Three, tria, tres

June 2, 2008: Zoey enjoys her first ride.

Guinevere Arielle Ackley, Good Better Best (a work in progress) and now Blahg Blahg Blahg. There is just something about the number 3.

After talking with Scott Strazzante Tuesday I decided to focus this blog on photo triptychs, my little 3 picture essays. Scott has been working on a photo essay on the Cagwin farm near Lockport for over 10 years now. These days the farm is gone and where corn, soy beans and cattle once grew the current residents are now raising their families on that same land. Scott continues to document the neighborhood and recently started matching his older photos of Harlow and Gene with current photos of the family life in the subdivision. Just this past year Scott's diptych essay ran in National Geographic and the Chicago Tribune magazine. You can view a gallery of this essay on the Chicago Tribune website HERE. The photos are awesome.

As a picture editor my job involves picking, cropping, sizing, designing, assigning and waiting for photos but I still really love to make my own pictures. For me there is still magic in my cameras. To chase the perfect moment, to find art in the world around me it is just an adrenaline rush I can't get anywhere else.

In an attempt to keep myself from becoming a photo potato so I am getting back to my roots; carrying a camera with me everywhere I go.

I have never been a 1 frame shooter so a triptych is perfect for me. I always work a situation looking at different angles, composition, different lenses, exposures, depth of field, etc. The hunt for that perfect moment. Sometimes it is the first frame but I always think to myself I can make a better picture.

To keep my shooting eye fresh I am going to try to fill this blog with current photos of my life and the journey, 3 frames at a time. I will also go back into older shoots and pull out some archived triptychs.

This weekend we took Zoey for her first ride in the convertible, she loved it! Good thing I was not driving.

-jk