DragonCon 2026 - The Good, The Bad, The Needs Improvement
DragonCon 2026 - The Good, The Bad, The Needs Improvement
DragonCon is, sadly, once again over. Me and 75,000 of my closest friends have all returned home to rub our sore feet, recover from various forms of con crude, and most important, sleep for long periods of time in the vain hope of feeling human again.
I you have never been to DragonCon before you might wonder why someone would subject themselves to something that has such serious after effects, and the answer is simple. DragonCon, regardless of the price to be paid, is, and always has, been worth it.
I attended DragonCon for the very first time in 2008. I was visiting my Uncle and cousins in Atlanta, and on a bright sunny Saturday morning my Uncle Jerry called and told my cousin Jeremy and I that there were a bunch of folks walking around in cosplay downtown, and maybe we might want to come down and check it out. So, we hopped into the car, drove downtown, and walked into DragonCon.
I had no idea, at the time, just how much that single decision would affect my life. Looking back, knowing all the ways DragonCon would change my life, I often wonder what my life would be like, today, had I not ever attended that first DragonCon.
In 2008, security was a lot less than it is today, so Jeremy and I were able to walk right into the Marriott, the Hilton, The Westin, and the Sheraton without anyone so much as giving us a second glance. True, we couldn't get into any panels, but we weren't really interested in the panels. We spent the day just wondering the hotels, taking pictures of the various cosplays and costumes. It was, a lot of fun, and I left DragonCon, that night, determined to return the next year, with a badge, and experience the full thing.
Fast forward to 2026, and I am attending DragonCon again. This time with a lot of experience and past DragonCons under my belt, and as soon as I walked into the Marriott, I could breath a sigh of relief. I was home. I was among friends. I was safe.
All that said, this year, in the year of our lord 2026, DragonCon had it's ups and it's downs. It wasn't the worst year, in my experience of attending, but it certainly wasn't the best. Most, if not all my criticism of this years DragonCon can be squarely laid at the feet of the Courtland hotel (formerly the Sheraton). I won't go into a lot of detail, other than to say, the Courtland made it very Very VERY clear that they do not want to be part of DragonCon anymore. Which is disappointing, and honestly baffling, in my humble opinion. But, I think this year, and all the issues with the Courtland, from badge pickup, to room nightmares, to broken sewer lines, are proof that DragonCon needs to evolve. Perhaps, in a future post, I will jot down a few thoughts on ways, I think, DragonCon could and should change, but not today.
Today, I just want to focus on how good it felt to be home, and, even though my phone was ruined due to rain, and the fact that I picked a couple dud panels, I really loved being there.
This year, I did something I have never done before. I participated in the Marriott floor show. Again, if you've never been to DragonCon before you probably have no idea what I am talking about, so, let me explain...
The Marriott is sort of the central hub of DragonCon, and when the sun goes down all the best cosplays, and more migrate to the Marriott. On the main 3rd floor level, near the back, people in large cosplays will often stand in a single spot in order to be seen and photographed, but, people also, set up fun little displays and interactive events. For example, last year, there was a Swedish fish glory hole...use your imagination.
I've never participated in the floor show, but a few months ago I had an idea, The Con-Fessional. I wanted to set up a confessional booth and take peoples confessions. No I'm not a catholic, I just like making fun of religion. I posed my idea to my buddy Eric and he was 100% onboard, so, we bought a couple priest outfits from Spirit Halloween, and set up a confessional booth using PVC and some extra fabric Leslie had laying about.
The booth was an absolute hit. Before the con I had 250 Con-Fessional ribbons printed to be handed out to anyone who made a confession. We left DragonCon with 37 left.
So, I think the Con-Fessional will certainly be returning to DragonCon in 2027.
There is so much more I could talk about and speak on when it comes to DragonCon, but, it is only Wednesday, and I will confess, I am tired. So I will leave you with this...
While DragonCon 2026 had it's issues, DragonCon is great. It's still worth the long lines, the ATL heat, and all the sweat. Because, I'll say it again, DragonCon is home.
The First Spirit Halloween Store Visit of 2026
The First Spirit Halloween Store Visit of 2026
I ventured out today.
I know, I know… Why would I do that?! There are people out in public, and you make a compelling point, but I had a very good reason to put on pants and leave the house today.
It was my first official trip to a Spirit Halloween store this season.
See, I told you it was a good reason.
