The Blog of James Jay
Things that I come across in my daily travels that have some kind of visual significance to me
Mentally Not Well…
I hate coming into the office when I’m just not feeling it mentally. I feel like this today. Last night I had nightmares and tossed and turned in bed. I came into work late and just being in the office is not helping even though it is Friday I still feel like crap. I hope your having a great day.
Playing some tunes on vinyl
I always had aspirations of becoming this awesome cool trance Dj, but alas that never transpired. My little brother always has had a thing for drum & bass more so than trance, he would always wander off at a party to hear it being played. He has been playing for what seems forever, and has always pushed himself to be better. He has never been famous but is really good at what he does. I have always envied his skills.
Saturday we got together just to play some records and just hang out. We don’t really get to be together much but we have fun when we do. As always his skills surpass mine every single time. He was just throwing down records so I just started taking photos. Though later on in the evening I think I played really decent I was actually making a nice little mix with no train wrecks and making my transitions between tracks sound good.
5 o’clock shadows
macro shots from the Ricoh GRD III
House Fire
I always feel weird about photographing things like this, but at the same time it is one of those moments that I feel should be recorded. But at the same time I try to stay out of everyones way and just observe.
Every time I come upon a scene like this Im reminded off my photo teacher and how one day he had come upon a horrible accident and first thing he did was take out his camera and start taking photos. Turns out it was one of his students fathers, he felt bad about it but at the same time he felt he needed to take photos. Not to get rich off the photos but because it was a story that needed to be told.
Im sure we all feel the same way about house fires, that they are horrible and sad. I cannot imagine ones belonging gone just like that, having to start over with just the clothes on your back. I think that is where we as caring individuals should step in and lend a helping hand. As I wandered around the scene I saw the homeowner a woman and a child about 1 to 2 years of age sitting on the sidewalk with a diaper bag and a box of baby wipes. Inside I wanted to take a photo but at the same time I could not bring myself to capture such a moment. I don’t regret not taking the photo It is one of those moments recorded in my mind.
I instead focused more on the fire fighters doing there job and how they interacted with each other to get the job done.
Multiple times the fire fighters made eye contact with me, Im not sure if they were annoyed or not.
I really like this one.
Friday Night Fun, ok more like madness
Friday night’s are usually pretty normal around our home. Im a family man so usually I go home cook or decide to go out for dinner, by 9 Chloe is asleep in her bed and we usually end up watching a movie. Well Talia’s mom wanted to take Chloe for the weekend which happens every now and then it gives Talia and me a break from being parents, a break is always nice. We take advantage of this time, usually it is a movie and dinner. But I knew this wasn’t going to happen since Talia is trying to finish her schoolwork before thanksgiving.
Since I knew I was free for the weekend, I wanted to call Darrell and see if he wanted to head over to the bar for a drink with me. I never got around to calling Friday. So I ended up not thinking about it that evening, then Talia said Darrell wanted to hang out with us so we can get some dinner and you guys can have your guy time. Well me and Darrell usually go to this place called the tilted kilt. Look it up online. Mostly because it is within bike riding distance. The bike path runs right down the street from the place so if things get out of hand I know we can ride home without having to deal with a single car. So the only danger is to ourselves. But things really don’t get that bad. better safe than sorry, but as I said Talia was going to be driving and hanging out with us.
Well you know me always with a camera in hand here is a look at our journey.
Super noisy image. I forgot to use the flash.
Talia telling us a story, I think she was telling us about the newest episode of the office. Which I still havent seen.
Talia still doing work.
I thought this Image was a little poignant. He just got done telling us about how the NAVY had messed up his hearing, and at times he can’t really hear anything unless he is yelled at.
ummmm this isn’t the reason we like coming here either. Usually we sit outside we just felt Talia needed the full experience.
Her name was Ashtyn, She was a nice girl, I said thanks for putting up with me and my friend, she said we were no problem she gets more unruly customers.
Well after this photo we left and we wanted to go meet with the tempe bicycle action group since they were having a bike ride that night and this was supposed to be the last spot… they never came. At this point I think we were running on alcohol.
The last shot. Well not really, I took some shots of the people in this place. But they were not good.
What I neglected to mention is that during the night there was some family drama on my side. I was getting phone calls all night but seeing as I could do nothing about it I just decided to have fun and take care of it in the morning. let’s just say being the oldest and having a young brother and sister can be a interesting adventure in itself.
Normally I would be curled up on the floor asleep, and then going for some greasy food and a soda pop. So the next morning I had to go to phoenix then to the reservation. Food and soda would have to wait till later. Well we finished our business and then drove to whataburger with the windows rolled down and music playing loud. It was a gorgeous cloudy day Saturday these were the last 2 frames. Well I took some other frames of other people but this was my adventure so I kept the images basic.
I think in this frame I wanted to see how crappy I looked, and Im probably thinking Fat Tire/Jamesons/PBR do not mix………….
