I Married a Photographer

On rt 204, taking shots of a former home.

Early Wednesday morning, I had a few spare minutes at work.  I caught myself surfing the world-wide-interweb (reference from one of my favorite movies) for a home to call ours. Deep sigh.  This hunt has become a lost cause but that is a whole different topic.  Ugh!  Anyway, I found this house on the interweb and called the listing agent to set up a time to see it. After getting the run-around by a real estate agent, I decided that Dean and I should just drive by the place and see if it is worth the hassle to us.

After work on a fairly sad and rainy afternoon, Zak, Dean, and I took the camera equipment, hopped in the ole’ Xterra and headed toward this house.  I was delighted to use the google maps app on my new iPhone to better assist in my already excellent navigational skills!  We were calmly driving along routes 11 & 15 South. Dean found a spot where he wanted to take some shots and told Zak to remember where it was.  In the passenger seat, I looked to see where exactly the turn off was and Dean slowed the car, pulled onto the shoulder, and asked if this is the right road. I respond, “No.”  So he accelerated and merged back onto 11&15.  I corrected myself by saying that “That was the road we wanted to take, but not the same road the house is on.”  Thinking back, his response was, “Ace directions, Andrea.” So chalk it up to misunderstanding, right?

We continue on. I was doing my best to read the road signs and figure out where the next turn was, to get better reception, I held my phone close to the windshield.  I shouted, “That was the turn!”  As we drive by the road, this being our second missed turn and increasing frustration.  Dean slammed on the brakes -they work very well, by the way, turned the car around and continued on our route.  I knew Dean was furious. I wasn’t very happy with my neurons misfiring.  You could cut the tension with a knife.  Zak and I remained silent.  How do I recover from playing the confident idiot?!

Finally, my google map tells me that we’re past the house, which I announced. But thinking of the photo that was posted online, I hadn’t seen anything proving that we had.  Lo and behold, there in front of us the house stood.  Shabby, weather-beaten, old and now I knew why and how it was priced.  We looked around the property for a little while, I didn’t like it enough to care at that point and I think Dean and Zak were more fascinated by the junked cars in the yard. Disappointed, we crawled back in the car but this time we were much less tense and much more interested in getting some odd shots.  Of what, we didn’t know.

More driving and wrong turns were in our future but lo and behold, we did finally get to the abandoned gas station/garage where Dean asked Zak to earmark earlier.  I didn’t have my camera along, so I can only share his photos. I looked around and imagined how this place may have operated in its day.  A  little garage/shop that could have held two cars at most, I pictured a few guys sitting around in their white t-shirts and neatly buzzed hair, having coffee and cigarettes while catching up on local news.  I saw a skull of a deer or something that had horns, near signs that read ‘beware of dogs’ and ‘no tresspassing’.  Watching Dean at his craft is a cathartic experience for me.  He laid on the ground to get the perfect angle for his shots.  A feeling of complete sadness came over me, thinking that where I now stand there used to be life.  Many years after the closing of this old building no one ever thinks of them as anything mre than an eyesore or junkyard.  I am then brought back to assisting my husband with switching lenses or setting up the tripod.  I stand and watch, seeing what is in his mind, how he sees the final product while taking the images.  I guess, in an analogy it’d be stated as such: Dean is to photography as Andrea is to running.  I know his vision is not anything I could see or photograph but in and around life Dean finds art.

Dean shooting a HDR titled "The Elders"

After spending all day Saturday out in the hot sun at our daughter’s field hockey tournament, we planned to attack Sunday with unusual energy.  Constantly running between the kids’ games and practices, we find that most of our weekends are spent at the extremes of straightening the house or lounging about.   It has been a while since we all climbed in the car with nowhere to go and nothing special to see or do. So that’s exactly what we did!  Sunday in the early afternoon, all four of us and the baby (Dean’s Nikon D300) hopped in the family vehicle to a destination to where we rarely ever travel!

