Back in July of last year I shot some family portraits for a friend from work. I shared some of those images from that shoot in a blog post called Family Portrait. When I shot those photos I had enough people to try an idea I have been thinking about. I laid on the ground and shot the group as they circled around me. It was a fun experiment and it paid off. I posted the image on my Flickr stream and was contacted in February from a photo editor for London based magazine Photography Monthly. They had an article idea for interesting family portraits and they wanted to use my photo in the article.

This is another example that you should always try to experiment and try something new. It may not work out but when it does people will take notice. I have taken this to heart and now try to think of new ways to do things in my photography and also in my day-to-day work life.

Here is a tear sheet from the article. They mention I used a Canon 1Ds MkII which was not the case. I used a Canon 5D.

One of the advantages (or disadvantage) of being unemployed is you have time to volunteer for charity projects during the day. I have been spending a great deal of time for the past couple of weeks photographing items that will be used for a Smithsonian National Zoo online auction.

One of the main fundraising events that the Zoo hosts each year is Zoofari. They always have a silent auction at the event and this year they added the online auction as well.

You can view and bid on the items at the Zoofari link. The auction ends on May 13th.