Finally online with my Fine Art Print Website. And there was much rejoicing. Check it out!




To kick it off, I am offereing a selection of photographs from the August 2007 feature I shot for National Geographic Adventure Magazine, "Where the Big River Gets Lost."

Writer Kim Brown Seely, my sister Christine Kornylak and I spent a week on and off the river in the Delta region south of Memphis with riverman John Ruskey for the piece. I had no idea what a beautiful and untouched wilderness we have right along that mighty river. Ruskey is one of the few (if only) people to offer guided trips down the Mississippi, through the Quapaw Canoe Company. He also started an after-school apprenticeship program called The Mighty Quapaws. 25% of the profits from the Mississippi River print sales will go to this program.

Check it out - and do a river trip down the Mississippi with John sometime (or in a hollow log if you prefer a short one). You won't regret it.

National Geographic Channels is currently airing a show called Hard Time, a look at Georgia's paramilitary correctional system. From NGC: "Hard Time takes viewers on a yearlong journey behind bars, following the lives of those who work and serve time in two of Georgia's toughest maximum-security prisons."

Before the first airing, I was hired to shoot a few 360-degree panoramic photographs of the interior of a prison: the cells, the yard, the common areas, etc. I spent the day with Executive Producer Greg Henry of Part2Pictures at Hays State Prison, near Rome, Georgia.

Click here to see the resulting virtual tour of a prison cell and the yard.

Technically, shooting a 360-degree panoramic for this type of virtual tour is straightforward. Almost any camera and lens combination will work, but the wider the field of view of each shot, the fewer shots you will need to cover the entire 360-degree field of view. The critical part, if you want to do it well, is using a tripod that will allow you to rotate your camera about the lens rather than the camera base. This eliminates parallax errors when you are stitching the images together (Tricky to do handheld - try it.) Ideally you will use a tripod that can do this rotation horizontally (hula hooping) as well as vertically (jumping rope). Then you can get the sky and the ground while the camera is still attached to the tripod. Crank those images through some special software and voila: QTVR, or in this case, a Flash VR.



I couldnt get my hands on a true 360 "spherical" pano head in time for this shoot, only one that gave me proper offset horizontal "cylindrical" swivel. No problem: With a full frame camera and 8mm fisheye lens, you can get nearly full 360-degree coverage in 3 shots. Yes, I know, for you pano experts out there, there were some nadir and zenith issues. Don't sweat me. We nailed it.

I took the photos on a Nikon D3 with a Sigma 8mm lens, and a Manfrotto 303PLUS tripod head. The folks at Channels did the stitching. Temporary accomodations provided by the State of Georgia.

Just a note to check out the new website. Same Livebooks goodness, but it's bigger, with more new work. Check out the new Food portfolio, from a story on organic farming at The Cliffs Communities in North Carolina, some personal work from the holidays, and vegetable still-life. I love food.

"Wiley X is really about versatility, and it is one of the few brands that can meet occupational safety requirements while being cool enough and functional enough for outdoor sports and just hanging out. Andrew has really helped us bring the versatility story to life in a very authentic way." - Mike Smith, Partner at Sasquatch Advertising.

In early February I shot a third campaign for California-based WileyX Eyewear. Another fun shoot with a client whose products I actually use.

We shot for a week in my old hood, Tucson and Phoenix Arizona. I brought my crew from Atlanta:


At the Denver Airport: Left, John Kelso, pro skater, pro punk rocker, pro-beard. Right: Sharif Hassan - the Egyptian MacGuyver.

The theme for this campaign was "Recession Proof Eyewear," i.e. shades that can be worn for work, play and hanging out. All the product we shot this year, from performance cycling blades to bubble shades meets ANSI standards for safety. So you can throw away that box of cheap throwaway safety glasses youd never be caught dead in without a hard hat.

So for this concept, we shot four different models in three different scenarios each: recreational, occupational, and lifestyle. Since a lot of the sunglasses are multi-purpose (thats the whole point), we also needed to get each permutation shot with 2 or 3 different glasses. So we were looking at like 48 different shots. I knew that math degree would come in handy some day.

Luckily Art Director, Matt Graff from Sasquatch was on location, to keep the math straight and to provide, well, art direction.

Total Airheads. Matt Graff of Sasquatch Ads, left, and the crew stoke up on Sour Cherry and Green Apple at the Mastercraft facility in Phoenix.

We were joined by stylist/MUA Valerie Badalian from Tucson. We also worked with Set/Prop coordinator Maggie Macfarland and had locaton help from Jason Mullins and my good friends at Rocks and Ropes Climbing Gym, Ed Foster at La Suprema Bikes, and Luke Bertelsen at Contact Climbing Holds. Peter Catalanotte and The folks at the Tucson Film Office went out of their way to get us last-minute permits and location advice. Mastercraft of Arizona provided a sick new wakeboat for the shoot.

Some behind the scenes shots: