Turning Point

As of right NOW, two worlds are converging. I have spent years working on two sides of the border- one blog for commercial photography and another for wedding and portrait work. The bottom line is that I love to take pictures. Sometimes those pictures are for a bride and groom, sometimes they are for a corporation or an ad agency, and sometimes they are for myself. They won’t be separated any longer and that is very refreshing to me. I’m stoked that these images can finally live together in one place. I have a newfound motivation to make this blog my diary, a journal of photographic happenings in my life.

I’ll get this started by backtracking a few months, but we’ll get caught up shortly.

enjoy

KC with my new Tilt Shift lens

A few months ago, my wife, Joey, and some good friends headed south to KC in search of some vintage coffee table legs. We had heard about this massive retro furniture store and wanted to check it out. If you have any interest whatsoever in retro furniture and design, you need to go to Retro Inferno located in Downtown Kansas City- http://www.retroinferno.com/

We found what we were looking for (more on that later) and had a super fun adventure. Here are some images from the day…Oh yeah, all of these were shot with my new Canon 35 2.8 TS lens.

Flip Through My Book

Evolution of an Architecture Shoot

I was hired recently by a client to shoot a number of assisted living facilities for a new marketing campaign. Some of these facilities were out of town and we had some major time constraints, so I didn’t have the normal luxuries I might typically have on this type of shoot. Typically, I would start the process by going on a scouting mission to make aesthetic and compositional decisions. Then, I would decide on what time of day to schedule the shoot based on environmental conditions.

This shoot was scheduled a little late in the year and the time of day that we scheduled wasn’t perfect. When I arrived at the location, this is what I found waiting for me:

OK, we’ve got a few issues that need to be dealt with. The client wanted the shot to feel bright, Summery, and welcoming. Obviously, it’s not bright and Summery, but we’ve also got a few other obstacles to confront. Here’s a list (in no particular order):
1. Bleak and dreary sky.
2. We’re way past the magic hour typically associated with architectural photography.
3. Multiple trees WITH NO LEAVES in front of the building.
4. Dead ornamental grasses in the landscaping.
5. Water stains and excessive gravel in the parking lot.

In my line of work, I have to make it work- no excuses. The first decision I have to make is compositional, meaning at what angle can I make this building look the most attractive. After a series of test shots, I decided on this composition:

It’s a start. I decided to try to trick the magic hour look by manipulating the elements. I found the maintenance man and asked him to turn on the exterior lights. This gives the viewer the impression that it is either dusk or dawn (even thought it was around 9:45am). I then shot a series of images ranging from way underexposed to way overexposed. These shots will give me some good ammunition in post processing.

After a little work in post, here is another link in the chain:

The lighting, contrast, and composition all work together nicely, but we still have some issues to confront. The leaves are still bare, the landscaping is still tired, the parking lot is still messy and the sky still feels a little bleak. We decided to replace the sky altogether with one that is warmer and feels a little bit more welcoming. Instead of adding leafy trees, we opted to remove them all together. And Finally, the landscaping was refreshed and we got out the old digital broom and cleaned up the parking lot and curbs. Here is the final image:

Elderly Care

I recently completed an advertising campaign for a company that owns premier assisted living facilities all across the region. The facilities are super nice (I would live there) and all of the residents we worked with were genuinely excited about living there. The portraits were lit with a photogenic monolight with a softbox, but everything else was shot with mostly natural light with a little fill light here and there for good measure. Here are some of my favorites from the project:

Ladyfinger likes tacos

Photo shoot with Omaha-based band Ladyfinger for promotional imagery. Tacos anyone?

Corporate Lifestyle

Here is a recent campaign that I worked on for a corporate client. They wanted “editorial” style images that felt real and natural, which is my specialty and the reason why most of my clients hire me. These images were used on the company’s web site, marketing brochures, and in a variety of advertisements.

Road Trip

We had a great time working on a lifestyle shoot just north of town recently. The story idea was to promote and inspire regional day trips.

Midwest “Mountain” Biking?