In just a few short days, we will enter into the "ber" months, starting with September, which, every sane and rational person knows, is the start of spooky season. Traditions abound in the early "ber" months, orange lights, pumpkins, hot apple cider, simmer pots, and more, just to name a few.
Whenever September begins, I can feel my soul breath a heavy sigh, release some of the tension in it's jaw, and become a little bit happier, because, this is my favorite part(s) of the year.
And, all of it usually starts with a traditional visit to a Spirit Halloween store.
Last year, I had just recently purchased a new 35mm film camera, and was anxious to try it out, so, loaded with a Kodak 400 roll of film I ventured into Spirit and walked around taking pictures of the various masks, home decor, and costumes that so many of us have come to love.
I'm sure I looked somewhat crazy, considering I was shooting on an old Olympus mju ii camera with flash, but thankfully, I stopped caring what strangers thought of me long ago. I wanted to repeat the Spirit Halloween photoshoot today, and I even had a new point and shoot camera I had won in a raffle at the last ATL Shooters event, but, sadly, I purchased the wrong batteries for it, and had to leave it in the car, while I ventured into the store.
I'm sure, before Halloween is over, and the Spirit Halloween stores revert back to abandoned buildings, I will get in there, and take some cool film photos, but, for now, enjoy these images from last year.
Postcrossing: The Delightfully Old-Fashioned Hobby That Made Me Love Checking the Mail Again
Postcrossing: The Delightfully Old-Fashioned Hobby That Made Me Love Checking the Mail Again
I have been doing this long enough now that I feel reasonably qualified to talk about it without sounding like someone who discovered fountain pens three weeks ago and immediately started calling them "a lifestyle."
For the last couple of years, I've been slowly falling down the wonderfully analog rabbit hole of handwritten letters. Not just the occasional birthday card or thank-you note, either. I mean actual, honest-to-goodness letters—the kind that require ink, paper, stamps, and the increasingly rare ability to remember someone's mailing address.
Naturally, I did what any reasonable person would do: I became gloriously overcommitted.
It started with one fountain pen. Then another. Then another. Somewhere along the way I stopped counting because "a small collection" sounds much healthier than "I literally attended the Atlanta Pen Show." At last count I have four or five fountain pens, custom-designed stationery, paper that feels too nice for grocery lists, matching envelopes, an assortment of interesting stamps, and no fewer than four or five different wax seal designs. Apparently, my correspondence now arrives looking as though it contains either royal decrees or instructions for a secret society.
It's ridiculously fun.
Once a week I sit down and write letters to friends and family. I don't expect them to solve world peace or alter the course of history. I simply hope that when someone opens their mailbox, nestled between the electric bill, junk mail, and yet another offer to refinance something they don't own, they find an envelope that exists for one purpose: to make them smile.
That feels worthwhile.
The habit spilled over into another tradition. Whenever Leslie and I travel somewhere interesting, I pick up postcards, or, more often these days, make my own, and send one to my nieces and nephew. My hope is that years from now they'll remember me as the uncle who was always wandering off to strange places with a camera in hand and who somehow managed to send postcards from wherever the road happened to lead. Every family deserves at least one slightly eccentric relative. I'm simply embracing the assignment.
Of course, there was one small problem with all this enthusiastic letter writing.
I wasn't getting much mail back.
Now, don't misunderstand me. I don't write letters because I expect a reply. But if you've ever tossed a message into the world, you'll know there's a tiny part of you that hopes one might someday come sailing back.
That's how I stumbled across Postcrossing.
It's a wonderfully simple, and wonderfully nerdy, idea. You sign up for free, the website gives you the address of someone somewhere else in the world, and you send them a postcard. Eventually, complete strangers from other corners of the planet send postcards back to you. It's a giant international exchange built entirely on trust, curiosity, and the delightful notion that the mailbox can still hold surprises.
So far I've mailed postcards to Japan, Ukraine, Russia, Spain, and several other countries, with plenty more destinations waiting in the wings. And the best part?
The postcards that come back are fantastic.
Rather than buying generic tourist postcards, I've been using my own photography. I print the images on my photo printer, trim them down to postcard size, write a note on the back, and send little pieces of my work out into the world. There's something deeply satisfying about knowing that a photograph I took in Georgia or somewhere on one of our trips might end up pinned to a bulletin board in Europe or tucked into a collection halfway across the globe.
Photography has always been about connecting with people. I just never expected the connection to involve international postal systems and enough postage to make my local mail carrier recognize me on sight.
