Beer of the Month - March

The beer of the month for March is Dogfish Head Craft Brewery's Midas Touch Ale {9% abv}. My introduction to this beer came a couple months ago at the Laurrapin Grille in Havre De Grace, MD. I was in attendance to check out the great tunes of my brother-in-laws band, The Rivals, and I ended up looking through the see-through fridge behind the bar for something I hadn't tried before. Fortunately for me, they had a very eclectic assortment of bottled brews. That's when I saw it; Midas Touch in a dark bottle with the fingerprint label. After three sips I knew it'd be claiming the BOTM crown for March.

Dogfish Head as a brewery began life in 1995, in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. The company aimed to provide original beers and great foods for the local beach community, but the business grew faster than they imagined. From an extremely small brewing setup which required use 15 times a week, to the current industrial-sized brewery in Milton Delaware, Dogfish Head's quality products have always found their way into restaurants, storefronts and homes of their fans.

Dogfish Head's exponential growth history repeated itself again in late 2010, with their involvement in the Brew Masters TV Series on the Discovery Channel. With even more exposure, they've unfortunately had to pull some distribution to better handle the now near-worldwide demand. Dogfish Head recently addressed the public online to calm the nerves of their constituency. Even though some feel slighted, with the current economy there's no point in expanding in a manner that only addresses the short-term, so I completely respect their actions.

Midas Touch Ale is a lovely golden color in the glass, with virtually no head. The first sip of this ale is an explosion of flavor, rare for most brews. You can definitely taste the labelled ingredients, including muscat grapes and honey, but it takes a skilled palette to detect the subtle saffron aromatics. For some background for those of you who don't drink wine, muscat grapes are typically used in dessert wines. Actually, wine is a good way to describe the feel of this beer. It's easy to tell this brew has fermented for a longer period of time than most, which lends both to the alcohol content and complex taste. Don't misinterpret the ingredient list, Midas Touch isn't sweet, it's a quite refined blend of flavors. This great brew from Dogfish Head Craft Brewery's lineup is hard to find, expensive and comes in four-packs. Use the search function on the Dogfish Head website and call ahead. Seek Midas Touch out with vigilance. 4 stars.

Monochrome. #1

While I love color and everything that makes eyesight one of the best senses we humans possess, sometimes the most striking representations of a point in time have no color at all. This is the start of a new post series built on images composed only with tones. I'll post em' fresh as I shoot.

Beer of the Month - Febrewary

The beer of the month for February is Sapporo Premium Beer {5% abv}. I was laboring over what I was going to pick this month, but it all became crystal clear after going to a Japanese Steakhouse for my buddy Mike's birthday celebration. I hadn't had a Sapporo in quite some time, but when I heard it was on the beer list I immediately ordered a lovely 22oz aluminum can. When I later looked for these 22oz cans for the picture, I ran into storefronts selling bottles only; check out the Sapporo website to see what the can looks like.

Sapporo's notoriety comes from being Japan's oldest beer brand. Back in the 1870's Sapporo's founder, Seibei Nakagawa, trained in Germany to learn advanced brewing techniques. He returned to his home in Sapporo City, the first Japanese German-trained brewmaster (braumeister) in the world. There have been many aspiring brewers that travelled to Germany (or surrounding areas) to learn superior techniques, but unique to Seibei-san, he returned to make beer using all local ingredients. In 1876, the resulting brew Seibei-san produced under the Sapporo name became rapidly popular throughout Japan, and by 1964 it began being imported to the USA. The large star on the Sapporo label dates back to the origin of the company, symbolizing not only the pioneering spirit of Japanese inhabiting Sapporo region in the late 19th Century, but also symbolizing the Sapporo brand being at the very forefront of the Japanese beer industry.

Sapporo Premium Beer has a very crisp, light flavor which results from the use of aroma hops as well as brewing method. It makes perfect sense as a Japanese beer, given the amount of lighter fare common in the land of the rising sun where seafood is a mainstay. I would equate this brew much to a white wine, shining when paired with a meal starring pork, chicken, fish or shellfish. Sapporo Premium Beer is an easy drinking lager and shouldn't be limited to a seasonal snag. 2 stars.

First Friday.

A couple years ago I was at my now brother-in-laws wife's parent's house, which is within walking distance of the Chesapeake Bay. It was a lovely afternoon; light on clouds, bright sun and there was a large gathering with a pig roast, horseshoes and cold beverages. Across from their house was a neighbor whose yard lead to a small set of stairs that lead you down to the beach several meters down, but more importantly one of the best views for a sunset on the East Coast. I took a couple pictures early in the afternoon, then made sure to come back to catch the sun drop with my camera. My sister-in-law-laws mom (Jo) who hosted this party liked the pictures I took and told me about an Art event that takes place in nearby Oxford, PA called First Friday. After we conversed about the shooting I'd done over the years prior and her own love and production of artwork she suggested I find a day to come to the shop she manages in PA to be her featured artists during the First Friday Art Stroll.

