I got this Polaroid for 7 bucks!! Not a bad start to the new town!

I accompanied my friend Anthony to a meeting last week, and afterwords we found all these cool locations to shoot, some of them scarier than others, but nothing I couldn't handle. It was just fun to explore and to take pictures; something we hadn't done together in a while.

Late last week I went to Revolver Magazine's kickoff concert for the Hell Hath No Fury Tour. There were 5 amazing bands that played, including In This Moment, and my new favorite band, Straight Line Stitch. All of the band are fronted by women, which is very inspiring. I went with one of my best friends, and we needed that jolt of electricity you get from being at a hard rock/heavy metal show. It just reminded me why I love that type of music. Naturally, I had to take some photos.

I recently did my very first album cover art; it was designed for an up and coming artist, Flash. it was inspired by Frank Miller's The Spirit. I really like the idea of incorporating text into just about any image. Also it allowed me to attempt to use Illustrator, which is another beast all together.

Portrait of a artist from Marina Del Rey, 2011

I recently got a holga lens for my Canon 7D. The lens is plastic just like the holga lens, its just modified to fit on a digital camera. People keep asking me why I would buy a expensive camera just to put a 20 dollar lens on it. To them I say because I can.

I am still in a tutorial mode from doing the workshop yesterday, So I will give a breakdown of how I created my surreal self portrait. I am not going to go into detail on how I edited the images in Photoshop, but more so on how I took each image for the composite.


The first thing I did was photograph the broken mannequin head. I originally had another type of table for the surface, but I'm glad I chose the wooden surface. It adds texture and like the mannequin and me-- it's not perfect.

The next step that I took was to photograph myself for the face of the mannequin. I had my assistant for that day help me with this step. The metal bar in the lower right of the image was a marker to help me know where to align my body so my face would match up with the mannequin head.I realized I had to take a second picture of myself to get my lips and the mannequins to match correctly. Since the first image was shot at a different angle, I couldn't use the lips from that portrait because the mannequins lips are laying against the table.

So I had to align my face at the same angle as the table. The bar to the right was my guide to where I should be so the lips would line up.

From there I took these three images and composted them to get the final image. Which I will repost down here to avoid scrolling all the way back up.

This image is an outtake from a shoot I worked on yesterday with LA RAWwater. I really liked the paring of these two models.

Event Description

"Toxic Footprints" by Denise Favre, Presented by Phantom Gallery Los Angeles/Long Beach.

Denise Favre presents a series of photographs called Toxic Footprints. For over three years she has taken images in and around the South Bay area of Southern California. These images show the massive toxic sites by companies and the damage that is being done to the environment and communities that we live in. Putting them together visually should become clearer to us all, what we need to do.

Artist Reception: Saturday, March 12, 6:00 p.m. - 10:00 p.m.

For more information, please visit our website or call (424) 234-9958 or e-mail us at denise@dfavre.com.

This image is from a test shoot in 2010. People often mistake me for the model, (which is hilarious) I only wish my body was that good looking.

This is one of my favorite portraits, my model is a talented photographer named Joshua Rayburn. His images were always some of my favorites in studio lighting class.

I recently was featured in a local magazine LA RAWWater, as an artist, and also a contributing photographer. The founder of the magazine is a friend, who commissioned me to photograph him. The lighting of this photo is what I like the most.

©2011 Anthony Castro Photography

Event Description

Phantom Galleries Presents "Lure of Local," a body of photographic work exploring the urban aesthetic beauty of neglected corners, damaged streets and forgotten alleys.

Fine Art Photography by Anthony Castro.

Curated by Neil France.

Artist Reception Saturday, February 5th, 2011.

Located at 346 E 3rd Street Long Beach, CA 90802.

For more information, please visit our website or call (562) 786-7092 or e-mail us at thesaltypoet@aol.com.

This was an image that I had envisioned in my mind about 3 months before I actually executed it. I knew I wanted it to be a rock star, seedy, just woke up from a hangover type of vibe, and I think it worked pretty well. The song names are from inside jokes between friends. This image was featured in the LBCC 2010 Student Exhibit at the LBCC Art Gallery.

This image is an appropriation of the famous 1970 Kent State shootings where the shooting of unarmed college students by members of the Ohio National Guard took place on on Monday, May 4, 1970.

My group and I decided to take that iconic image and apply it to a modern setting. One of the group members made note that they were alive when this massacre happened and it affected students nationwide, and nowadays students probably wouldn't notice what's happening right in front of them because they're always on there laptops, ipods and texting.

So that's when the proverbial light bulb went on above all our heads and we decided to use that as our concept. (Group Members: Jade Aldrich, Denise Favre, Lisa Herman, Louis Castellanos, Will Gonzales, LaToya Tyson, Steven Lopez)

This image is another one from my surreal series, I have yet to name this particular series. To bad My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is already taken, haha.

© DB8S Photography

Event Description

Darnell Bates at DB8S Photography

"NOT ALONE"

Presented by Phantom Gallery Los Angeles/Long Beach

An exploration of solitude while in natural, urban, and/or open landscapes, by Darnell Bates.

Artist Reception: Saturday, January 8, 6:00 p.m. - 10:00 p.m.

Exhibition runs January 8 through February 6, 2011.

Sunday - Friday Open by appointment only, Saturday Open 4pm - 6pm

For more information, please visit our website or call (714) 794-9895 or e-mail us at darnellbates@db8s.com.