And last but not least my saviour. Always there to take care of me even with all my stupid antics
Lesson to be learned in all this: Im to old to be doing this.
Thoughts On Photos
When I shoot photos I tend to take photos of anything that catches my interest. And those things are usually just random images that happen to cross my path, as I have said they usually have some kind of visual significance to me. In my head I end up associating those images with something that I’m feeling or thinking.
Take for instance this Image so many thoughts enter my head. Was this person really a hippy at a point in there life? and if they were what made them change? do they have a corporate job? Do they drink starbucks?
Then It makes me think of pachouli oil. Pachoui oil reminds me of my mom and how she would have vials of that stuff laying around the house. It smelled in the house.
This image is funny for some odd reason in my head, It makes me think what the hell was the person doing in this toilet? and why didn’t they have enough courtesy to clean up after themselves. It makes me think people are really gross and weird.
I don’t know what it is about glasses of wine and artists in general. Maybe it’s the allure or whatever. like it’s supoosed to be super artsy. It always makes me laugh, so I took one. cause I’m super artsy. that was a joke btw.
Even in printed and illustrated form men are drawn to images of seductive looking woman. This image totally received many a view on flickr. This was at the local pizza joint.
In the end I know that photos I take are highly subjective. And that’s is ok with me, I have no problem with it. I know that when I make a image it is for me.
But on the same token if a viewer see’s a image that I have made and can also pull a feeling from that photo. It makes me feel good knowing that I’m not the only one that see’s it that way.
Pine Cone Family
Every time we go for a walk my little daughter ends up with a collection of these. I don’t mind, we end up putting them on shelves decorating the house. We went to play ball outside where I accidently hit her in the eye with a soft baseball. We stopped playing ball and she gathered these up in her mitt. I was surprised that she a family’s worth
Phoenix Downtown Pie Social
The day’s here in the valley have been overcast, rainy, filled with things to do, perfect. The only bad thing is the weekends are way to short. Even now I’m sitting her with all the windows open hearing birds and kids play outside.
Yesterday we spent the day hanging out at the Phoenix Downtown Pie Social with Tiphanie & Mike and met some other cool people they are also friends of Tiph & Mike, Mike & Brooke If i remember correctly. We attempted to go to last years Pie Social but for whatever reason we were not able to make it.
The plan is you pay $10 bucks for a taste of 5 pies. To be honest I was thinking that wasn’t going to be enough. But to be honest I was wrong, It was plenty. Even had to give tickets away cause it was to much. So once we got our tickets we surveyed the pie area, got a idea of the pies we were going to try and went for it. Im lucky I had my camera to document the event cause everything was a blur. All I know is I was filled with a sugar high that one could not believe. Thank goodness for free water and milk. Coffee would have been nice, but alas no such luck. It took me back to those days of being a kid and all you survive on is sugar. I have to admit though the comedown was not as easy, I was so tired and so hungover from pie last night. I woke up this morning wondering what happened the night before. Talia tells me I was snoring and falling asleep all over the house.
All I know is in the end pie is ever so amazing, and consuming mass amount of pie will leave you hungover and totally unaware of what you did the night before. I honestly cannot wait for next year. Here is my photos.
Tiphanie’s work area. I love seeing all the color of her home.
Round 1, actually round 2 I had this chocolate whip cream thingy and I forgot a picture.
Apple Ginger Pie. If I’m Correct, I might be wrong I just know taste was amazing. and something else.
Matt & Brooke & Mike. What’s a good way to meet new people?
Consuming mass amounts of pie together!
Round 2
This is some kind of pecan pie and the second one is a apple, Carmel pie? third is a chocolate & bacon pie. I did not eat the bacon pie, I feared the bacon pie.
Mike going to attempt the bacon pie. He said it was ok, kinda weird but ok, ok enough to finish the whole thing.
Chloe was a little disappointed, that was until the pumpkin pie showed up. Reminds me of a momma bird feeding her young.
Final Round
The best I had. Apple, Green Chili Pie. Amazing!
After eating our fill and drinking lots of milk and water we went back to Mike and Tiph’s place.
the last 2 pics. Funny I didn’t even take a photo of Talia or Tiph. Next time.
Actually you can see Tiph’s eye by Chloe’s bow.
Busy life, & random photos
Sometimes its hard for me to keep up with the blog, life ends up taking over. Recently I have been super busy with work trying to finish 2 major projects before the year is up. So photography, personal design projects end up being put on the back burner.
Thats the only bad thing about sitting in front of a computer with photoshop, indesign, and illustrator open. The last thing you want to do is open it again when you get home.
Here is another photo of Danni in her office. I like how her eyes are gazing over the piece of paper at me, I think she was yelling at me not to take photos of her.
My coworker recently purchased a 70′s Mercedes Benz. I fell in love with the stereo.
This time of year in the valley the clouds fill the sky.
And last but not least you see some funny stuff at the truck stop.
