Here are some of our favorite select stock photos of New York City.  NYC is one of my favorite places to just go and shoot the sights.  It doesn’t matter where you go in New York; the photographic opportunities are everywhere.  If you’re planning on visiting NYC anytime soon, here is my best piece of advice: don’t expect to be able to capture of it all within a day or two.  You can easily kill a week, and still just scratch the surface of New York City and its many boroughs.  They say that about visiting Rome Italy, as well – spend a week.  If you’re planning on going to NYC with a large group of people, you might want to rethink that… take my advice.  Groups of 4 or less are perfect.  Be smart, the city can be just as dangerous of a place in certain areas as anywhere else in this crazy world we live in.  Use the buddy system, and rely on your gut instinct at all times.  There are certain areas where you might not want to whip out your $5000 camera/lens combo without someone else by your side to have your back.  NYC is a very inspirational place. There is so much to see and do, and so many people in such a small area, yet it seems so grandiose like you will never be able to experience it all, no matter how many times you go back.  I wonder if those that live right in the Big Apple even feel that way?

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Desigual is a global fashion company that tried to create clothing that conveys positive feelings. All of their stuff is amazing creative, so no wonder their building in Herald Square is this colorful. This paint job of their NYC location has basically transformed that block. I think it looks amazing, and definitely stands out amongst its drab neighboring buildings. This video shows the process behind what went into that transformation and the tedious process of painting the mural on the building’s exterior fascade. Lean more about the Desigual project here. Read the rest of this entry »

Recently I was in the mood to create something a little wild in Photoshop that I could also license as a royalty free stock photo.  I’m not the visionary type that can just get ideas in my head, and then go run and shoot all of the separate pieces.  I’m more of the type that shoots a lot of “stuff”, browses through it all, and realizes later (sometimes accidentally) which elements might play nicely together.  So, I started with a shot from my own photo library of a few little kids running. They were the son and daughter of some friends of mine, and I got a shot of them running through the park during a family photoshoot I did for them about a year ago. When I was in NYC recently, I caught a crazy shot of the traffic driving across the Brooklyn Bridge, with a slight gap in the traffic. I was standing above the highway on the foot path, and shot it at a slight angle so that it looks a bit more candid.  What was the result? Here it is!

The original kids shot:

The final:

The shadows were a bit tricky, but I got them right.  The size and skew angle of the children was probably the most difficult part.

It’s so much fun when you realize that you can combine multiple photo pieces to create and entirely new and different composition. Gotta love it!  The parents and kids got a kick of of it, and laughed their heads off on seeing this final result   That’s about as good as it gets.

Now why would someone want to use this photo?  Why bother going through all of the trouble to compose such an image?  Why not?  First of all, I had fun doing it.  Even if I don’t make a dime from the photo, that right there was worth it.  But unfortunately, homeboy has to pay the bills.  If my wife thought I messed around all day on the computer creating “fun” photos that I couldn’t sell, she probably might not be very pleased with me.  How might someone put this final image of kids running through highway traffic to good use in an advertisement or magazine article? I was thinking it might apply to childhood behavior concepts; perhaps even hyperactivity or ADHD.  Wild kids, kids gone wild, or other topics of that nature.  What about the location?  It’s New York City, and we all know that NYC is one of the most visited cities in the entire world.  Maybe an article about family friendly vacations to the Big Apple might find a nice use for this hilarious photo.  In the end, it can be applied to a number of different concepts.  Safety, behavior, travel, parenting, and more.

Image keywords: add, ADHD, bad, boy, Bridge, Brooklyn, brother, cars, Chase, chases, chasing, Children, control, crazy, Danger, dangerous, excited, freeway, Fun, funny, Girl, Happy, highway, hyper, hysterical, Kid, Kids, loose, misbehaved, misbehaving, mischievous, motorway, out, playing, plays, running, siblings, Sister, smiling, Street, tag, teen, together, Traffic, uncontrolled, undisciplined, unsafe, wild, young, youth

I was in NYC walking down Canal street (Chinatown) back when I was about 20 years old, with a bunch of my friends one afternoon. My friend Paul is a crazy guy, and I told him, “Quick – Go and chase that pigeon over there!” When he took off running, I snapped the shot with my Vivitar point and shoot, and this was the result

Sometimes you get a conceptual image by accident…this one could portray escape, stress, fear, moving away, luncacy – you be the judge!  A little bit of photoshop, a little zoom blur and color isolation, and this was the final result.  An abstract motion blur of a guy running away while flailing his arms around.  You just have to be ready for unplanned action.  Keep that camera around your neck, at your side, or in your hand with a hand strap if you can.  Don’t carry it around in your bag all the time.  Anticipate capturing the next random thing even before it occurs.  It only takes a second or two to move your camera from your side to your face.

Feel free to share your own “accidental conceptual” images here – just post a comment below with a link.

I had an opportunity to work with a couple of very talented models on my last daytrip to the big apple.  Here are some select shots from the day, as well as some other New York City pics.  Royalty-free licensing for these stock images is available at ArenaCreative.com