I had the privilege of taking part in a special moment a while back.  My great friends Justin & Cara got engaged and I came over a little bit later and snapped a few pictures of the evening.  I am also bending my “old rule” of no wedding photography for them.  The awesome thing about  forgetting the “old rule” is that this wedding is in the jungle of Belize.  So I guess I’m now taking wedding clients for destination weddings only.  Well see how well that works out.

Back at the beginning of January my wife and I traveled to Nashville.  I had the honor of getting to attend Jeremy Cowart’s photography workshop.  His work has always been a constant inspiration for me. What I learned at the workshop was totally different then what I expected.  I went in with the notion of learning a bunch of technical aspects of photography and left with so much more:  feeling more inspired than I have felt in a long time.  This past year I have become very complacent with my photography and have not been exploring my own personal projects.  Being in the commercial world for several years has sort of snuffed out my flame of inspiration and creativity for doing my own personal artwork.  Well, this will continue no more.  2010 will see the return of me working on my own projects.  I’m very excited about this.  Here are a few shots from the workshop.  On the second day of the workshop we split off into groups and photographed our own model for a group critique.  Those pics are below as well.

The other great thing about the trip to Nashville was getting time spend with Avery House Creative.  It was great to share the workshop experience with Matt while our wives got to explore the city of Nashville.  You should check out their work because it is amazing.  Here are a few shots I took of them at the Hotel just goofing around.

After the conference ended my wife and I got to go to David Bean’s Studio for a photographers’ party.  It was a great time and was very fun to meet and talk to David.  He has a great body of photography work and an all around great guy.  The actual party would have been a little awkward if it weren’t for two photographers we met, Aaron Greene and Jeff Hall.  They noticed us when we walked in and struck up a conversation with us right off the bat.  It was great to talk to them about the different types of work they do and what we do.  They made us feel like we were home, even though they weren’t from Nashville either.  Definitely check out there work as well.

To sum it up, the 5 days spent in Nashville really changed me and inspired me beyond belief for the upcoming decade.

I had the pleasure of photographing a David Bazan and Say Hi show a few months back in Denton, TX at Dan’s Silverleaf.  It was my 4th time to see David Bazan and I have to say it was the best sounding show I’ve seen him play.

There is a new album coming out in March that I am particulary excited about.  It’s called Broken Bells and its the collaboration between The Shins frontman, James Mercer, and producer extraordinaire Danger Mouse. You can get their first single by going here and giving them your email. Do it. You won’t regret it.

Here is a great video from a great band, Vampire Weekend.  Their new album drops next week and I believe that everyone should own it.  It seems to be a great soundtrack to starting off the new year right. You can pre-order it here.  Enjoy.

Here are my favorite albums from 2009 in no particular order.  This was a tough list to make and there are several honorable mentions.  If you want to know my honorable mentions just send me a comment.

David Bazan -  Curse Your Branches

The Avett Brothers – I and Love and You

Manchester Orchestra – Mean Everything to Nothing

Dead Man’s Bones – Dean Man’s Bones

Yeah Yeah Yeahs – It’s Blitz!

Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus

Grizzly Bear – Veckatimest

Jay-Z - The Blueprint 3

The Middle East –  The Recordings of the Middle East

Neko Case – Middle Cyclone

Since it’s the end of the year and things are slow this week, I decided to make a cheesy video of our Golden Retriever Mix, Winnie, playing in the snow….. You don’t have to tell me how childish and dorky this is, I already know.  Enjoy.

It is turning out to be very hard for me to pick my favorite albums of the past year. I do know one thing right now, The Avett Brothers’ new record, I And Love And You, will be on my favorites list. I highly recommend getting this album right now. Seriously.

I had the privilege of photographing a great band, Wilco, a while back at the Palladium in Dallas, TX.  It was a great time and also a huge learning experience for me.  Part of the deal for the shoot was that I was only allowed to photograph the first 3 songs of the set, so it was very chaotic, fast, stressful and lovely.

Time to try out this blog thing again. I promise it will be updated a ton this time! Check back soon.