With nothing on our minds but a new family adventure, a hint of newness came over me.  It felt good to approach life with a fresh mind, open to explore.  We found our car slowing down around Halfway Dam; we could not resist.  Slowly we pulled the car into the parking space, I heard the gravel under the tires as we came to a stop.  The first door opened.  I felt the hot Spring air sting my face as I stepped out into the afternoon sun.  Seeing photo opportunities all the time, Dean really has become crafty in finding what angles, lighting, and lenses to use in any given situation.  It always amazes me to see him work.  He gets so into his art that my job is not to point things out to him but help him change the lenses and encourage his craft.

In order for you to view any of these images at an excellent resolution/size, you’ll need to become Dean’s contact on Flickr.  He also has posted most of the images on Facebook and JPGmag. After he took some great images of the forest near the dam, we headed up the hill to the overlook area.  This is where things got interesting!  Having little to no expectation sometimes is the best way to go about things. And in this instance it proved correct.  We got to the top of the hill where there is a narrow pull-off on the right hand side of the road. On this day it happened to be lined with cycles.  There were at least 10 bikes there whose owners stood about 20 feet away looking out over the dam talking.  Dean pulled off the road to turn around since there wasn’t a space for us to park and headed back down the hill.  As he was driving away, we talked about how the bikes would be a great untapped resource.  We ran the scenario by one another – ask the owner permission to take a photo, hand him/her a business card, send him/her a print after it has been processed and violá!  We both looked at one another and Dean did exactly what I thought he should, turned the car around.  I was getting a card ready to hand to the bike owner as Dean became excited thinking about how his shots will turn out. He could see the the HDR results in his mind’s eye and just couldn’t resist.

We parked the car and approached the slew of bikers who were laughing and clearly having nice time.  Dean singled out one fellow to ask him which person owned the bike he wanted to take a shot of – the owner agreed.   After asking us if we were cops, which I found humorous, Dean proceeded to take some amazing images.

As we wrapped up the photo session, we waved to and thanked the bikers once again. They all kind of reminded me of my Uncle Jim but that is a whole different story.   We packed up our equipment and headed off to the next destination; taking snaps of the Amish in transit to . . . uh . . . wherever they go on Sunday. Church? One culture to the next, huh?!  Looking back on the day, it was perfect in a number of ways.  Dean has illustrated to me a number of times how serious he is about doing photography full-time and when I see him work I can’t help but think that his talent is somewhat of a waste in an area that underwhelmed is the new overwhelmed.  We continue on though hoping for that shot to get published or to find that perfect studio space.  Everyday one step closer . . .

Like the oxymoronic title?  This is and update on when and where you maybe have seen Dean’s images.  I was happy to announce in June of 2008 that Die Strafbar Photography was hung at The Kind Cafe in Selinsgrove, PA.  We had about 25 pieces there ranging from portraits to landscapes.  It was our first time in the community and the staff at the cafe were great, very hospitable and easy to work with.  We had our photos there from June 27th to July 18th.

Photographing the remnants of an old stone house on rt 204 in Kratzerville, PA

With little feedback, we were on to our next endeavor. Just a week later, I entered Dean in a local judged contest.  Not completely knowing what to expect, I happily took over some framed pieces ready to be put on display.  I did take a visual survey of the other photography pieces that had been entered but I wasn’t sure for which ones we’d directly compete.  Well, that artist’s reception was just not our ‘cup of tea’ so-to-speak.  There were a good variety of artists there who used their medium as a way to pass the time.  For me personally, I just found it really ridiculous to compare some of them on a fair basis.  Based completely on talent and interestingness, there wasn’t a whole lot offered there.  I felt that our work was so very out of place. Dean’s submitted work was dark and brooding in contrast to the generally placid landscapes and portraits of the other contestants; almost a different genre. All-in-all, it was a learning experience.

