking around just waiting to get their picture taken. As long as you’re polite, they’ll be polite and you may come out with some interesting stuff. Even if you’re a sniper-photog with a long telephoto, the stuff that happens at these conventions won’t be replicated elsewhere and putting the photos together could make for a great story.

I had meant to take photos documenting what I did each day at the convention, but opted not to after a hectic press schedule. I did catch one of the Twin Bee’s, a bit of the h.Naoto show, a Jasmine You (visual kei band Versailles) cosplayer and some other random cosplay stuff.

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