Women's Press

click to embiggenI took a photo of former Minnesota RollerGirl Cupcake a few years back for a calendar and the Minnesota Women's Press wanted to use it for their July 2011 cover. Just thought I'd share.

http://www.womenspress.com/

My Persona and The Roller Derby

As some of you may be aware I'm closely involved with the Minnesota RollerGirls. Not only do I do a ton of studio photography for them but I am also an instructor and a member of their league. There is one other role I play and that is of their Janitorial Artist.

At every roller derby bout I roller skate around in my janitors uniform making sure the track is clean and safe from any foreign objects, blood, sweat, skate debris, and of course spilled fan beer. When there is a lull in the action I take my home made t-shirt cannon and launch Pabst T-Shirts into the crowd.

If you ever told me 8 years ago that I'd be doing this all in front of 5,000 screaming fans I'd tell you to go straight to hell but the Minnesota RollerGirls are a great muse for me and allow me to try fun new projects just because I have the ability to.

At our Season 7 Championship bout I strapped my GoPro HD camera to my T-Shirt Cannon for a single shirt launch and also for a confetti launch for the Coveted Golden Skate winning Rockits. It was a spur of the moment idea but ended up being pretty fun and I'm going to do this again in the future.

Sorry that most of the time the camera is pointing straight up but when the cannon is loaded I need to consider it a loaded weapon. At close range it could really hurt someone but once the cannon is discharged I'm able to point it around a bit more.

Minnesota RollerGirls Season 7 Team Portraits

A few weekends ago my good friend Zack and I got together and photographed the Minnesota RollerGirls.  Zack shot video portraits while I photographed the girls for their seventh season trading cards and also did some quick team portraits.

The theme this season is based around old photographs and portraits. The teams shots are a reflection of some 60's and 70's elementary class portraits while the trading cards, which are still under production, will look a lot more like an old baseball card in it's photograph sense.

Enjoy.

Click to embiggen.

Press Check

I went over to Landland today to do a press check on the Minnesota RollerGirls 2010 Season Championship "Bone of Contention" Poster and I decided to bring my little video camera with me.  The poster is coming along really nice and the best part is it's going to glow in the dark!  I'm super excited.  Thanks Dan for letting me do this.

Minnesota RollerGirls Trading Cards Season 6

Once again this season I was able to take photos for the Minnesot RollerGirls trading cards.  Here are just some of my favorites.

Enjoy.

Minnesota RollerGirls Trading Cards

I've been working again with the Minnesota RollerGirls to create their 2010 Home Season Trading Cards and the whole project has been going great.  We shot this video to give the world a little taste of what they will be able to get once the trading cards are released to the public in January.

One of the problems we've had in the past with doing over a 100 different trading cards was the amount of post production time we need to create the front and the backs of all the cards with all the correct information on them.  We decided this year to try to do all of the names and numbers and likes and dislikes in camera at the time of shoot.

We have two sets going for this project.  The first one is for the front of the trading cards in which the RollerGirl gets to actually stand in their frame.  The second is for the backs of the trading card where she spells out letters her important information.

Minnesota RollerGirls Bio Photos

Every fall I get to photograph all the new rookies for the Minnesota RollerGirls.  They use these photos on their website but also in certain media advertising as well.

This year I was real sick during the photoshoot and had a pretty good fever at the time.  Considering that, I'm pretty impressed with how well the photos came out again this year.  Below are just three of the twenty different rookies I got to photograph this year.

BOOMbay SafireCassie RolleMadame de Stompadour

My New Skates are SO Pretty!

I am so excited to show off my brand new custom Riedell skates!

They've got Powerdyne DynaPro Aluminum Plates which are some of best plates for the money in my opinion and I also like them because they are super durable and are going to last you more then a few seasons possibly a lifetime.

The best part of these skates are the custom boots for sure. Together with Riedell we sat down to recreate the look and feel of my old skates, the joggers, as much as possible.  So we started with a standard 265 boot size 8. The 265 already has a retro feel with the old school logo on the side and it's two vertical stripes but you also get a great durable boot without having to break the bank.

We then decided to go with the 'Ultra Blue' premium leather as the base color for the skate and used the premium leather 'Yellow' for the stripes and for the tongue of the skate.  The standard white laces go a super long way. I had been planning on replacing the laces with yellows ones but as soon as I got the white ones on the skates I decided to keep them.

I'm still debating if I need to swap out the toe stops for a white or yellow stop but for right now I'm leaving them they way they are, and of course I'm ordering some 'Ultra Blue' toe protectors from Riedell right away to keep these babies protected from regular roller derby toe wear.

There is one crucial feature of these skates that is dramatically different then my old skates; they are the correct size!  I had no idea my previous 265 boots (not shown) where too big for me by half a size but that along with me being a little flat footed was causing some horrible cramping in my feet.  Riedell measured me for these skates and they also gave me some small wedges to put under the heels of my feet to help with my flat footed-ness.  It's amazing the difference I've already noticed with these skates.

I don't think I can emphasize how excited and in love with these skates I am!   I love them so much.  Thank you Riedell for being an awesome company but for also being an awesome Minnesota company.

My new babies!My old babies.Two generations side by side.

Derby Informercial

My Minnesota RollerGirls are some of the craziest and most creative people on this planet and every year we put together a short video for our Wheelie awards.  While the Wheelies are not open to the public we do share the video every year with the world.  So, I proudly present Roller Derby!

"For my second trick..."

I did this time-lapse video of one of the Minnesota RollerGirls bouts this past season and I just wanted to share it with the world again.  It's just so damn pretty.  I want to give some props to my friend Luke Harper at Audio Altimeter for all the help with the music.  We've got a couple more in mind that we would like to do in the future.