July 29, 2014

Hi everybody. Welcome to my blog where I talk about the past. I'm gonna dedicate this to my coach in college. The guy almost killed me with his workouts, but he, in a way, saved me as well. Because of his training I'm here today to talk with you. Speaking of almost dying, let's talk about me in the early '80's. I was an assistant photographer in Florida. I was in my hotel room watching TV when I looked up and I saw a garbage can fly by. I thought to myself, OK, that's weird. It was weird cause I was on the 12th floor. I then realized we were in a major hurricane. So I called the other assistant and we did what any young adult would do in a hurricane. We went to the bar. Well, obviously the shoot we were on got cancelled so we flew back to New York. When the weather was better we flew back to Florida to do the shoot. But you know what? The hurricane did a loop di loop and came right back towards us. It was like the first time in the history of recorded weather that a hurricane ever did this. The shoot got cancelled again and we went back to New York. No flying garbage cans this time though. The next event took place in California. I was a photographer out looking for places to shoot. I was with the producer, the client and one of my assistants. When we were heading back to the hotel I looked up to see one of my assistants was sprinting across a field. Right behind him was a huge bull chasing him. Apparently he walked out into the field to do a portrait of the bull. He had a camera, a tripod and a flash unit with him. Well, he approached the bull, set everything up, set the strobe unit up, you know with the umbrella and everything. The bull was curious. He just stared at him. Well, when the assistant took the picture of the bull, the strobe in it freaked the bull out. It went off and he got really pissed off and started chasing my assistant across the field. Well, my assistant threw all the equipment over the fence and dove through the fence. Now mind you I'm watching this whole thing, and I'm thinking, "Wait a minute, that's my stuff." Never a dull moment, I'll tell you. We had the stuff checked out and it was OK. He never did tell me he got a good shot of the bull. He probably got a shot of his own feet running.

I'm just gonna have my friend here pick out a journal. You see I kept my journals, my diaries in cartoon form.

You know, my life was crazy. I remember at one point I had an agent in New York, Paris, London, Australia, Germany, Milan. I was running all over the place working. Anyway, I'll include a cartoon to give you an idea of how I felt. Don't forget to check out my other blog and you can always check out my website www.briannice.com. Have a good week. Love you. Talk to you soon, B. Nice

July 15, 2014

Welcome to the past. I'll tell some random stories. You know, they were things I thought about cause you know I was in the hospital for like a year altogether. All in all, I've been through some rough stuff, but I'll tell you a few random stories. I was on a photoshoot in Mexico. One of the models I was working with is a friend of mine. We were at the bar and she said, "Hey! I'll upgrade us to first class. We can watch a movie and have some champagne." Well, we got on the plane and I found we were not only in first class, we had bulkhead seats. It was gonna be a great trip. Well, right after the plane took off my friend looked at me with her beautiful eyes and said, "I don't feel so good." She looked really sweaty and she had a kind of greenish beige tone about her. She started fumbling for an air sick bag, but the airline in their infinite wisdom decided not to issue air sick bags to save money. I ran to the flight attendant cabin and I said, "You better give me a garbage bag and quick." So I grabbed a garbage bag and some paper towels. I gave the bag to my friend and said, "Here, this is just in case you get sick." Well she grabbed the bag and proceeded to power puke into the bag. I looked at my neighbors who were mortified. I said, "Hi, how's it going?" They just stared at me blankly. The whole cabin smelled like puke. Anyway, she threw up all the way from Mexico to New York City. When we taxied to the gate, there was a woman in the back who ran to the front of the plane with a bag of puke as well. My friend ran to the front of the plane as well, and the navigator came out of the flight deck. He took one look at the two women and went back inside the flight cabin. The women were chosen to get off the plane first. I said to the flight attendant, as we were leaving, "Have a good day." Going through customs was a whole other story. Let's put it this way, they asked her if she had anything to declare. I'll leave it up to your imagination.

The next story takes place in New York City in a studio, I was shooting a job that a producer got for me. A South Korean client. It was a good gig. Anyway, I hired my girlfriend to be the female in the photoshoot. Oh yeah, it was a commercial job. Anyway, the art director didn't speak English. He would act out what he wanted, and then he'd started to take off his shirt and then he pointed at my girlfriend. He wanted her to be topless. I felt rather uncomfortable. I explained to her that she had to be topless for the shot. She said, "You've got to  be fucking kidding." And then, I heard my assistant getting into a fight with the producer. My assistant started yelling, "I've had enough of you." The whole shoot started to turn into a nightmare, but we worked it all out. It turned out to be a good shoot.

