Sad news today-
Jim Marshall, legendary music photographer passed away last night in NYC.
He was 74.

© Damon Webster
Jim Marshall at Duncan Miller Gallery for the Woodstock 40th Anniversary exhibit.

Known as a hard core pro, there is a story about him (well, many no doubt) coming on to the stage during an acoustic performance of a big rocker and taking photos of him, while the singer played and sang.
Concert promoter Bill Graham supposedly took him backstage, lifted him by the throat and said that if he ever did that again, he would f’ing kill him.
Jim responded that he would be doing it again.
After all, that is what HE did; take photographs.
And he did that well. Again and again.
Rest in Peace, Jim.

We’d like to thank everyone that submitted photos for this contest and special thanks to our sponsors and judges, that guided us along the way.

The GRAND PRIZE winning photo came from Katya Evdokimova:

© Katya Evdokimova

We are in touch with the Food Bank in London that Ms. Evdokimova asked the donation be made to, and will be issuing a check to them. Thank you all for that.

DOWN TO BUSINESS CATEGORY WINNER- Mark Tedeschi

© Mark Tedeschi

“This photo is of Rt. Hon. Bishop Kenneth Leslie, the former Bishop of Bathurst in NSW, Australia. Bishop Leslie was one of the longest serving Bishops in the history of the Anglican Church in Australia. Here he was having lunch in a restaurant in Bathurst. Bishop Leslie is now almost 99 years old.”

FRIENDS AND FAMILY CATEGORY WINNER- Dan Komoda

© Dan Komoda

“My daughter enjoying her first fish and chips lunch. She absolutely loved the tarter sauce.”

STREET CATEGORY WINNER- Betty Liou

© Betty Liou

“A legend in the street food business, this noodle company has been around for 30 years in Taiwan. The owners still operate out of their mobile cart, but they now own all the buildings on the block due to their success.”

STUDENT CATEGORY WINNER- Tatiana Loria Rio

© Tatiana Loria Rio

“After a long photoshoot at school, we were playing with Anette in my house and got the look I wanted at the first time.”

PEOPLE’S CHOICE CATEGORY WINNER- Julie Antillon

© Julie Antillon
“This was the last dinner my son choose as a civilian. It was the night we were taking him to the recruiters office, he was flying out the next day for Air Force BMT. We were in a race against time and our favorite sushi place wasnt open this early, so we went to Dono Sushi and told them why we were there and that our time was limited. They gave us excellent service and great food! A great meal and special time to be remembered for all of us! (I didnt take this Photo expecting to enter a contest. That is my sons hand reaching for the sushi) Thank You!!”

Visit Let’s Do Lunch! Photo contest to see all of the winners and the honorable mentions.
We will be making a book via Blurb.com including all of those photographs, and 20% of the sale of those will go to Food Banks.
Like we said. Eat, Shoot, Win Prizes, Feed People.
And start shooting because we’re doing this again!

True, we have been a bit lax in getting our posts out to the site, due to 10 days of non stop shooting in Austin, Texas.
We want to give the behind the scenes info on what goes on at the hottest festival around, in our opinion, SXSW.
With 3 sections, somewhat overlapping, categories of seminars, screenings, performances and conversations, you can come to one city, Austin, Texas and get a full helping of Interactive, Film, and Music in a 10 day period.

There were keynotes from the CEO of Twitter and conversations about becoming a professional photographer.
That one we were very interested in, but the info fell a bit short. Designed as a conversation, only a few joined in.
On the plus side met a ton of photogs in the room.

You could learn how the latest social media apps could help your business, no matter what profession you were in.
And there were celebs screening new movies, panel discussions with the directors of Zombieland and Cloverfield, plus music.

Raphael Saadiq © Damon Webster

How about Smokey Robinson, Raphael Saadiq, Broken Bell and Cheap Trick? No?
Then maybe Citizen Cope, The Drums, She and Him, Dawes, and Hole is more to your liking.
The point is that you get immersed in so many things in short span of time, that your senses get filled, and for us, so do the memory cards.

And the portable darkroom was working all of the time:

Yep, we were shooting the whole time, and had some very good access, thanks to the SXSW festival press people.

