Right Place Right Time

Somethimes you just end up at the right place at the right time. Today was a day like that. Nothing profound, just a fun experience with some great people.

As many of you know I'm a photographer for Infineon Raceway in Sonoma California. This relationship affords me certain access to motorsports that not many people get to experience. From meeting and photographing celebrities and racing personalities to watching the racing world from the inside out. It's a great gig. 

This weekend is the Toyota Save Mart 350 NASCAR Sprint Cup race at the track. Like many events there is plenty of hospitality and VIP experiences. One such perk is the VIP ride - a hot lap around the track in specially prepared Toyota Camry's. These rides are given by the highly professional Jim Russell driving instructors who are based right here at the track. To say they know the course is an understatement. Today I was fortunate enough to get one of those rides and my iPhone 4 was in hand to capture the fun. To put it in perspective a Sprint Cup car will lap at about 1' 17" on this course - we brought it home in 1'58". Big thank you to Lynne @ Infineon Raceway for the invite.

Enjoy the ride.

HDR Coming to an iPhone Near You

At todays Apple Event Steve Jobs took center stage to talk about updates to the iPod and iOS devices. One of the intriguing things that is coming in iOS 4.1 is the iPhone and iPod touch ability to capture native HDR images. Jobs explained that this will be a 3 frame bracket.

iPhone 4: Photographers Friend

I managed to get through the deluge of folks trying to pre-order the new iphone. AT&T and Apple servers were choking on the traffic and I tried on and off for 6 hours to do it but at about 1pm PST i completed the pre-order transaction.

Normally I wouldn't care about being first with the new phone. When the original iPhone came out in 2007 It was a couple of months before I got the iPhone and even at that I had a loaner from an Apple buddy. Of course I got an iPhone 3G and 3GS when they came out just to stay current but again not at launch.

So what's different here? Why the excitement for the iPhone 4? Simple. I think the iPhone 4 will change the way I capture images. Sure it's just a "camera phone" but something about the iphone simplicity and availability makes it one of the best photo tools in my arsenal. Seattle Photographer and social artist Chase Jarvis produced a very interesting book "The Best Camera Is The One That's With You", 256 pages of iPhone photos from a guy that carries a 40 megapixel Hasselblad in his arsenal. The images are personal, sometimes raw but always about the "right-now".

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