The past few weeks have been slightly tough with work and personally. My father in law sought refuge with us after the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. He lives in Tokyo so there was no damage to his house or anything around him. Minor broken dishes and the likes but life went on. However, with dwindling food supplies, continuous aftershocks, and the fear of a radiated Godzilla returning to strike Japan, it was best to have him come and sun in Honoruru. Having a third person in our condo isn’t bad but its not holiday time so work must go on.
As far as the tsunami is concerned, I must say its been tough not going and documenting the drama unfolding has overpowered my desire to travel to the wasteland. We figured its best not to have a retrospective on my life after going.
Before and during all of this I had a hectic shooting schedule which had me shooting numerous jobs and as it always seems, all at once. One of the most intensive jobs shooting a travel piece for Delta Sky magazine. Sky assigned me to travel to several islands and I got to shoot everything from horseback riding to a celebrity chef. The spread was published in their April 2011 issue. I’ve already had a few flying friends send me notes they are seeing the Delta line across the friendly skies…no wait that United.
The pdf spread can be found here.
Sky tasked me to document multiple locations around Hawaii within a short time and lots of freedom. I got to pick and choose from a list of locations and venues and decide which would make great art versus what could be picked up from hotel stock. We figured there would be very little value in shooting hotel rooms and beautiful sunsets because most hotels have libraries of that stuff. So I concentrated on the unique, rather, the more editorial view of most of the locations.
One of my favorite images came out of the Halekulani Resort in Waikiki. The Resort has numerous gorgeous stock images of their hibiscus signature pool but the images sell corporate beauty, not what its like to actually see it. You see an idea, a concept, not the reality of a pool filled with tourists. I scouted the pool before I realized dusk and above would get me a great shot. I asked the hotel to get me a room above with a balcony overlooking the property. It didn’t take long to see the images I wanted to capture.
The mag loved it. They actually wanted to use it as the opening spread but the higher ups wanted a different type of image showcasing Hawaii a bit more.
The opening shot of the spread ended up being, again, at the Halekulani. I got a really nice room at the hotel and tried to shoot the model, Cindy, slung sexily over a lounge chair with Diamond Head in the background. Sadly, the sun decided not to cooperate. We had NO sun…the entire day was cloudy. At the end when we gave up, we popped a bottle of wine and Cindy went out onto the balcony to enjoy the view from the $7000/night sweet…errr…suite at the Halekulani. Diamond Head, the night sky, and the beautiful girl drinking wine on the balcony all lined up into a perfect martini shot. Delta was extremely happy as was I. This is the second major spread in their magazine in so many years. I’m fond of this shot and all the work it took to make all of this work out…actually what little work we did to get this shot.