Chesapeake Bay

Over the next couple years I saw Jo at the odd wife's-side family events; weddings, birthdays, pig roasts (mmhm). The same question would come up as I showed her new work of mine after travelling and what not, and I kept having to put it off for the trip/carshow this weekend, or the wrenching on my car that weekend. On top of that, I still hadn't found a trustworthy place to make prints of my images, representing my shots as well as my raws looked on my computer. Fast forward to this past December (2010) and Jo let me know there was an opening in her featured artist spot for February. I freed up some time away from other projects to track down a reliable printing house and assemble some prints to showcase at Jo's store. After some research I found a printer that lined up with my needs. I ordered several prints through this printer, in a variety of large sizes, primarily to see how my fullsize 350dpi jpegs would translate once printed on quality paper. I didn't get anything framed to keep costs down, just went with sturdy yet clean mat-board bases so the shots were solid enough to hang. Thankfully, I was quite pleased with what showed up in the mail.

February 4th (2011) arrived and it was time to get to work. I drove North and arrived at Jo's store, the Outback Trading Company at 29 South Third Street Oxford, PA 19363. I met Jo's and her colleagues, the Hatfield ladies, and we quickly worked together to get the store ready for the event. We ended up using a couple stand-up display boards they normally used for clothing, removed all the hooks, then used Velcro stickers to arrange all my displayed work.

Throughout the evening large amounts of people came by the store and checked out all the current clothing deals going on. Some of Outbacks' patrons also checked out my work and asked me everything you can think of about the images that stood out to them. It was interesting to hear the different takes as well as input on some of my subjects, especially since these are all people that just found out about what I do that day. I had some great conversations, plenty of close friends and family stopped by to check things out and I got leads on some places to shoot future work. Icing on the cake was that I sold a piece from the Vegas 2010 album; as you can see I'm gearing up accordingly. I was happy I finally made it out to support this event, even if it was just in a small way. Hopefully I can make time to bring some new work out later this year.

I'd like to thank Jo (right) and Trina (left) for the help they provided for this first public event of mine. If you're into quality suede and leather boots, hats, clothing as well as casual and active outdoor apparel, you definitely need to check out the Outback Trading Company. Outback Trading Co. gear is sold across the US and worn by adventurists, cowboys and cowgirls alike, but the Oxford, PA location is the place to get these goods, discounted directly from the source. Visit them online or give them a call, and tell them that Allen sent ya.

It's cold.

The Winter has come and, barring something amazing in the next couple weeks, has for the most part retreated. Going after a shot representative of this season was difficult, because what is Winter really? Ice? Cloudy skies? 20 inches of snow? Winter is whatever you're used to in your neck of the woods from Dec through early March; on the East Coast of the US, it's rubbing your hands together while you wait for your cars' airconditioning to warm up. It's Winter Weather Advisories every time there's a threat of precipitation. It's heat and electric bills doubling over the previous month. It's the sun setting before 5pm. It's warm tea on a Saturday afternoon after a couple hours of shoveling...I think you get the idea.

All that said, I figured a nice snowy day would be perfect for me to shoot in. Fool! The first problem with this plan is that when you have light snowflakes, they tend to float and drift upwards rather than falling straight down, which gets shot ruining water droplets on your lens. The second problem was that since the snowflakes during this days' shower were extremely small, the shots end up looking like they're soft on focus more than appearing that it's actually snowing. If I had all the time in the world, I would've shot a set when the flakes were huge, but ya can't win them all. I was happy to take on this challenge so I can keep working outside of my comfort zone. While the level of entertainment this post will bring you is up for debate, me enjoying this process isn't ha.

Keeping lens dry...sorta.



I wandered around for an hour or two in my area looking for a great representation of what Winter is; I ended up running into some old stomping grounds in the process. This old mansion below I spoke of in the beginning of the Fall ended up being a repeat destination. Something interesting to add about this building is what I learned while doing an Art exhibit of sorts a couple weeks ago. I had a large print of this same structure that I took this past November on display and we ended up getting into a conversation about it's architecture and history.

The gentlemen explained that this was likely an old plantation mansion which probably dates back to the 1800s. As you all know at that time, Maryland (and most of America for that matter) still participated in legal slavery (for my International readers who are unaware, slavery in the US was legally abolished with the enactment of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution in 1865). He also told me about a few other locations in Maryland where historical buildings like this are preserved and I think I'll try seeking a few out for the sake of documentation. I've always been into history, almost minoring in it during college, because learning about what was before your time allows you to put right now in perfect context. Being aware of previous successes and failures also does a pretty good job of keeping yesterday's poor choices by society from being revisited.

Now that we'll have a 50 degree-high day or two, during the next several weeks while we await Spring, all those thoughts of time flying by too fast come to the forefront again. The Sun staying out past 6pm makes it a bit easier to accept though.