The last story I'll tell you was in Phoenix, in the desert. My assistant who was french vietnamese, he said he was going to take a walk in the desert. I looked down at his feet and we was wearing flip flops. I said, "You can't walk around the desert in those." He said in a french accent, "I'll do whatever I want." Well, he was gone for about half an hour and I heard a scream in the distance. Apparently he walked right into a cactus. Some people don't listen to me. I hope you have a good week. Here's the link to my other blog. I'll include a cartoon. You know, drawings I used to do when I could draw. Have a good week. Love, B. Nice

July 8, 2014

Hi you guys. Welcome to the blog where I talk about the past.  Oh man, one time I was on a photoshoot in Quebec Canada. We used to shoot in Quebec a lot because it looked a lot like Europe without the distance. Anyway, there was a big concert there. The model I was working with knew the performer so we all went to the concert together. I got separated from my crew and in the sea of humanity I wondered how I would find them. I looked up at a video screen and there was my crew dancing on the stage. Well, I knew where to go at least. I battled my way to the front, you know, to the stage and there they all were dancing. It was a fun night. I'll tell you, one of my friends can't dance worth shit. That reminds me, I just saw my model friend in an ad. It was an ad where you were looking down at three girls. It reminded me of a shoot I did for a magazine, you know, a men's magazine. You know, one of those magazines they have girls, trucks, food, and all that highly intellectual stuff. Anyway, I had to photograph three girls in bed wearing nothing but their birthday suits. I thought it would be funny to put my assistant in the bed with the girls. My assistant was a little Mexican guy with a comb over. It was funny. He looked like an elf with three Amazon women. He had a shit eating smile on his face. It was great. It was all fun and games until my conservative client showed up from the studio next door. There I was at the top of this ladder laughing. My assistant was in the bed with these naked girls. We were all laughing and then my conservative client said, "Brian, I was just next door shooting and I saw your name listed on the wall. Did I break something up? I'm sorry." And she left. Funny. I never did work with that client again.

You know, I love cooking. I picked it up from a photographer I worked for in the '80's. He used to give me his credit card and a shopping list. Oh yeah, money for a cab. I would go to the store and buy the best of the best. We would then cook a great meal. The other thing I used to do was watch my mom cook. She would open the fridge and a cabinet and cook an amazing meal based on what she had. So now I combine them both and make a great meal. At least my health assistant does for me. I can't quite cook yet, but I sure can watch - and yell.

I'm sharing with you some random stories. Someone wrote in, "More assistant stories please." So I'll tell this one story about an assistant. One of my favorites. I was doing a photo shoot in South Beach Miami. Actually, it was way down in the keys. Anyway, I'd been partying with another crew. I went back to my room because we had to start early. My assistant stayed behind and partied on. Anyway, he stayed out pretty late I guess. So late that he couldn't find his way back to the room. He ended up in the woods covered in spider webs so he decided he would do the intelligent thing: lie down. Well, I saw him the next day and he looked like Hell. He described what happened and he said he woke up when it got light, saw where he was and worked his way back to his room just in time to change and come to the shoot. The guy looked like he'd been in war. He lasted about an hour.

You know, it was the 4th of July this past weekend. I once caught an evening flight on the 4th of July. I had a window seat. I saw fireworks all the way from New York to LA. Quite a trip. Anyway, hope you have a good week. I'm gonna share a couple of images from my road trip. Hope you enjoy them. Love, B. Nice

July 1, 2014

I had someone read my previous blog for me and I'd like to say one thing. I want my damn house back. I just had to get that out of my systems. Bitter, party of One. Anyway, let's talk about photography.

I can't imagine starting out now. It's so different from when I was starting. Listen to me. I sound like an old fart. I don't know if it's the same, but when I was starting we had to go somewhere new like Europe or Australia. You know, somewhere different. If you worked hard enough and long enough someone eventually gives you a break. I still remember my break and the woman that gave me a break. It all built up from there. It all built up until my brain exploded. Ha! Anyway, now I deal with a new reality.

Sorry, I'm going off on a tangent here. I'll go back to starting out. I started out in Australia and then to moved to Paris. I thought, "Great, here I am in Paris. This is fantastic. Only one problem. I don't know any bloody french and my fridge doesn't work." Now, I learned all my french from watching Magnum PI and getting the fridge repaired was a whole other story. I had to look in the french/english dictionary and try and get a repairman. It was a joke. Eventually I just went out and bought a new fridge. The old one, the broken one, they wouldn't take it away so I used it to store my clothes. I felt like I was back in college.

I'm gonna have my friend here pick out a journal. I used to keep all my journals in cartoon form. I'll be right back.

I found an old book. Hope you enjoy it. Check out my other blog. Have a good week. Love, B. Nice

June 27, 2014

Hi everybody. Welcome to the past.  Those are things I talk about, things I thought about when I was lying on my back for years.  I just wanted to make a brief comment. I guess I'm talking shop a little bit. So if you want to click off, feel free to close this or stop here. Anyway, you know, I was thinking of the first photo I ever too. It was a photo of a fire alarm. Pretty exciting huh? But you see, my father was an artist and came out of the pop art generation so I grew up around him painting objects. You know, like a pack of cigarettes, or a beer can, or a cowboy boot. So that was always in my mind. So when I started taking photos I would just do what I know. I would take pictures of objects. Like a fire alarm. I would show the image to my teach and my teacher would just look at me blankly and say, "Well, that's a fire alarm." I guess people just didn't understand what I was trying to do. I would treat people as iconic images. You know, separate them from the background. Make them stand out alone. It was the 80's. Everyone was shooting with long lenses. The backgrounds were all fuzzy and the model would stand out. So that timing was perfect. I worked all the time. Maybe they gave me too much medication when I was in hospital, but those are the kind of things I would think about. Anyway, that was just one of the many things I would think about. You know, I'm really tired because my daughter was here for a visit. We had a great time. If you want to hear more about the present, go my other blog which is right here. In the meantime, if you want to see more, go to www.briannice.com. Have a good weekend. Love, B. Nice