I've only sent out five postcards so far, and I've already received four in return. Statistically, that's a pretty good trade. Emotionally, it's even better. Every card has its own personality, its own artwork, its own handwriting, and its own tiny glimpse into someone else's life. They're little paper ambassadors reminding me that the world is simultaneously enormous and surprisingly small.
Honestly... look at these things. They're just plain cool.
If you've ever wanted an excuse to write something by hand, brighten a stranger's day, or give your mailbox a fighting chance of containing something other than bills and advertisements, give Postcrossing a try.
The internet is excellent at moving information around the world in milliseconds.
The postal service, on the other hand, moves tiny pieces of humanity at the speed of anticipation.
And sometimes, that's exactly the pace a good story deserves.
The AI Obsession
The AI Obsession
Yesterday, I watched Good Luck Have Fun Don't Die and it was... unsettling.
Not horror-movie unsettling. Not jump-scare unsettling. More the kind of unsettling that sits quietly in the passenger seat of your brain afterward, occasionally clearing its throat while you're trying to think about something else.
If you haven't seen it, let me summarize the premise in a way that somehow manages not to spoil anything.
Summary: A man travels back from the future to recruit a team of misfits in order to prevent the creation of a sentient AI that will eventually wipe out humanity as we know it.
And yet, somehow, that summary tells you almost nothing about the movie.
Seriously. Go watch it. Then come back and tell me I'm wrong.
The film itself isn't really what disturbed me, though. What got under my skin was the way AI, and humanity's relationship with it, is discussed throughout the story. It felt less like science fiction and more like someone had wandered into a boardroom meeting, a technology conference, and a social media marketing seminar, then blended them together into a screenplay.
At this point, I assume there are still a handful of people somewhere on Earth who haven't heard the term AI. Maybe they're living happily in a cabin in the woods. Maybe they're on a fishing boat somewhere. Maybe they've simply achieved enlightenment and stopped reading headlines.
But if you're reading this blog, you've almost certainly heard of AI.
You couldn't avoid it if you tried.
AI is everywhere.
Every product has AI.
Every company has AI.
Every app has AI.
Every toaster is apparently one firmware update away from becoming self-aware and demanding voting rights.
We've reached a strange moment in history where companies are attaching the letters "A" and "I" to absolutely everything, whether artificial intelligence is involved or not. There seems to be a growing belief that if a product doesn't have AI, then it must somehow be outdated, incomplete, or inferior.
As though humanity collectively woke up one morning and decided that software wasn't enough anymore. It needed to sound like it had read three philosophy books and was planning a hostile takeover.
Let me give you a few examples.
A few weeks ago, I noticed several websites listing my camera, the Sony a7III, as having AI features.
Now, for those unfamiliar with camera history, the Sony a7III was released in early 2018. Back then, AI wasn't being sprinkled onto marketing materials like parmesan cheese at an Italian restaurant. It was just a remarkably good camera.
Yet somehow, sites like B&H, Amazon, and others had begun describing certain features as AI-powered.
They aren't.
The camera didn't magically become smarter while sitting on my shelf.
No secret update transformed it into a silicon philosopher.
The features were the same features it has always had. They had simply been renamed.
Why?
Because AI sells.
That's it.
That's the whole explanation.
People want AI, whether they understand it or not. Whether it provides value or not. Whether it actually exists or not.
It's the modern equivalent of putting "all-natural" on a bottle of water.
I see the same thing in my day job.
As some of you know, I work in software sales.
Not long ago, I was speaking with a prospective customer about a software platform.
At one point he asked me, "Does it have AI?"
The answer was no.
So I asked him a simple question:
"What would you want the AI to do?"
He paused.
Then admitted he wasn't sure.
He just wanted it to have AI.
So I asked again.
"What problem are you trying to solve? What would you want AI to accomplish for you?"
Again, no answer.
Not because he was uninformed or unintelligent. Quite the opposite. He was a smart guy.
But somewhere along the way, AI had become the goal rather than the tool.
It's a bit like walking into a hardware store and demanding a hammer without knowing whether you're building a deck, hanging a picture, or attempting to fight a bear.
The hammer isn't the objective.
The outcome is.
This morning brought another example.
I logged into WordPress and noticed a shiny new button proudly labeled "AI Link Genius."
Naturally, I clicked it.
I had to know.
Was this some revolutionary new technology?
