Bring the Ruckus!

Saturday was Bring the Ruckus; the craziest bboy jam I've ever been to. Looney Tunes Crew really knows how to thrown down a jam. The competition was intense! It was a 3 on 3 competition, and I couldn't even make it past preliminaries. It's a really good experience though. If you're interested in the jam, or the dance in general, search it up on youtube. Check out Strife.tv's channel, I believe videos are uploaded.  As crazy as the event was, I didn't even watch the actual competition. I think that Knuckleheads Cali won though. I spent around four hours cyphering (maybe more) instead.
For all those people who aren't bboys, you're probably asking "What's cyphering?". Well, here's my definition of a cypher.
Cypher: (sy-fer, noun) A cypher is a circle created by bboys. The dancers take turns dancing to the music, often mixed by a DJ, showing off what they got. Bboys might compete if challenged by another in the cypher, in which the oppositions take turns dancing uninteruppted until one decides to stop.

I tried to give a professional definition, although it's not the greatest, but it brings the point across. So it was that for hours, just grooving to the music. A guy called me out, I called out a guy (he was talking stuff on Facebook), and just more grooving. Overall, it's the most memorable event I've been to. Props to you, Looney Tunes.

Since we're on bboying, I might as well post a photo of the dance.
Week 5:

Clicking on this photo will lead you to my Flickr.

EXIF Data:
F-Stop: f/4.0
Exposure time: 1/25 sec.
ISO Speed - ISO 100
Focal length: 22mm
Exposure bias: +0.76

Yes, it's a shot of me. No, I didn't take the picture (it'd be amazing if I did). Karen helped me take a lot of shots when I was sessioning with Marcus and Jared (thanks, babyy!).  I love that Karen also takes photos. I usually don't get much pictures of myself because I'm usually the guy shooting photos. It's the first action shot I've posted, and hopefully there's more to come.


That's pretty much all I have to say now. But if you're a photographer or bboy (or both) from the Twin Cities, hit me up!

Nearly missed it.

Well, you can see that I'm terrible when it comes to coming up to date with things. I will try harder to actually post every Saturday, or at least not six days after. The first week of school has put me on edge, and I just haven't had much time to actually sit down and post. This also means that I haven't had much time to get out and take shots. However, I do have more shots of Xiah. So, here it is.

Week four:

Clicking on this photo will lead you to my Flickr.

EXIF Data
Dimensions: 3872 x 2592
F-Stop: f/6.3
Exposure time: 1/125
ISO Speed: ISO-200
Focal Length: 48mm

Another interesting expression of Xiah. It's a pretty cool shot. The nose is very defined, however the eyes aren't. It kinda bugs me, but it changes the perspective of him. I didn't do any editing for the picture. I shot it and put it straight up onto the blog.

Since there's another Bboy jam tomorrow, I'm probably going to post again Sunday. Just maybe. Haha.

I'm finally posting this week's photo. The trip to California's been crazy, especially the last couple days. Friday, we went to San Jose to see Karen's cousin (the newlywed), which is an hour drive. Came back, ate food, frozen yogurt, etc., and then a bboy session a Marcus'. We went to sleep at around midnight, to wake up at 8. We drove back to San Jose, spent the whole day there for the wedding, and left San Jose at 11:00 PM. We didn't sleep until 1 in the morning, only to wake up Sunday at 5:30 to catch our flight back to Minnesota.

I was able to get one small shoot in during our trip. It was still pretty cold for a shoot, so we cut it short (maybe 25 minutes?). So, I'll post that up. Hopefully further in the week, I'll be able to throw in some bboy shots that Karen helped me take. I've never had much pictures of me dancing, because I'm usually the one taking the pictures.

Week Three

Clicking on this photo will lead you to my Flickr.

This was taken at a park near where we were staying. It was small, but nice. There was a couple small ponds, one with a water fountain that is shown above. That's.. pretty much it! Maybe I'll add more about it later. I just want to get this down so I won't forget it later. So... until next time!

Xiah.

Unable to get a photography session in this week with Karen, I decided to have a mini shoot with my sister pet, Xiah. I haven't been able to post it until now, though. It's been a crazy day. My brother, Harvey, and my cousin Max and I went to a B-Boy jam, and our crew (Flo'riental Flava) went to the semi-finals. On our way back, one of my brother's tires blew out. In the process of replacing it with a spare tire, the good-for-nothing jack tipped, causing the car to drop. We're waiting for the tow company to call us about the status of the car this very minute. This is a great example of a good day gone bad. Anyways, here's week two.

Clicking on the picture redirects you to my Flickr.

EXIF Data
Dimensions: 3872x2592
Camera Model: Nikon D60
F-Stop: f/8
Exposure Time: 1/125 sec.
ISO Speed: ISO 400
Exposure Bias: 0 Step
Focal Length: 55 mm
Flash Mode: No Flash

He was a tough one; he's always jumping up at me and constantly running around the house. I had to use automatic focus because there wasn't enough time to do it manually. That's one reason why the eyes are not sharp. I really like his expression, however. It's definitely not something I can do again.

An update on the car:
It seems like the car's too low for the provider to jack it up. They have to call another provider with a low-profile jack. This means at least another hour of waiting. Karen has work at 9 in the morning, too. Fantastic. Well, California Monday.

An Introduction.

So I started a Blogger. This decision came to me when I decided to take up a 52 Week Photography Challenge. I'm going to post at least one new piece of work every Saturday, for the whole year. If this goes well, I'll continue to do so for the years to come. Hopefully, I'll be able to post some extras in between Saturdays. I would love to take up a 365 Day Challenge, where I would post one a day. Unfortunately, being a College Student, it will be difficult to follow that goal. After an hour of fidgeting on the site (and getting a ridiculous amount of help from Karen, who I love so, so much), I got my Blogger running! I'm going to keep record of my photography on this blog, and see how I improve as time goes on.

Without further ado, here's week one!

EXIF Data
Dimensions: 3872 x 2592
Camera Model: Nikon D60
F-Stop: f/2.5
Exposure time: 1/60 sec
ISO Speed: ISO-400
Exposure Bias: 0 Step
Focal Length: 50mm
Flash Mode: No Flash

You will be redirected to the Flickr version of this photo if you click on it. You can check out other stuff I have as well.

This first photo is of my buddy, Hien, at the University of  Minnesota. I actually took this in the beginning of the semester. It's somewhat cheating (I did edit it today, however), but due to the weather, I haven't been able to get any recent photos in. It really bugged me that I couldn't get a start on New Year's, so I dug up some of my older photos. It's nothing special; Karen and I just decided to bring our cameras to the campus, and took pictures of random things. However, I really like the reflection on his shades.You can even see the group I hung out with on it!

So, there it is. Hopefully I'll get some shoots in for next Saturday. I'm heading to California on Monday for a week to attend Karen's cousin's wedding and maybe, just maybe, I'll get some good shots there as well.