Cody J. Bennett

Tuesday at around 11:30 I got a call from Jayleen with an invitation to join her on her boat to take in the local sights for a whale-watch adventure. Not one to turn down a chance to get out on the water and spend some quality time with good people, I made it work with my office and sped out the door to run home for a camera before heading to Auke Bay.

The whales were fairly active but often elusive and scatter, but I had the most fun watching the sea lions anyhow. They always seemed intrigued with the boats and would at times pop up fairly close to take a look. Here are a few keepers from the day – you can see the rest here:
http://photos.codyjbennett.com/fine-art/2012/

Meet Irene. Musician, student, friend.

She’s pretty amazing.

Last Saturday with the help of Nicole and Jayleen, we took headed out to the Ferry Terminal and then farther out the road. We didn’t have anything too structured planned, though we had talked about the idea of getting wet and muddy, even to the extent of dunking her in Auke Bay with a prop guitar for an unusual musical portrait.

Lucky for her she didn’t get submerged (for now), but we still were able to find several neat places to photograph at. I’m looking forward to the next session!

Enjoy!

Not gonna lie: I’m doing the happy dance in the comfort of my own home. Not totally sure when it will ship (it’s on backorder around the nation), but rest assured, I’ll be an excited little boy when word arrives that it’s en route!

Nicole is awesome.

I had the privilege to work with her at the University during her final year of college, while she was on academic exchange from Wisconsin. It was fun to hear about, read about, and sometimes see (in person!) the adventures of her year in the Outdoor Studies Program at UAS.

For graduation, she had some some beautiful pictures of her at ocean’s-edge to send out for her announcements, complete with a purple blouse and beads of pearls. They were good looking photos, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that we should partner to make some pictures that more closely matched my picture of Nicole’s awesome outdoorsy’ness. I mean heck, she got dropped off on an icefield and hiked out 35 miles. That’s something that purple and pearls doesn’t quite communicate.

So we went out yesterday into the Juneau rain and found some great photos. Take a look for yourself…

I’m a lucky guy. I was asked to the be the photographer for the 26th Juneau Jazz & Classics festival. Today I was able to attend the Strings at the Shrine event with the Avalon Quartet. It was a beautiful day at the shrine, and wonderful to see so many smiling faces. The music (as always) was stellar, and with such a great location it’s hard not to be whisked away by the experience.

Anyhow, enough of my commentary. You’ll see these images on the Jazz & Classics Facebook page (go, quick, like them!) and I’m sure I’ll have more to share over the next couple of weeks.

Enjoy!

For some reason, I’ve always loved mud. The best time for a mountain bike ride is when it’s a torrential downpour, and there is no possible way to return home without being caked with mud and dirt from head to toe.

Fortunately, UAS gives folks easy access to mud. This was a course that was set up by Tara Olson for the students to have a good time at the end of the semester. It seemed like a hit, and I certainly enjoyed photographing it!

Just a quick post to share a few images from a recent portrait session with Doanh (pronounced ‘Dawn’), who is a soon-to-be college grad from UAA. Fortunately for me, she had been working as a student intern within the last semester here in Juneau, so it means that I got to make a new friend who will do some amazing things with her life.

Without further adieu, take a gander. Just like my wife, I’m sure you’ll exclaim, “she’s beautiful!”

Good luck, Doanh!

See Doanh’s final choices here: http://photos.codyjbennett.com/Portraits/Doanh/

Last night, after crawling into bed with Heather to watch a sitcom, my phone buzzed. It’s not often that folks call me in the late hours, so after the show was over, I hopped out of bed to find a message from my friend Shea excitedly telling me about the Aurora. He hasn’t let me down with reports of northern lights in the past, but just to be sure, I headed to Facebook to see what the crowdsourced space-weather report looked like: tons of people were chatting up the lights.

Not wanting to miss out on epic action, we bundled up and walked to the end of the street, seeing the sky aglow with the wisps of light. While the lights were certainly present, they were a bit bland to the naked eye – the truly amazing show had been earlier when the message was left. Not wanting to miss out on a return event, we went back home, tucked Heather into bed, and I headed out to make some photos.

