Unexpected Happenings

My name is Rob, and my clients are cooler than yours. In my line of work I meet a lot of people. Most of the time those people close the door on me as soon as they realize I'm trying to sell them something. But every once in a while I meet some truly amazing folks. This is the story of such an occasion.

A little while ago I was solicited by a company out of Chicago to create virtual tours for 5 retirement homes across north Alabama. They took all the selling out of the equation. All I had to do was show up and shoot the place.

Sounds simple, but there's a certain sense of uneasiness involved. All I was given was a name and an address. I'd never seen the place, and never met my contact there. I had absolutely no idea what to expect. What happened when I arrived at the location was even more unexpected that I thought.

The first person to greet me happened to be my point of contact there, the executive director, Amy. She had a beaming smile, and seemed really excited about the work we had to do that day.

Seeing as I had never seen the facility before, we started off with a tour. Amy told me all about the place, with brief interruptions to say hi to the staff and ask residents how they were doing. You could tell immediately that everybody was friends here. I was taken to all the standard areas you'd see on a tour - the dining room, activities area, the model room. She was particularly proud of the court yard in the center of the building.

After the tour I wasn't asked if I'd like something to drink, but what I wanted to drink.  It seemed as though I wasn't playing contractor that day. I was already, somehow, part of a family.

It was then I started off to work. I began with still photos of the building - Amy with me the whole time offering to help in any way she could and providing feedback for exactly what they were looking for. She seemed to have a very clear picture in her head of what she wanted. This is a tremendous help to photographers who aren't doing strictly creative work.

The last still shot I took was of a plated meal. Amy asked me directly afterward if I had plans for lunch. Taken aback, I stammered for a second, only to have her all but force a menu upon me. Moments later I was seated in the private dining room, presented with lunch. It was easily an order of magnitude more delicious than anything I would have picked up for myself that day. During the course of my meal no less than three different people came by to greet me, ask how things were going, and if I needed anything.

I didn't. Hell, I would have been happy if someone had offered me a glass of water, much less a 5 star meal.

After stuffing my face, it was time get all the panoramas done. It went off without a hitch. Everything was perfectly placed. I managed to avoid photographing nearly every single soul in the place as well. This is usually a big problem when dealing with a populated area.

As I'm finishing up, I take another walk around the outside of the facility to see if there's anything interesting I may have missed. Just as I'm walking off, Amy calls my name and asks me back to the front entrance.

"This is Jean." She says. "She's a movie-star, and we're gonna need a picture."

I smile and oblige.

Jean, who had just returned from an outing with her sister, was grinning from ear to ear at the opportunity to have her picture taken by a "professional".

Jean has lived at the facility longer than any other resident, and is absolutely adored by the staff and everyone else there. I didn't have much of a chance to speak with her as I had a long drive back Huntsville, but you could tell right off the bat that she had an infectious personality and a wicked sense of humor.

Snapping that picture, with the promise that I'd email it to them was icing on the cake at the end of my work day there.

The following week, I received an a phone call from a number I didn't recognize. It was Amy, just calling to tell me that the shoot had posted already and that they were absolutely tickled with how it turned out. Once again, they had managed to make my day with a simple gesture.

It was a real pleasure having the opportunity to meet and work with all the staff at this particular establishment. It's experiences like these that make me love what I do even more.

The Continuous Life

My name is Rob, and I'm impressed. It's Friday afternoon, and I'm sitting in the park under a tree dumping the contents of my head into my laptop. It's a beautiful day. People are out and about walking dogs and feeding the ducks. It's nice in the shade, with an ever so slight breeze.

It's got me thinking. Everything is fucking amazing. I'm sitting here in a park with a portable computer in my lap. I'm connected to the internet wirelessly through my telephone! The seamless transition from just sitting here enjoying the outdoors to being able to communicate with the whole world through the medium of the internet is astounding.

Now, I won't pretend like I'm one of these people who doesn't have their smartphones on them at all times, because I do. But nearly every time I need to communicate with someone hundreds of miles away, or think of a question I need answered I think to myself  "Oh wait, I've got the entire internet in my pocket!"

I'm still kinda young. I don't really remember what it was like to not have a computer in the house, or being able to connect to other computers to gather information, but that doesn't make it any less impressive.

Life is a whirlwind of new technology and discoveries making everything better, faster, more understandable, more accessible and in more remote locations. From cell phones, to the internet, to planes, trains, and automobiles. What the human race is accomplishing in this world is amazing, and I'm glad to be living in it.

New Direction

My name is Rob, and I'm glad I didn't wear my suit. It seems as though for the last few weeks everything has gone my way. No matter how hard I try, I just can't manage to screw anything up. This sort of feeling doesn't happen very often in my life. This time I thought of a metaphor to help me express it - parallax.