Having lived in the West, I know first hand that most people think that Nebraska and Iowa are flat, treeless, miserable wastelands full of corn and rednecks. Besides having culture, we also have some pretty darn nice recreational opportunities. Here are some shots from an Autumn day ride at Manawa…

River Trip

As many of you know, I worked as a commercial white water rafting guide for the better part of 8 years on rivers in Colorado and Montana. With that being said, one of my all time favorite rivers to float is….the Niobrara in Northern Nebraska. Hard to believe I know, but this river is truly outstanding. The Niobrara River drains over 12,000 square miles of the Sandhills, one of the largest stabilized dunefields in the world. You’ll be pleasantly surprised to see pine-clad hills and prairie, numerous waterfalls, tall sandstone cliffs and wildlife like deer, bison, elk, beaver, mink, herons and kingfishers. In late August, 8 of my closest friends converged on the river for three fabulous days to celebrate life and my soon-to-be-extinct single status.

Sandhill Cranes

Every spring, tens of thousands of Sandhill Cranes migrate from areas of Mexico to parts of Alaska and Siberia. They have been taking this same route for millions of years….and every year they hang out in Central Nebraska for a few weeks. I am completely fascinated by this journey and this animal. I try to get out a few days every year to watch, listen, and photograph these amazing creatures. My father and I will be heading out next April if you’d care to join us!<a

New Website

We just launched our new website! Super simple design that showcases the images….

Check it out: http://www.iwenexposures.com

Night Blooming Cereus

My dad has this crazy desert plant called a Night Blooming Cereus. This plant, which is also known as Queen of the Night, is a member of the cactus family. This plant is pretty nondescript most of the year, but once a year, on a midsummers night, it produces one heck of a pretty flower. The flower, which lasts only one night, seems to grow our of nowhere and produces a very pungent odor while it is blooming. The video consists of 250 still images shot with a Canon 5D over a period of 6 hours.

Costa Rica

A few years ago, I decided to take a month off from responsibility and head down to Costa Rica. Most visitors will fly into San Jose, Costa Rica’s largest city, and then most will scramble to get out of there as quickly as possible. I must admit, there is a gritty, nervous, and noisy vibe at first, but once that settles, the real cultural elements start to unfurl. Stick around for a little bit. I actually fell in love with this city and had a fabulous time strolling the markets, museums, and side streets.

San Jose

Heredia
Heredia is bustling city with a very unique, elegant feel located just 10km north of San Jose. Heredia has some of the oldest historical architecture in Costa Rica and it’s definitely worth the 50 cent bus ride. On the bus ride there, I noticed a rainbow to the west. Thankfully, it waited for me to get to Heredia before it clocked out for the afternoon.

The main bus terminal in San Jose is located on the grounds of an old Coca Cola plant, so it is appropriately referred to as the Coca Cola Bus Terminal. From here, you can catch a bus to just about every part of the country. My next destination was the small coastal town of Quepos, which is a sleepy little village on the Pacific side. Taking the bus cross country is a magnificent way to see the Costa Rican countryside. We stopped once at a small country market to pick up a few passengers and have a little lunch on the side of the road.

Once I arrived in Quepos, I didn’t have much time to poke around because Antonio was waiting to take me up to Rafiki Safari. Rafiki Safari is a remote jungle ecotourism slice of heaven. The Boshoff family started the project in 1999 in hopes of using tourism to build a wildlife refuge and Tapir re-introduction program. Once you get to this place, you’ll never want to leave. My good friend Bob, who I river guided with in Montana, was working at Rafiki as a raft guide for the winter. I climbed the stairs to the bar, which was a huge thatched roof over a deck over looking some of the most amazing jungle views you’ll ever see, to find Bob happily mixing drink behind the bar. After a big hug, I asked Bob for something fruity to quench my thirst. He proceeded to pour copious amounts of rum into a very large glass, drop a couple of ice cubes, and finished it off with a lime wedge. Fruity enough, I guess. A few more were in order after that. I spent 10 glorious days at Rafiki. Every day was a new adventure: rafting on the Sevegre river, hiking through the jungle, horseback rides to remote villages, and sipping Pilsens on the hammock.

Here are a few shots from Rafiki and the surrounding countryside:

Bob and Frog

Christmas dinner at Rafiki

My bedroom

Typical Costa Rican lunch in a tiny little village while on a horseback ride.

Bridge over the Sevegre River and our put in for a rafting trip




View of the lodge at Rafiki from across the valley

Time to move on…Keith and I caught a ride out of Rafiki from daddy Boshoff. Our destination was Manuel Antonio and Quepos.