Would it analyze my content and create intelligent pathways through my writing?
Would it achieve digital enlightenment?
No.
It checked links.
That's it.
It was the exact same feature that periodically scans my site looking for broken links and optimization opportunities.
A feature WordPress and related plugins have had for years.
The interface was the same.
The functionality was the same.
Everything was the same.
Someone had simply stapled the letters "AI" onto the front of it and sent it back into the world wearing a fake mustache.
Apparently that's innovation now.
To be fair, some of this madness appears to be fading.
The AI descriptions attached to the Sony a7III seem to have disappeared from many major retailers, and some original product descriptions have returned.
That's encouraging.
But the broader trend remains.
Every week another product emerges from the marketing laboratory wearing an AI sticker like a participation trophy.
It's exhausting.
Some days it makes me feel like the guy standing on a street corner wearing a tinfoil hat and muttering about the end times.
The difference is that the tinfoil hat guy is usually worried about aliens.
I'm worried about marketing departments.
Thankfully, I have photography.
Photography remains one of the few things that consistently pulls me back to reality.
A camera doesn't care about quarterly earnings reports.
Film doesn't care about investor presentations.
Light doesn't care about buzzwords.
The photons have no interest whatsoever in your product roadmap.
Recently, I've found myself spending less time scrolling through social media and more time looking at sculpture, classical art, and Renaissance paintings.
Many of them feature nudity, of course, but what fascinates me isn't the nudity itself.
It's the drapery.
The fabric.
The way cloth seems to float, twist, conceal, reveal, and guide the eye through an image.
The way marble somehow looks softer than skin.
The way painters managed to create movement from stillness.
I wanted to see if I could capture some of that feeling through photography.
Not recreate it exactly.
Just borrow a little of the language.
Translate it into a modern photograph.
Thankfully, Natalie was available and willing to help me indulge this particular artistic rabbit hole.
Armed with nothing more sophisticated than my decidedly non-AI Sony a7III, an Olympus mju-II, a Canon AE-1, and a collection of fabric that probably looked suspicious to anyone passing by, we set out to create something.
No prompts.
No generators.
No algorithms.
No machine learning.
Just two humans making art.
One of us standing behind the camera.
One of us standing in front of it.
I've only edited a small fraction of the images so far, and more can be found over on Patreon, but I'm genuinely proud of what we created.
They're beautiful.
Not because technology made them beautiful.
Not because software decided what beauty should look like.
They're beautiful because two people collaborated, experimented, failed a few times, laughed a few times, adjusted the fabric, adjusted the light, and kept creating until something clicked.
Maybe that makes me old-fashioned.
Maybe someday I'll be the guy yelling at clouds while wearing a tinfoil hat and clutching a film camera.
But at least I'll be making art.
And for now, that's enough.
Because despite all the marketing campaigns, all the buzzwords, all the promises that AI will inevitably transform every aspect of human existence, I still believe there is tremendous value in creating something with your own hands.
A photograph.
A painting.
A sculpture.
A story.
A conversation.
Things made by people remain meaningful precisely because people made them.
And until someone invents an AI capable of wandering through a field at sunset, getting distracted by the way light hits a piece of fabric, and then spending three hours chasing an idea that may or may not work simply because it feels interesting...
I think we'll be okay.
Self-Doubt and Creativity: He Wouldn't Believe It
Self-Doubt and Creativity: He Wouldn't Believe It
I've said it before. I'll probably say it again, the way you keep returning to a scar just to confirm it still belongs to you.
But God, I wish I could go back.
Not to fix anything. I want to materialize out of nowhere, slide into the booth across from my younger self, who is probably nursing chips and salsa in a Mexican restaurant scribbling in his journal, convinced the world had already decided its opinion of him — and just show him.
Not tell him. Telling never worked on me. Show him.
Spread it all out on the table. The photographs. The art. The projects that haven't even happened yet, built in collaboration with people he hasn't met, in rooms he hasn't stood in, for reasons he couldn't have invented on his best day. Let him turn it over in his hands. Let him squint at it under the lights.
He wouldn't believe it. That's the whole point. He'd look at me like I was running a con, because that's what his life had taught him to expect, the bait, then the switch. He'd be waiting for the catch.
There is no catch, kid. That's the most disorienting part.
The work is real. It's strange and it's real and it came from somewhere inside you that you keep trying to board up like a condemned building. Stop that. Quit apologizing for the weird corners. The weird corners are load-bearing.
