New Website!

So... my good friend Brendan Rygus made me a new website and I am therefore leaving blogger.

I encourage you to keep following my blog that is now integrated into the new website! Check it out here:

www.dylanleeder.com

Thanks for your continues support and I hope you guys keep following my new site!

- Dylan

Fil Skateboarding

Skateboarding has been a part of my life since I can remember. Because I was surrounded by it growing up I have naturally taken some skate photos before. The biggest difference between my old skate photos and these ones are that this is the first time I've used flash. Since college i've been excited to try it - I'm happy with the results but I definitely have a few things to learn.

Here's Fil skating in Toronto.

Here's the guys checking out some footage.

Oh, and yeah... my computer crashed again since I last posted. I've been able to grab these off my hard drive and edit them on my roommates computer. Honestly, fixing my computer has been hell. It's been two months, it worked for a week, and now I have to by a new hard drive for it. It's definitely been a difficult time in terms of my photography but that's life. Gotta keep on pushing through.

Thanks!

- Dylan

People Watching: Freedom Festival

Toronto's Freedom Festival was last week and having enjoyed last years I made a point to check it out. The festival is a celebration/protest of marijuana - it's basically live music, various food vendors, and other entertainment with a lot of high people in a park. If you're interested in the festival you can check out my coverage of the same event last summer - see that here: http://dylanleeder.blogspot.com/2010/05/freedom-festival.html

Because I covered the event last year and had less time at the festival I decided to just make another addition to my People Watching series. So...

People Watching: Freedom Festival

I'm digging the whole People Watching series. I find the images have a lot to look at. The longer you look at the image the more things you find. If you want to see the last entry check it out here: http://dylanleeder.blogspot.com/2011/02/people-watching-yonge-dundas.html

More to come.

Thanks!

May Update - What's coming.

It's been a while!

My computer crashed at the beginning of April but I was able to get it fixed! My roommate was generous enough to give me the parts to his old laptop and I found someone that was able to combine my broken one with his and create a sort of frankenstein laptop. Score.

During my time without a computer I kept shooting and was able to keep up on my priority photos using my other roommates laptop. I'm really grateful for all the people that helped me out - it could have been a disaster. Because I was focusing on other stuff I had a collection of personal photos built up. This will be a preview of the posts I'll be doing in the next week...

First, some random photos from my trip back home to Brockville...

I also found a skull in the woods. I cleaned it up and scanned it. Turned out pretty awesome.

Okay... the following are a few preview photos of some of the posts I'll be making in the next week.

I've shot a few skateboarding shots before but never with flash. I've been wanting to try this out for a while and am pretty excited about the results. I was definitely experimenting and have a few things to learn but they're a good start. Here's a moment behind the scenes - the actual skate shots will be posted in the next few days.

I also shot another entry to my People Watching series. Preview of that:

I should also have those images finished and posted within the next few days.

So, now that I finally have a computer again I'll hopefully be back to posting a few times a month. I have a lot of shoots I hope to do this summer and am pretty excited to see the results. Some big things coming up! Yes!

If you're interested in following my other work I shoot and write for a Toronto Blog called BlogTO. I do a weekly series called In The Window that is released every Thursday and I shoot concerts a few times a month. If you're interested you can follow me on twitter and I'll tweet about them as they release. I'll do a concert photo update in the next few weeks with a few examples of what bands I've been shooting.

Check back in the next few days and I'll have the skate shots and the People Watching photos posted.

Thanks!

- Dylan

Lyall's Crow

So my laptop recently crashed. It's pretty frustrating being a photographer without his own computer. Luckily I live with a roommate who is nice enough to let me use one of his until I know what's up with mine - I will hopefully find out today.

No computer problem is going to stop me from taking photos, tho. I recently photographed my friend Lyall. Check out our hangout with his crow:

Lately I've also been shooting a lot for BlogTO - A lot of shows and also continuing with my weekly feature - In The Window.

Some of my latest posts I wrote and photographed:

Mother Mother:

Full review: Mother Mother light up The Phoenix

Listener:

Full review: Listening to Listener at CMF

My In The Window feature:

In the window: Spiritualized, The White Stripes, Nas

In addition to doing the show review for Listener I also managed to get a few videos of Dan doing his spoken word. I really like this guys music.

