I’m off to India to photograph some personal projects and stories. I’ll be all over, but I’m going to be updating this blog as I move around. Above is the latest and greatest in my competitive eater project, Crazy Legs Conti. Of all the subjects I’ve photographed for this project he was the most helpful, open and willing to play around. He’s also helped put me in touch with Kobayashi, Beautiful Brian, and Joey Chestnut. In other words, he’s awesome. We’re going to be planning a gallery show of my portraits for next July, right around the Nathan’s contest. I’ll keep you posted.
I’m off to finish packing! I’ll be landing late Wednesday night in Delhi. It’s 12 hours ahead there, that should be easy to remember. My first order of business will be to get a local Indian cell phone. I’ll post that here so we can all keep in touch.
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It’s been a while since I remembered how fun my job can be. I’ve been working on a small portrait project for a few months focusing on competitive eaters. They are a friendly, welcoming bunch and everyone I’ve approached has been happy to take time out of their lives to let me get goofy with them. Above is Tim “Eater X” Janus, ranked 4th in the International Federation of Competitive Eating. I let each eater choose which food they want to be photographed with. It can be something they particularly like, or something they’ve won a major competition with. Tim has won lots of contests but one of the most recent was when he ate 10 1/2 pounds of ramen in eight minutes! I was there and it was impressive. He is the roommates of another competitive eater (whose portrait you’ll see soon) and they train ahead of time, trying out different beverages and strategies.
When he chose ramen as the food in his picture it was kind of a no-brainer to take him down to Chinatown for the tail end of the New Year’s celebration. It was snowing, and we were attracting a crowd. The energy was great and people were shooting on confetti. It was a shoot I was stressed out about but it could not have gone better. I had a really hard time picking an image, and this may not be the one I stick with but it gives you the idea.
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Have you heard of Kaiju? The best way I can describe it is live-action Japanese anime wrestling. It’s like high-energy WWE crossed with all the weirdness of Japanese monster movies. All of the “wrestlers” are characters that you would never recognize. One is called Dusto Bunny. Another is Kung-fu Chicken Noodle. My favorite is a waffle-shaped called French Toast. I was turned onto this sport by my friend Sol Neelman. He photographed a “battel” a few months ago and it looked so strange that I couldn’t turn down the opportunity to take pictures from the danger zone the other night. This is the conclusion of the main event at Webster Hall, between Call-Me-Kevin and Grudyin (from Dr. Cube’s posse.)
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This self-assignment was born out of frustration. I was on a not-so-exciting assignment last week when I ran across the postcard for the Manhattan Amateur Classic children’s ballroom dancing competition. I spent a few minutes getting mad about why I never get sent on these types of assignments until I realized that I could just send myself. So I did. I will never cease to be amazed at the power of photography. Or more to the point, you can get in all sorts of cool places just by asking. For more work, take a look at the Flickr set.
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Taco Taco | January 15th, 2008
I had an assignment the other day at La Esquina, the superhip, trendy restaurant in the bottom of a taco spot downtown. Last night I happened to be back in the neighborhood and was hungry for a fish taco. This is the view out of their diner window.
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