Wrap-Up and Planning

I seem to be spending a bunch of time away from home the last couple of months.  One reason is all the work involved in getting the Kentucky home up and running, so to speak.  The second reason is that work has been a lot steadier this year than the same period last year.  That is a real good thing!  The pup above is Luke the Drifter.  He belongs to a buddy of mine that I spent some time with recently, Tony Smotherman.  Otherwise known as the Travelin' Hunter.  While I was there in Nashville with him we shot some images for his new upcoming project, and a few "just cuz" pix.  I'm thinking that ol' Luke here will make some sort of apearance in my Dogtra work soon.  The image below is one of the other images I really liked that came out of this trip.

The rest of the summer is booking up pretty quickly as well.  Looks like at least one or two more trips to Nashville for work, a trip to Mississippi for the POMA Conference, some fishing photography in Michigan and perhaps Florida, and of course more personal work and payoing work in Kentucky.

Doesn't seem that it's been 3 weeks since my last post here.  I couldn't wait to get my site back up and running because I was missing writing here.  Now it's back and I forget to do anything with it...  Go figure.  The image above was one I shot recently of a friend of mine, Kim.  She was very pregnant at this point and she and my other friend Scot, had their baby this morning.  A boy.  Congratulations!

The image above works for me for several reasons.  I think she looks beautiful, it's something of a new style of photograhy, at least for me, and thirdly, I didn't drag out a ton of lights and gear and stands, etc to make it.  The photo was made with just a single, medium sized reflector.  SHe is backlit through the tre and the reflector is just bouncing some light, albeit, hard light, on her face.  Seems like a far cry from my more typical dark and desat style.  I don't think this will become my go to shooting style, but it's nice to know I'm maybe not as 1 dimentional as I thought...

The images below are older shots, but were on my desktop for some reason or another.  I still like them and thought I'd share them again, if I ever did in the first place.

If You Don't Like the Weather, Give it a Minute, It'll Change...

Recently I had the opportunity once again to spend some time with a couple of the best, most professional, personalities in the outdoor industry!  Pat Reeve and Nicole Jones.  For the third time in the last several years we were able to get together and shoot some of what I feel is my best work to date.  Over the course of three days together, we shot in sunrise, sunset, full sun, overcast, light misting rain, total drenching downpour, dark of night, brush fire, and even a few snow storms!  Truth is, most of the weather was just fine on location, we created all the rough stuff, so to speak.  Although far from unsurmountable, creating what we felt was believable harsh weather was a challenge in it's own right.  Getting the lighting right, without destroying the electronic gear in the often soaking enviorment, was the second big issue.  Mixing our weather with the real weather, like the amount of light, wind, etc. was the third biggest hurdle.  It took time and I know it was pretty miserable for Pat and Nicole being wet and cold most of the time but to their credit they toughed it out and we made some great pictures together, again!  The few shots below are just a small sample of the work that came out of our time together.  I can't wait for next time!

A lot has been going on recently, from the rebuild of the website, to work for new clients, and quite a bit of editorial work, at least for me. The image above is one of four that Realtree is using on the backs and double trucks of various waterfowl hunting magazines. It's from the most recent batch of Max4 effectiveness work we shot this past December in MS.

As for the editorial work I mentioned, American Hunter, the NRA publication ran a small image of mine a couple months ago and then came back to run this photo below, across 2 pages for the start of their piece on selecting the proper optics package.

Harris Publications is also running a series of photos I shot in Rifle Firepower, with a story they did on getting  back to using your grandfather's deer rifle.  Several shots were used in the story.  And another magazine, Petersen's Hunting is running the shot of the woman getting her jaw broken by an asian carp, on the back page called the Rear View.  And as a final editorial job, Bloomberg Businessweek ran a different shot of asian carp on the Illinois River in one of their recent issues.  Indiana Outdoor News will be running an image of mine in next month's issue to round out what has been quite a stretch of editorial work.

Very soon I post some images from a 3 day shoot I did last week in Minnesota with a couple of returning clients.  I was thrilled with what we accomplished!

As for right now, I am back at the farm in KY waiting on a friend or two that will show up today and another in a day or so to do a bit more turkey hunting.  One is coming for the heck of it while the other will be here to film an episode for his TV show. Hopefully the birds will cooperate for both of them.  I will be heading to Nashville sometime next week for what I anticipate will be a bit of work and some good times with family.  From there it will be off to South Carolina for a few days of work then on to Georgia for a couple days.  I may make it back home by June... which is just in time to head to Beaver Island and Fort Lauderdale, both for fishing and photography.  I love my job!

Home!

Seems like it has been an unusually long time since I've awakened in my own bed. Other than a few days here and there, I have probably been gone the better part of two months I think. But now I'm home, for about three days anyhow. The day after tomorrow I head to MN for a multiple day shoot with a great client. I'l have a one nite stop over at home, then it's back to KY to hunt with Tony Smotherman, the Travelin Hunter. I also have a few days of work that will be shot there during this trip. After that, I believe I will be heading to Nashville for a bit of work with an entertainer or two, and to cut some cedar trees that will become roof supports for the KY home. By the middle of May I will be heading to South Carolina for another multi day shoot with a new client. There are a couple other irons in the fire but I think I will have an extended stay at home by the end of May.

Heck, I might even get a chance to hunt turkey here at home!

The Season is Over?

I guess I'm never satisfied. I've spent like the last 3 months thinking about turkey hunting this spring. I mean probably more time thinking about it than I thought about deer huntning. Opening day here in KY was this past Saturday, and somehow, despite oversleeping, I killed one half of a double with my buddy John. Obviously he killed the other half. I was thrilled to say the least, turkey season was shaping up to be even better than I had hoped. Fast forward a few days to this morning. Somehow John's alarm at the other end of the hoouse woke me. I can't believe he didn't hear it but he never did get up. I figured as long as I was up I'd give it a go just to see if I could find another bird. I think it took about 15 minutes to strike one that was interested. Actually I think he came from the next ridge over. He covered about 500 yards in nothing flat and then spent the next hour and fifteen minutes strutting at about 70 yards from me. I finally couldn't take it any more and stopped calling to him. He gobbled a couple more times then drifted over the hill. I managed to get my legs straightened out and uncramped and got back into position. Made a quick call and he bellowed back instantly from about 100 yards. This time he pretty much ran to me stopping briefly a couple times to strut. He ended up in the dirt at about 10 yards with a bit of help from a Benelli and a 3" Winchester shell. Talk about happy! But before I could cover the few yards to retrieve him, I realized my season was over. You can only take 2 birds here. All that time thinking about it and now its over.

I had one other thought to extend it a bit. I figured I could drag John around the hills for a couple days. Unfortunately when I suggested it ot him, he was ready to head out immediately. OK, thats fine. But go figure, it took us about 10 minutes to strike a bird and another 10 for him and two others to race their way to him where the winner was shot in the face. His season is over too. Dang our luck!

Anyone want to go turkey hunting?

Back Up, and Crawling...

It seems like its been forever, and I guess it has been quite a while, but I once again have a functioning, non hacked, website. Same old addie of www.billkonway.com. New layout, new design, new ideas, and new photos. Hope you like it. No doubt I'll have plenty more to tell you about for now, we're back in business!