Cheap Trick © Damon Webster

The first 3 songs in the pit in front of the stage, per performer was what the shooters were allowed.
Most of the time. Cheap Trick gave us one, and Smokey only two, but it helped you think fast and pick your spots.

Tigs © Damon Webster

The smaller venues had some incredible talent , as the lead singer of Chew Lips, Tigs, gave a sweaty performance to a packed house at Maggie Maes.
Most shooters used the same compliment of lenses: 24-70, 70-200, and some very wide variation on the low end.
When the stage was lit with red light though, we all knew it was gong to be some trouble getting the shot.
You either had to grin and bear it, or go B&W. We’re looking at some of that now.
It’s funny though; the bands come to SXSW to get press and noticed, when the red stage lights come on, the photography is worse than tough.
We were rocking a Nikon D3s for part of the festival, thanks to the people at Nikon.
What a machine. more on that later.

We’ll be going into depth later this week on some of the very cool shooters we met in the pits.
A camera comraderie to be sure.

We brought a lot of gear to try and review while on a 10 day shoot, and we quickly found out what was working and what wasn’t. More to come on all of that.
When you have one shot to photograph a legend like Smokey Robinson, you don’t want to guess on your gear.

Small note: photographed a rocker we had shot when we were very young. Tried to get a similar angle. Posting “then and now” later this week.

Thanks for hanging in, very sorry about the tardiness of the posts but it was 20 hour days for the whole time.
The last thing at the end of the night was to ingest, edit and post the photos and it was a great way to end every day.
Think we’ll do it again.

We couldn’t resist offering this set again.
You came out in force to get this so in fairness, we had to do it one more time (at least!)

We’ve been on an educational binge lately.
The tools at our disposal in the digital world of photography are truly mind boggling.
The computer that you call a camera, has so much capability that most of us never unleash, you may be missing some creative tools in your kit. You have to get that secret knowledge unlocked. Sometimes it comes from a specific need, sometimes just a random exploration.
OK, maybe it’s not secret but there is so much of it, it might as well be.
It’s kinda like Photoshop – don’t think that most of us have even scratched the surface of what it is capable of.
Just make sure you use it for good.
JK.
So we are offering up Scott Kelby’s Digital Photography Boxed Set, one of the best, plain speaking, photo teachers and writers out there today.
His series of 3 books on Digital Photography, contain photo tips in a very manageable bite-size form.
Pretty much one on a page so you can flip through the book anywhere and land on some good info.
We dig the format, and think you will too.
Or, if you already know it all, it’s is an outstanding gift for someone just getting into the zone.

As always, this is a special offering for our NEWSLETTER subscribers only. Just make sure you are signed up by the evening of 3/16/2010.
Full details will be in the 3/17/2010 email delivery, along with some additional coverage of the SXSW Interactive festival in Austin, Texas, that we just haven’t had the time to post here yet.
A chance to get this boxed set for free, newsbreaks, and a cheery greeting from us. Mid-week never sounded so good.

If only we could email you coffee and muffin, it would be all set.

Huge crowds began pouring into Austin ,Texas today for the SXSW festival.
Covering Interactive, Film and Music, of course the first folks we meet on the plane are Philip Bloom and his fiance Sara, both photographers, but Philip is here to do 2 presentations on shooting with HD DSLRs .

So it was a lively plane ride and we hope to attend the talk. He promises to bring about 6 different varieties o camera and we’ll see what the crowd thinks.
We still want RAW motion files, but….

Our cameras have been tagged an we are ready to go into the fray tomorrow, and hope we can bring some news of interest to our community.
We are carrying a bunch of gear to do some real world reviews, so we’ll see how it all works when you have to get a shot. Black Rapid straps, Olympus PEN-2, Gigtube, portable hard drive storage, and more. The only way to know if something works is to test it in the fields. SXSW is a pretty cool field.

There will be a lot of interactive and social media conversations, and at the very least, good pointers on promoting your photo businesses.

Well, we’re off for some BBQ and libations, before the crowds get too crazy.

More on our twitter feed to come as well as our Facebook page.