Everything else archive at Erik Seo Photography Blog

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Spring shoots are done, editing is done. ALMOST DONE!

02Jun10

I’m taking a break from this screen and pretty excited about it. This screen’s been haunting me for the past 3 weeks or so.

6600 Miles later. I’m home, done with the spring edit, and done looking at this screen for a bit, well part of it. It was a challenging ski season and even more of challenging of a spring with some less than ideal weather most of the year. All and all though I still came away with a bunch of shots I’m pretty stoked on and I’ll hopefully see how well they are received shortly after hearing back from the magazine editors and from my commercial clients.

I’ll be back here with some more posts and some new photos soon.

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Real creativity

19Apr10

I’ve been spending a lot of time the past few days editing photos and putting together my slideshow for the World Ski and Snowboard Festival Pro Photographer Showdown and the amount of work I’ve put into it has drained me. I’ve been feeling rather un-creative lately but my friend Kevin showed me this music video produced by a bunch of high school kids that is just awesome. So well done, especially coming out of a high school. The amount of planning and production that had to go into this to get it all to come together with kids is just amazing to me.

Could you have even tried to come up with a concept like that now? How about in high school? How about pulling off that kind of production with that many kids that are in that video? These guys killed it and I wish I could say it’s something I came up with. Go out there, get creative, bust out of the box and run away from it like these kids did.

Props to Sherwood High School, you are one creative group!

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This is one of those days you quit your job for

06Apr10

Which snow report do you believe? Which resort do you go to? It doesn’t matter. It’s going to be so good it’s stupid. This is one of those days you quit your job for if they won’t let you go skiing. Reports of 20″ overnight with another 12″ during the day. 24 hour snowfall reports up to 30″ and around 25″ in the Park City ridgeline. It’s redonkulous (That’s not even a word so I don’t know how to spell it right) and it’s April. That’s redonkulous! On that which do you believe, the Alta weather station at the Collins chair mid station just reported 34″ of snowfall in 12 hours. I’ve never been here for a storm like this.

Just go skiing.

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Sundance Film Festival is here

22Jan10

One of the busiest times of the year is apon me. The Sundance Film Festival has begun. It’s the time of year where I usually put my ski gear down, bite the bullet put my head down and go on paparatzi mode. This year is a bit different though. As opposed to the regular work covering random events for WireImage.com I’m covering the events put on by G-Tech by Hitachi. G-tech and Hitachi are putting on panels that are showcasing not just their products but on film ind photography. There will be a panel in a few days showing off some of the RED video products as well as 3d shootin with 2 cameras as well as some things on the photography side. I’m stoked to be doing Sundance work along side some like minded people instead of the usual Sundance crowd.

I’m also spending some time shootng the USSA Snowboard Gran Prix at Park City Mountain Resort which will keep me out of the Sundance scene for a few days and get me on-mountain a bit. I usually don’t get to spend any time on-mountain during the festival so this unusual Sundance for me should be the best one I’ve been a part of in the seven years I’ve covered it.

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FAA Guidelines for flying with strobe power pack batteries

28Dec09

For those of us photographers that travel internationally a lot, things could change drastically soon. With the recent failed terrorist attack on December 25, 2009 there is a lot of chatter on the internet about TSA potentially banning all electronics usage in-flight on American bound flights from outside the USA. This is pretty lame but if it happens it could mean for a lot of boring long distance flights. Check out some of the chatter here and here.

About this time last year, things changed for those of us using lithium batteries. Although the rules are counter intuitive to actual potential dangers, it’s another poorly thought out knee-jerk reaction to some previous problems with some lithium batteries catching fire. For more information about the lithium battery restrictions check out http://safetravel.dot.gov There is a fair amount of information there regarding lithium batteries on domestic flights.

So, although this is old news…a year old in fact I’m still posting this for a pretty good reason. My power packs for my Elinchrom Ranger RX AS Speed and my Alien Bees strobes use SLA and NiMH batteries. NiMH, Alkaline and SLA (Sealed Lead-Acid) batteries are still fine to put in your carry-on luggage. Sure, you know this. But do you have a pdf proving to the TSA village idiot you can to include in your Pelican case your strobe pack is in to make sure you don’t have a problem? I just spent the last half hour looking for mine, and fortunately I found it. So I thought I’d share it. Download it, print it, put it in your case/bag.