Someday, someone's going to hand you a project and trust you to do something extraordinary with it, and you're going to be so alarmed by that trust that you almost fumble it... but you won't. You'll find the thing that lives underneath the obvious answer, the image that says what words keep failing to say, and you'll make it real.
Back then, I was sure that I was devoid of artistic talent. That creative projects were for other people, and that any effort I made at art would be pointless.
He wouldn't believe it. But I'd make him look anyway.
Life at 45: Scars, Stories, and Everything in Between
Life at 45: Scars, Stories, and Everything in Between
Yesterday, I turned 45.
Forty-five doesn’t sound like much when you say it out loud. It’s not one of those milestone numbers people make a big dramatic fuss about. But when I look back at what’s packed into those years, it feels less like a number and more like a well-traveled road with a few wrong turns, a couple of bar fights, and at least one questionable map.
In that time, I’ve been a lifeguard. A medic. I was a Mormon missionary once, and later an ex-Mormon, which is less of a clean break and more of a long conversation that never quite ends. I’ve worked in safety, trying to keep people from doing dumb things, and in sales, learning that people will absolutely do dumb things.
I’ve been married twice. Loved hard, learned a lot, picked myself up, and kept moving. Not always gracefully, but forward counts.
I’ve lived in nine states and moved 26 times. I know how to leave, and I know how to start over. Both come with their own kind of weight.
Somewhere along the way, I got dubbed a Knight by The Knightly Order of the Fiat Lux. Which still sounds like something out of a late-night campaign session, but I’ve got the title, so I guess that makes it real. Still waiting on the dragon, though.
I opened a gym, Geek and Gamer Fitness, because clearly I thought mixing barbells and nerd culture was a good idea. Honestly, it still is.
I’ve played hundreds of TTRPG sessions, built worlds, told stories, rolled dice that betrayed me at the worst possible moments. I’ve hit the shutter on my camera thousands of times, chasing those perfect little slices of time that don’t last nearly long enough.
I love conventions, DragonCon, ECCC, PAX, places where everyone shows up exactly as they are, turned up to eleven, and somehow that becomes normal.
I’m a son, a brother, an uncle, and a friend. Roles that don’t come with clear rules, just a lot of showing up and doing your best.
And yeah, there’s been anxiety. Depression. Some darker stretches where things got heavy and stayed that way longer than I would’ve liked. That’s part of the story too. Not the whole thing, but it’s in there.
My life hasn’t been smooth. It’s been chaotic, unpredictable, occasionally ridiculous, but never boring. I’ve lived a lot of different versions of life in these 45 years. Enough to know there isn’t just one way to do this.
It’s a little strange realizing there’s probably less road ahead than behind. Not scary, just… real. Makes you pay attention a bit more.
But however much time is left, one thing’s clear: I lived. I tried. I didn’t sit it out.
And honestly? That feels like something worth being grateful for.
Vintage Camera Advertisements: The Beautiful Art of Selling Cameras in the 1980s
This morning started the way a lot of mornings start now: coffee in hand, thumb scrolling through Instagram Reels. Once upon a time people sat at the breakfast table with a newspaper and caught up on the world while the toast cooled. Now we sit there half-awake, letting the algorithm decide what we’re going to look at before the caffeine fully kicks in.
Somewhere in that endless stream of videos, a creator started talking about the Internet Archive. I’ll admit something that might sound a little strange for someone who spends plenty of time online, I had never actually explored it before. I knew it existed, of course, but I’d never gone wandering through it myself.
In the video, the creator mentioned that the Archive contains scans of old print advertisements from magazines. That alone was enough to grab my attention. I’ve always had a soft spot for vintage design and photography. Something about the look and feel of older ads just hits a certain aesthetic nerve for me.
So naturally I opened up a browser and decided to see what all the fuss was about.
It didn’t take long before I landed on a page filled with old magazine ads. Hundreds of them. Maybe thousands. It felt a little like rummaging through a dusty attic full of old magazines someone forgot to throw away, except everything was neatly scanned and waiting for you to stumble across it.
Two ads jumped out almost immediately. Both came from an April 1986 issue of Playboy.
Now this might surprise some people, but growing up Mormon meant I didn’t exactly have access to many Playboy magazines. So even now, as an adult, my experience with the magazine is pretty limited. Like most people, I grew up hearing the classic joke about people claiming they read Playboy “for the articles,” and I always assumed that was just a clever excuse.