In February, Dean and I were in contact with some new people for the Bloomsburg ArtWalk.  This is a great way to get your name out in the community and network with new artists; each artist applies and then is paired with a business in downtown Bloomsburg.  On the designated night, there are sandwich board signs placed in front of each of the participating businesses so that passers-by know to stop in.  The timing for this show was hard for me to manage, Dean was just getting back from a business trip days before the show.  I felt crunch time coming down on my shoulders and I didn’t want to get too ahead of the game.  I had notified the business and was  nervous about this foreign experience.  When the day came that we took our photos in to be hung in Ready Go Burrito, we met with the business owner Sean.  He was wonderful to work with, a very interesting, artsy man who welcomes all types of art in his business.  On the night of the event, all the staff was very open and welcoming. At one point, the joint was packed with people ,whether for the food or the art I’m not sure but overall we had a great turnout.  I also made a point to go visit the artist who was my p.o.c trough the entire experience, Abigail Smith Kurecian.  She was located up the street from us at B Green Loft, displaying her beautiful pottery.  I introduced myself and thanked her for setting everything up in such a mindful manner.

Onto our future, we will participate in the ArtWalk again on May 7th from 4pm to 8pm again in Bloomsburg.  We’ll keep you posted to all the details and would love to see you there! If you know of any other artist-friendly cafes, pubs, restaurants, or galleries that would be willing to work with us, please let us know.

It's a celebration!

Where to begin? This is always the hardest part, starting off cold; getting to know someone. I married a photographer.That is a simple statement, yet a lot can be inferred. Deciding to restart my blog with more of a purpose than a therapy session, I discussed with my (photographer) husband how my writings should focus. He suggested the brilliant idea of my energy, creative writing and artistic managing  to set up in a blog type format where I explore the photography world from my perspective.

I am involved yet mostly behind the scenes. Spending my twenty-somethings modeling, primarily in New York City (and on the rare occasion I’ll work for two of my favorite creative minds, Dean Michael Dorman and Oscar Bond), I have learned a lot from being in front of the camera. Dean has taught me a lot about the millions of things to think about while taking beautiful photographs. My experience modeling has proven invaluable in the photography industry and at the very least; I look forward to working with other models/clients who enjoy art and photography as much as we do!

So please allow me to introduce to you, my husband, Dean Michael Dorman, the founder of Die Strafbar Photography. If we were in a television studio, this would be the part where the applause light flickers and the crowd goes wild. I know that for real life events we don’t have the applause light but boy if we did –we all could compete for Vanna White’s Guinness book of world records . . . applause record, of course. Wouldn’t that be swell? I digress, back to the artist. I learned about Dean’s interest in photography soon after meeting him. He had purchased a Nikon D70s as his first semi-professional camera and after seeing some of his work I was very impressed. I remember seeing one photo, in particular titled From Frankenstein’s Junk Drawer, simply put it is an image of bolts. Yet, it’s not just bolts. It is an overall feeling of broken, maybe on the mend but incomplete. It is a great DoF shot, the color is a soft bluish-green and I get the sense of just wanting to look around the scene to get more of the story. These images and his approach to photography are unique to me.I completely understand that every photographer begins for various reasons; Dean’s was to meet people and have an expressive outlet. His images tell a story sometimes keeping the viewer guessing, just allowing us to see snippets rather than the complete version.

My purpose for this blog is to get people with common interest involved; fellow photographers, models and art lovers. So anyone who has an opinion, feedback or constructive criticism is welcome. I would like to have a weekly topic and get your take on our topics. As well as discussing photography, we will keep everyone up to date with local art shows and community art events. I look forward to this experience! Both Dean and I can appreciate that everyone sees art in their own individual way. Not all of our work will be loved by everyone but the Die Strafbar Photography palette is a great one hoping that you can find and enjoy some of our offerings.

Please register your email and make comments freely! We encourage any and all creative outlets and look forward to sharing our photography and career with you!

Andrea Dorman

Contact me at Andrea – at – DieStrafbarPhoto .com