Shea and others had been texting through the night encouraging and tipping each other off to aurora awesomeness in the case that we were not keeping eyes peeled to the sky… (Sometimes driving to a new location means that you miss the most amazing display ever.) It was nice to know that someone else was out in the cold and enjoying the sights. In a strange way, it’s kind of like that song in Fievel Goes West. Anyhow, back to last night.

After standing in the Mendenhall River for around an hour and thirty minutes, I was able to capture a variety of shots, and eventually headed back to the road where Shea had showed up. We stood and talked for the next hour or so making a few frames, and also gathering images for a time lapse video. Eventually I made it home, offloaded images, and was able to slip under the covers at just shy of 4am. Today has been a day of caffeine!

Take a look at what I came back with – shown in chronological order:

And lastly, the time lapse video. This was at ~2am for an hour. 400 frames, each at ~8sec/ea. Playing at 15fps.

Take a look at the larger versions by clicking on an image or heading to my 2012 Fine Art gallery.

I thought I’d throw up another one from my outing last weekend – I would venture to say that I like this one better for the additional ‘interesting’ things in the frame, though it’s not strictly a photo of the aurora.

What do you think? Do you have a preference?

Most people accuse me of not needing much sleep. I’m not so sure I agree, but I am certainly aware that I have strange sleep patterns. Take tonight for instance: I went to bed at a ‘reasonable’ hour (I think it was around 9:30 or 10pm), and then I awoke at 12:15am without much explanation. I even tried to go back to bed, and after laying there for 45 minutes waiting to fall asleep, I decided it was time to just get up and go read or otherwise keep myself entertained.

I’m glad I did.

Facebook did me well tonight. A fellow photographer who has a knack for aurora images had posted an image showing proof that the aurora’s were out, albeit faintly. That was enough. I went out and spent almost 2 hours collecting images. The one below which “made the cut” is one that was approximately a 33minute exposure (f6.3, ISO 400, @14mm).

I finally decided it was time to go home when I couldn’t feel the tips of my fingers. I’d blame it on the lack of gloves, but mostly I think it was my half-hearted efforts to create a time lapse that had my hands out of my pockets every 10 seconds.

Enjoy!

Also, I’ve put this up on my Fine Art page where prints and other artwork are available for purchase.

The car is 85% packed for a weekend adventure, but I get distracted easily, so I thought I’d take a moment to update the (mostly out of date) blog! It’s crazy to realize that the last time I was here … Continue reading →

I’m sitting on the flight from LAX to SEA surrounded by other first class passengers with Mike of Hood, OR fluttering around serving with great energy and a plethora of unexpected adjectives for the normally mundane (like the in-flight snack). … Continue reading →

“Interesting is such an emotionally neutral word…” I received that comment last night via text just after I had described my family reunion with the word “Interesting.” While I should have known that she’d call me out, her observation is … Continue reading →

Marco Jenny Hannah Georgia Kelly R. Rudy Kathy Annie Seth Kelly M. Robin Gary Alex Jim * Ellen * Kathleen * Bill † Seth L. † Karon † Stephanie † Pete † Eva † Amy † Nick * Dianna * … Continue reading →

Awake another 30 minutes before my alarm. This time, up and out the door 15 minutes early. Alarm time? 6am. I think one of the things that I miss while I’m immersed in the experience of Disney is simply the … Continue reading →

I woke up 40 minutes before my alarm went off and for the most part just laid there in the dark thinking about getting up, but also just thinking my alarm was a moment away. As it turns out, it … Continue reading →

Well, I’m sitting on a plane somewhere above 10,000 feet as they’re not yelling at me to put my electronics away. Good thing they don’t walk around and ask about bluetooth, or they’d chase away my keyboard. So far, things … Continue reading →

I’m trying to find the words inside to express some of the sensations I’ve been living with for the past several weeks. Around a month ago, Heather & I decided to attend the up-and-coming Bennett Family Reunion. My older brother … Continue reading →

I wanted to name this “the importance of being earnest”, but the talk really wasn’t about being earnest; it was about vulnerability. It’s one of those topics that you might touch upon in your soul searching, but oh-so-gratifying to see … Continue reading →

I’ve had my camera out a few times in the past couple of days… Thought I’d post some highlights for your enjoyment. First, an outing on Wednesday night/Thursday morning. It was the wee hours with a full moon: And then … Continue reading →