View the document here

Make sure you have your flash’s user manual as well. That way the security agents can see for themselves what’s going on in those strobe packs.

Elinchrom Ranger RX user manual

It’s a good idea to read all of this. Know the rules, have a copy of them. Chances are if you get an idiot asshole TSA agent none of the guidelines matter and you’ll be stuck waiting for a manager that knows what the rules actually are, but sometimes you can actually convince the TSA village idiots that you are obeying the rules and that you aren’t a terrorist. Just a photographer with a bunch of gear.

However, all of this being said, if you are someone that happens to have a Hensel Porty strobe kit then you are in for it. Your Li-ion battery for your power pack is too big and not allowed on the plane at all. You’ll have to ship it. Funny since it would be shipped, in a 747 just like you’d be flying in.

Filed under Everything else and Photography thoughts. |2 Comments

Skiing = Fat Knees

17Nov09

A few days ago, I got arthroscopic surgery done on both knees to clean them up a bit and make my rickety old joints work a little better and not hurt and pop all the time before the ski season gets going. Coming out of surgery I was told I had fatty tissue buildup in my knees from overuse and impact. So I guess that means Skiing gives you fat knees! I just watched the video of my surgery, if you’ve ever wondered what it looks like to take a dremel tool and a shop-vac into your knee, that’s what this video is about. I wish I had one from my back surgery I had in high school with all the rods, clamps and chicken wire they put into my spine. At least I have this one though.

Arthrosopic surgery on my knee from Erik Seo on Vimeo.

Continue reading ‘Skiing = Fat Knees’

Filed under Everything else and Personal work. |9 Comments

Here it comes…Winter

09Nov09

Winter is coming. At home in Utah we had a early bout of winter but again, Fall has prevailed and it’s warmed up a bit before the next storm rolls through. Hopefully that next storm will to flip the switch from fall to winter. The seven months that lie ahead of me are full of snowy roads, planes, sharing two bed hotel rooms with four to ten smelly dudes, being stuffed into rental cars overloaded with gear, all so I get to shoot ski photos all winter. Yes, I’m looking forward to this.

Continue reading ‘Here it comes…Winter’

Filed under Everything else, Personal work, Photography thoughts and Winter Sports Photography. |4 Comments

Halloween

03Nov09

This year I got lucky. I was at the Halloween store on Halloween day looking for a costume and found the most epic wig ever. I’m assuming every one of you has seen the Kill Bill movie series and remember the evil master, Pai Mae. I was considering a few other mediocre costumes then I saw the “Japanese Sensi” wig. Pretty easy choice, I then again got lucky at the thrift store and found a “Oriental” silk getup that completed the look. I had never done Halloween as any sort of Asian character but at least I pulled it off well. Needless to say I was pretty proud. Here’s to the drinking holiday where everyone gets to forget who they are and have a shitload of fun!

Continue reading ‘Halloween’

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Gallery showing Friday, September 18 at the Rage Films premiere of “Pretty Good” in Salt Lake City, UT

15Sep09

I’ve decided to put on a last minute show during the premiere of this year’s Rage Films movie “Pretty Good” at the Skybox Bar and Grill in Salt Lake City, UT on Friday, September 18. I will have a collection of large action prints from 10″x15″, 16″x24″, 20″x30″ and a 24″x36″ on metal as well as a small collection of lifestyle shots that were all taken during the filming of the movie “Pretty Good” this past Winter. All the prints will be available for sale at very little markup from the actual cost to print and mount these photos from $50 for the 10×15′s, $75 for the 16×24′s, $100 for the 20×30′s and $230 for the 6-piece print hung on metal.

Continue reading ‘Gallery showing Friday, September 18 at the Rage Films premiere of “Pretty Good” in Salt Lake City, UT’

Filed under Everything else, Press and Ski Photography. |4 Comments

4th of July, Part 2 – 22,000 bottle rocket launcher video

15Jul09

As promised, part 2 of the 4th of July post is here. If you didn’t see the original 4th of July post, check it out here. I did a quickie time lapse of the bottle rocket launcher on the barge being built with a quick video clip Justin Hansen took with his new Nikon D5000 of the 1 minute firing of the 22,000 bottle rockets. I’ve been called “a big 3rd grader” before. I guess this qualifies.

22,000 Bottle Rocket Launcher from Erik Seo on Vimeo.

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