On Assignment: HVM Racing's Simona De Silvestro 2011 IZOD IndyCar Series Press Event

For those of you who know me or have followed this blog, you know I love cars and competition. Putting these two things together, what I say next will make perfect sense; I love motorsports. I follow British and German Touring Car Championship racing, American LeMans Series racing, World Rally Championship racing and more importantly Formula 1. I also watch legendary endurance races like the 24 Hours of LeMans, Nurburgring and Daytona when they're televised. Of course then you can understand how I felt last year after hearing that Baltimore City would be playing host to an IndyCar Series race event over Labor Day weekend. By way of the Baltimore Race Development (BRD) Group, this festival of speed is called the Baltimore Grand Prix.

For my automotive site, I've covered and written articles for several shows from the U.S. German automotive enthusiast scene, but have yet to frequent road races since ROTL's inception; mainly due to glaring schedule conflicts. Rectifying last years errors, I've planned my schedule in advance ensuring my availability for the Baltimore Grand Prix. Accordingly, I've been in communication with BRD's Marketing Director concerning media access during the race weekend. A couple of weeks ago I was notified of a local press event being held by one of this years IndyCar Series Race Teams, HVM Racing. HVM's ace driver, Simona de Silvestro, was signed to return in 2011 for her sophomore year in IndyCar behind the wheel of the teams #78 race car. The catalyst behind this encore was last years major sponsor for Simona, Entergy Corporation, renewing her contract based upon the belief in the skills of this young (22) but accomplished driver; being 2010's IndyCar Series Rookie of the Year didn't hurt either.

I arrived an hour and a half in advance at the location where the demonstration is to be held; S. Howard & W. Camden at the tollgate entrance for Camden Yards. It was about 25 degrees in sun. The conditions weren't perfect for operating an IndyCar of course, but in order to make things a bit more manageable, the HVM Racing Team used tread laden rain tires rather than slicks.

Simona de Silvestro, the focal point of this gathering, arrived once the general media had swooped in on the prepped #78 car, changed into her firesuit, had a seat and then began her briefing with the team before getting started. The plan was a quick two figure '8's in the closed off area so the media could get as many angles as needed for coverage purposes.

The event went off without a hitch. Plenty of locals came outside of their jobs and lunch runs to watch everything going on, regardless of the cold, and the local city utility workers who were coincidentally on a job on W. Camden hung out with point and shoot cameras to capture the spectacle. It was a fun event; not only did it pump me up for the Baltimore Grand Prix, but it was interesting to see a young driver so early in her career going through this process of presenting herself publicly. From posing for pictures with fans and bigwigs (responsible for organizing the Baltimore GP), to signing autographs for kids; it was really cool to see. My entire set from this event can be seen here.

Beer of the Month - January

The beer of the month for January is St. Bernardus Christmas Ale {10% abv}. I know what some of you are thinking, "...it's too late for a Christmas Seasonal Beer to make BOTM." Fools! With the recent parading of Belgian inspired beers, we now have a genuine Belgian Family Brewers product. St. Bernardus Brewery was founded in 1946 in Watou, a Province of West Flanders in Belgium. What makes beers from this part of the world special is the brewing technique; once the finest ingredients and water are combined and brewed, the beer spends an additional three months time in tanks to mature before prep for bottling. This process results in a naturally produced carbonation, which is noticeable to the palette. The most important benefit of this carbonation technique is it allows you to age your bottled beer for up to 15 years. I know from personal experience, that bottle aging beer (that's capable of being aged) over a year or two's time smooths out the texture tremendously.

St. Bernardus Christmas Ale is dark and full bodied; flavorful is an understatement. Malty texture resides up front with hoppy tones singing backup. Familiar holiday spices finish the experience. This Abbey Ale is a brew to be sought out; accordingly, I give this authentic Belgian 4 stars. The tricky thing is if you want to try St. Bernardus Christmas Ale, you need to get your hands on a bottle or two now. Thankfully for me, I got it as a gift from my buddy Matt last month. Good news is you can age a few bottles in your home in case this ale is hard for you to get. Who said only wine aficionados can take advantage of affordable in home aging? And if you couldn't tell by the abv, this ale packs a left hook. Slow sipping is highly recommended...but when isn't it?

Playing with strobes.

After many years of ignoring my photography needs for automotive needs (ahem), I've been able to get some equipment together so I can take on more commercial projects. I'll still offer natural light portraiture of course, but controlled environments are a great thing. I'll update/link on here as I begin to advertise and take on new clientele, but in the meantime it's been fun dialing in my new setup for future work. I've had the privilege of assisting several young entrepreneurs I know personally get better images of themselves and products, for website, performance career and business promotion, and I'm very happy to now keep even more work in house.

Erin, a good friend of mine who runs a few blog-based websites like myself, was in need of some material. While the in-house studio space is still under construction, I got creative. A multiple hour evening shoot ensued, and a great start was established. I can't share samples from this set, but look for behind the scenes posts in the near future.