Yep. So I've basically just been keeping busy, working on my portfolio, and rockin' out. My birthday is on Friday! Exciting!

Thanks!

- Dylan

Print Prices

Hey guys!

I recently decided that I want to start selling more prints of my work. When photos are printed they're a lot better quality and I feel it gives the images more value. Photography is art and I want to start treating my photos more like fine art.

So! Here are the prices I will be selling my prints for:

Prints:

8x10 - 25.00

8x12 - 25.00

12x18 - 40.00

16x20 - 80.00

24x36 - 150.00

Framed Prints:

8x10 - 60

8x10 - 65

12x18 - 80

16x20 - 130

*ask about bigger sizes.

The frames will be black with a white matte. If you prefer something else we can definitely work something out.

If you're interested e-mail me at contact@dylanleeder.com. Free delivery if you're in Toronto, Brockville, Ottawa or anywhere in between. Anywhere else there will be additional shipping charges. You can pay through paypal or e-mail money transfers.

You can choose from almost any photo of mine. Here are a few of the photos that turned out beautifully printed:

Anything from THIS blog post.

Anything from the Gold Medal win HERE.

Here are a few photos of prints I have around my place.

You can also get two prints (5x7) in one frame:

Lots of prints!!!

Again, you can get a print of almost any image I've taken. If you've ever really liked a photo of mine consider it - they really add to a room and it's A LOT better than viewing them on a computer monitor.

I'm also still selling my Newfoundland book. 100$ for the book. More details on my Newfoundland blog post HERE.

Thanks so much!

- Dylan!

Whats up? BlogTO.

I recently started shooting for a Toronto blog - BlogTO. I'm pretty excited about it because it's getting me back shooting shows and will hopefully open a few doors along the way. It's been interesting so far because a lot of the job is writing. I'm definitely not the strongest writer in the world but I'm interested in improving. I think it'll be a great advantage in my career if I'm also able to write about my future experiences.

I work for their music section so I'm shooting a lot of shows. With the shows I also plan on doing "features" on local musicians or musicians that are stopping through on tour. The features will be a good way to improve my portrait work and make for some interesting subjects along the way. With the portraits will also be an interview - it's funny because this kind of just plays off of my Strange(r) People project. I guess I just like people.

Here's a few photos and the links to my recent BlogTO articles:

Tennis

Full article HERE

Persian Rugs

Full Article HERE

I also do a feature called "In The Window". It's basically a weekly article about what's in the windows of local record shops. I take photos of the storefront and then ask an employee to talk about a few of them. It's pretty interesting and has already gotten me listening to different music.

In The Window: Criminal Records

Full article HERE

In The Window: Rotate This

Full article HERE

I recently also set up my Paypal. So... I'm going to try and really get into selling prints/books. I find the quality of a photo increases drastically once it's printed. I want to start putting more value on my photos, as I think some of them deserve. I'm going to do a post on specific prices and sizes of prints available in the near future. I'm excited.

So ya... lot's coming up in the future. A BUNCH of shows I'm hoping to cover coming up... Deer Tick, City and Colour, Frank Turner, Cancer Bats, Joe Purdy. I'm hoping to start shooting more portraits (hah I always want to shoot more portraits). Uhmm... Actually, I should go to bed.

I'll leave you with a pretty funny behind the scenes of a shoot I assisted for a Toronto based photographer Matt Barnes. I really admire Matt's work so it's been pretty cool experiencing it first hand. Really good way to learn.

Matt Barnes Photographs Playmate Lindsey Gayle Evans from Westside Studio on Vimeo.

For more of Matts work check out his website www.thatsthespot.com

Take care

- Dylan

People Watching: Yonge & Dundas

Did I just start another series...? I have a feeling my career will have a lot of series. Series's?Serieses?... Serious?

Anyways... introducing my next series:

People Watching

This was interesting to do considering how obvious I was when taking photos of strangers. I stood in the middle of an extremely busy corner at Yonge and Dundas and set up my camera on a tripod. I left the camera on live-view and held my finger on the trigger so it wasn't too obvious when I was taking each frame. I tried to keep my eyes away from the back of the camera so the people had no idea when I was actually taking a photo. Overall I was pretty surprised with how mild the peoples reactions were.

If you've been to Dundas Square enough times you'll probably know this guy...

Thanks again!!

- Dylan