Nothing like a few Pilsens in the afternoon! There are two main Costa Rican beers: Pilsen and Imperial. The rule of thumb is, if the beer’s cold, drink a Pilsen. If the beer is warm, drink an Imperial.

From Quepos, I headed north again en route to San Jose for New Years Eve and to meet by good friend, Dan Decker, who was flying in to from Montana to hang out with me for a week. While at this crazy night club a few miles outside of San Jose, I happened to run into a long time friend and her husband. Crazy. Mind boggling. Of all the places in the world to be on New Years, here we are. Peggy and Mike had rented a car (I guess you could call it a car) and invited Dan and I on a little cross country road trip. Sweet.


Gardens in Zarcero

Sunset at Arenal

Fishing at sunset in Tamarindo

Dan and I headed inland to the little farming community of Santa Cruz. A three week festival had just gotten underway. Just in time.

I left Santa Cruz a few days later to head back to San Jose. After a couple more days in the capital city, I hopped on a plane and headed back to LA. Just in time for the crazy flood season…

80216

I go on a lot of scouting missions to find interesting backdrops for photo shoots. This exploratory activity lead to an ongoing series on zip codes. Here is a body of work I produced in an industrial area just north of Denver in Commerce City. It’s full of beautiful grit. Train yards, power plants, junk yards, and graffiti grace 80216.

Trek Store

A regional chain of Trek bike stores needed some employee profile portraits for a catalog they were sending out. My friend Ryan over at Harvest Designs wrote the words and worked on the layout.

Here are a few of the shots:

Here is what the finished product looked like:

Bored? Mount a camera to the top of your car.

Yep, the title pretty much says it all. I was a little bored, so I pulled out the Bogen Super Clamp and mounted my old 20d with a 15mm 2.8 fisheye to the rack on top of my car. I drove north from Oxnard on the 101 just in time for some nice sunset action on the Ventura Highway.

Inspiration from Dreams and Flies

Often times, I draw inspiration from books and movies. It could be beautiful cinematic lighting or it could be a sentence of intricately placed verbs and nouns that stirs the imagination and ignites an idea. Sometimes my dreams will lead to a photo shoot.

One night I had a dream that seemed somehow similar to the Lord of the Flies, so the next day I added it to my que and waited rather impatiently for it to arrive. About a week later, with all necessary model releases signed and dated, as well as about 5 trips to local thrift shops, I set out with 5 ten year olds and a couple of assistants. The assistants helped with lighting and other technical duties, but their main responsibility was making sure all of the models made it home alive.

East of Persia

A group of my ancestors left Germany and other parts of Europe and were in search of new fertile ground in the new country. They were looking for what was familiar to them, land that had the same “feel” that they were used to. They ended up settling in an area of south west Iowa that happens to be very fertile.

Bill Iwen starting farming on his father’s land at a very young age. He has been working that land east of Persia, Iowa for the better part of forty years. He is working and living off of the land that his father did and his father before him. Generations have worked this land. My father’s father used to help with the harvest on this land every fall.

The farm and everything about it has always intrigued me. Today, family farms are struggling as large commercial farms threaten to overtake them. It takes incredible courage and strength to operate a small farm today.

This ongoing photo essay began as a documentation of the plight of the family farm, but it has become much more to me than that. It is a documentary of my family history and an examination of my roots and heritage.

Ouray Ice

For the last 12 years, the Ouray Ice Festival had been recognized as the premier international gathering of its kind. Competitors and ice fanatics from all over the world descend upon this remote south western Colorado winter wonderland in early to mid January to get their fix. These image are from the 2007 festival. My friend Jared and I headed down from Denver to join the festivities. Having enough cold weather gear for my body was not enough. My poor little lithium camera batteries were in desperate need of their own cold-weather gear. With mid day temperatures far less than zero, fully charged lithium batteries for my 5d would last all of about 50 shots. No joke. Solution? Chemically-charged hand and feet warmers. Activate those crazy warm little buddies and wrap them close to your battery compartment with small cloth- a wash cloth works great for this. Secure the warm cocoon with some gaffer’s tape and your all set. Don’t forget to bring extra hand warmers for your own hands, as well!

Jared at the Black Canyon of the Gunnison

Nightscape of Park County en route back to Denver