Garrett in the Garage.

Garrett Williams.

Photo of my friend Garrett, Kenora newspaper writer extraordinaire. Shot on location at "The Garage Studio".

Garrett Williams no.2

Garrett was very relaxed infront of the camera and made shooting him super easy which is not always the case when shooting friends. Oddly I still have friends that are nervous when I take their photograph no matter how long I have known them.

Changes.

Andrea no.1 Originally shot for the series "Immortalized In Flesh"

This is the first version of the Andrea photo for my series "Immortalized In Flesh" that I recently removed and replaced with the image below, making a better fit with other images.

Andrea for the series "immortalized In Flesh"

This photo was taken a while ago for my second coming of the series "Immortalized In Flesh" that I initially passed on. I returned to it as I liked the shape and just the look that Andrea has, plus her first photo didn't mesh well with another photo I took later of 'Kim' that was posed in a similar way. The photo of Kim looked better interms of posing in conjunction with her amazing tattoo work, so Andrea got the boot and had to be switched up for variety purposes. Deems da breaks! Luckily I like this photo just as much as Andreas first intended shot(and so does she), so its all good!

No Toast.

Tamara cutting to the chase!

Bitchin' Brooklin Fair.

So recently My girlfriend Tamara and I went to check out the Brooklin County Fair, just outside of her home town of Whitby. I was picturing like a small ghetto little fair that usually comes to various towns throughout ontario in the summer. Boy was I wrong! This is like a huge oldschool kinda fair with all kinds of rides, ridiculous amounts of tasty americana-isk food to eat, freestyle motocross(dirt bikes hitting huge jumps) and a totally bitchin' crash up derby to top things off. A pretty epic time was had!

Whats a fair without rides that are put together in an hour and the unsuspecting parents that send their kids down them.

So this is mid crash up derby, I was told that these were the amateurs. Once the pros came out after this match (they take things to the next level!) you could see the difference right away; Flooring it and crashing at full speed into each other, fighting with the ref's and as told by an ex derby pro sitting near us, that all the competitors usually hate each other! It was like a manly white trash version of a soup opera!

There was some epic backgrounds there also(this was one of them) whens a 7b around when you need one? Oh well, next time.

Dirt bikers hitting huge jumps and doin' awesome tricks that one would see on the X Games was pretty sweet! luckily no one ate shit and all the bikers survived to jump again next year.

New portraits.

So a long while ago I was shooting photos of people and their tattoo work for the series entitled "Immortalized In Flesh" but had to be put on the back burner as duty called else where aka a whack load of magazine shoots for the totally awesome Pie Magazine. I recently revisited and revised the look of "Immortalized In Flesh" and have been shooting new photos of my friends and friends of friends and their tattoo work they have had done. They all have tattoos for different reasons but are connected through their loving embrace of the art form, design and skill involved in tattooing. Something this series documents.

Nicole.

Kim.

Jeff.

A bittersweet Applied Arts win.

Applied Arts winning image- "Margaret"

In early March I received an email with some much needed good news. I had been chosen as a winner of the prestigious Applied Arts annual professional photography award in the category of portraiture. My grandmother who was the subject of the winning photo had just died a few days before. During the last few monthes of her life, I was responsible for looking after her as she was bed ridden as a result of Lung Cancer. Looking back I remember when I asked her if I could use the photo for the competition many months before, her reply was "if it will win you an award for something then sure!" at the time I was thinking "well Marg don't get your hopes up....." as in the past Applied Arts has a funny way of picking winners, as they have passed on some REALLY talented photographers and peers of mine. Regardless of their motives this one really meant something to me and I am glad my image conveyed that to them in some sort of way. This was my first award as a professional and I am super glad it was with this photo!

The full artist statement for this photo can be viewed on my website under "personal Photographs"

http://ianjameshopkins.carbonmade.com/

Family Visit.

So my sister Christine came all the way up from Massatuchutes for a brief visit a few monthes ago. While she was here she asked me to take a photo of her. These are my two faves. The shoot consisted of 1 flash, 2 backgrounds and LOTS of fun!

Christine.

Christine 2.