Parallax error occurs in photography when the viewing angle for the photographer is different than that of the camera. You can witness this first-hand by holding your finger in front of your face and closing one eye, then the other. Notice the difference? Your finger is in the same spot but it appears to be in a different position because each of your eyes is viewing from a slightly different angle. When this phenomena occurs it can cause distortion in converging lines, and can cause real problems in stitching panoramic photos. In panoramic photography you alleviate this by rotating the lens in such a fashion that the no parallax point is always in the same point in space no matter what direction it's facing.

It would appear as though I've found my no parallax point. Everything is in perfect focus. There is zero distortion. No parallax. I'm managing to view everything from exactly the point of reference that's needed.

The focus ring came into alignment after I felt like I'd nailed a job interview on Wednesday. It happened despite a serious series of unfortunate events spanning more than 24 hours before hand.

I woke up Tuesday morning to the power at my place being out. It's not really an uncommon occurrence when you live in the sticks, but a pain in the ass nonetheless. I set off for work knowing I had a photo-shoot that day, and thinking the power would be back when I got home.

It wasn't. It wasn't to be back that day either. Awesome.

So let's make a list. I had no power. No water. No way to process the photos I took, and thusly no way to show them off at the interview. No way to charge my cell phone(read: alarm clock). No way to get a hair cut, or trim the beard. No A/C.

But, you know what I did have? Awesome friends who let me crash at their house. Problem solved.

There were another few minor snags. Like the fact that I only slept for 4 hours that night. And I forgot my dress shoes, so I left for the interview in my sneakers.  And that I used every minute of the two and a half hours I'd allotted myself for a drive that should only take an hour and 45 minutes.

No matter. I was bound and determined to impress the guy that was interviewing me. It helped a bit that my friends and family bombarded my cell phone with good luck's and you'll be awesome's and You got dis!

My head was held high as I entered the building, scanning the room for someone who looks like they might be looking for someone looking for them. I came up empty handed. The place was filled with people in suits playing with laptops. And people in casual clothes playing with laptops. And people wearing other things - playing with laptops.

As I reached the front of the building again, I see  this bearded guy covered in tattoos at the cash register. I didn't think anything of it at first. There was a pair of black thick rimmed glasses sitting on his nose. He was wearing flip flops, cargo shorts and a plaid short sleeve shirt with a messenger bag draped over his shoulder.

"Rob?" he says, as he turns toward me.

"Casey?" I say back. "Nice to meet you!"

"Holy shit, this is the guy that's interviewing me?" I thought to myself.

"Man! I'm glad I didn't wear my suit!" were the words that actually escaped my lips.

"Me too!" he chuckled, as he glances down at his nearly bare feet.  "I'd have felt really under-dressed if you had."

Check mark. 1 point for Rob.

During the course of the interview I got the impression that Casey was the sort of guy who could take a joke. I mentioned, off-hand, that I hacked off nearly two inches of beard that morning expecting that I'd be meeting with some corporate stiff who would look down on the artsy-fartsy photographer dressed as casually as could be.

This statement wasn't met with awkward laughter, nor genuine laughter. There was no witty retort. A distinct look of actual concern came across his face.

"Dude! I'm so sorry. I feel for your loss."

I couldn't help but chuckle at his reaction.

Check mark. 2 points for Rob.

We chatted for nearly an hour about what the job entailed, and my background in photography. He seemed genuinely impressed with my concert and landscape stuff.

Toward the end of the interview, he kept making inferences.

So, you'd start training on this day, if you get the job.

You'd be training under so-and-so, if you get the job.

Ya know, you'll have to take a drug test, if you get the job.

If you get the job.

Check mark. 3 points for Rob. What if? There's no if. I've got this on lock down!

I drove back to Huntsville feeling on top of the whole world. I knew I just nailed that interview. I just knew it. I was a better fit for this position than the other two guys. I didn't even know who they were, and I didn't care.

Fast-forwarding to Friday morning, I received a call from my contact at the company in Chicago offering me the job.

Elation doesn't begin to describe what I felt. I didn't know what to do. I texted everyone I could think to, and frantically paced around my house smiling and giggling for what must have been an hour or so.

The following weekend I spent nearly every waking moment, and a few non-waking moments with a lot of the people I care about most.

This story is a just a small part of life, and how well it's been going for me. It's been through no conscious effort on my account, either. I don't know if it's luck, or fate, or the stars aligning in my favor, or what, but I'm glad I didn't wear my suit. This path I've found myself on has me feeling happier than I have in quite some time.

Here's to continuing my journey down that path.