What I didn’t realize until today is that back in the 80s and 90s a huge chunk of the magazine was actually articles and advertisements. From what I could see, something like eighty percent of the pages were writing or ads, leaving only a smaller portion for what most people immediately associate with the magazine.
And some of those articles were surprisingly serious.
While browsing, I stumbled across a long piece about the War on Drugs and the propaganda surrounding it. Not a throwaway article either, the writer had clearly done his homework. It was thoughtful, detailed, and the kind of thing that probably gave readers plenty to chew on.
It definitely wasn’t what I expected when I clicked into a random Playboy issue from the 80s.
But honestly, the real highlight for me was the advertising.
Inside that same issue were two camera ads, one for Canon and one for Olympus, and they immediately caught my eye. They were
beautifully done. Strong composition, interesting lighting, and just enough storytelling in the image to make you imagine the kind of life you might live with that camera in your hands.
They just don’t make ads like that anymore.
What struck me most is that these cameras are now decades old, yet those advertisements still have the power to make me want one. That’s impressive. Most modern ads barely stick in your memory long enough to survive the next scroll.
These older ads feel different. They’re stylish, thoughtful, and very clearly made by people who understood photography and human psychology. They weren’t just selling a product, they were selling a feeling.
And as someone who loves photography, that kind of thing is endlessly interesting. There’s a lot to study there. The lighting. The styling. The mood. All of it could easily inspire ideas for my own work.
So I’m genuinely grateful to that random creator on Instagram who mentioned the Internet Archive this morning. What started as casual scrolling over coffee turned into discovering an entire world of old magazines, articles, and beautifully crafted advertisements.
Something tells me I’ll be spending a lot more time wandering through the Archive in the months ahead. And honestly, there are worse ways to lose an afternoon than flipping through the visual history of the past.
Emotional Vulnerability in Relationships
Emotional Vulnerability in Relationships
At the start of 2026, I made a simple decision: I was going to start posting more of my photography to Reddit. Not with a master plan, not with spreadsheets and content calendars, just show up once a day and throw my work into the wild to see what happened.
What happened surprised me.
In a month and a half, I saw more engagement and more real human interaction than I got on Instagram during all of 2025. Which feels backwards. Instagram used to be the place for photographers. Now it feels like a shopping mall where everyone’s yelling and no one’s listening. Social media is losing its magic, and people are starting to realize that growing on any Meta platform now is like trying to plant flowers in concrete. You can try, but the odds are not in your favor.
But the real surprise wasn’t the numbers. It was my inbox.
I started getting messages from husbands, careful, hesitant messages, from men who wanted their wives to do a boudoir shoot but were afraid something might happen during the session. Afraid of boundaries being crossed. Afraid of discomfort. Afraid of opening doors they weren’t sure they could close.
I wrote about this last week, but I want to come at it from a different angle.
A photoshoot should feel safe. Always. But so should a relationship. And I’ve been shocked by how many people don’t feel emotionally safe with their own partners. Not unsafe in a dramatic sense, but in the quiet, everyday way that makes honesty feel risky. The kind of unsafe that teaches you to swallow your feelings and call it peace.
Now, I’m no saint. I carry my own collection of anxieties, neatly stacked like old moving boxes I never quite unpacked. I’ve dealt with anxiety most of my life. I take medication. I see a therapist every week. Most of the time, that’s enough to keep me steady.
But for the last month, my anxiety has been loud.
The last time it was this bad, I was going through a divorce, closing down a business, and moving to a new state with a woman I wasn’t even sure I wanted to keep dating. That level of chaos earns its anxiety. This time? Nothing is falling apart. No disasters. No major life upheavals. And yet, some days, just breathing feels like work.
For a long time, I didn’t talk about any of this. My ex-wife used to publicly mock me for being depressed, and that kind of thing teaches you fast. So I learned to keep it to myself. To deal with it quietly. To not burden anyone else with my internal storms.
But that’s not how I want to live anymore.
So I’m trying to be more open. Talking with Leslie. Letting a few trusted people see the parts of me that aren’t polished or easy. Admitting that sometimes I’m not okay. Not because it magically fixes anything, it doesn’t, but because learning to be vulnerable feels like learning how to breathe again after holding your breath for years.
And that circles me right back to those messages from Reddit.
To the men wishing their wives would do a boudoir shoot: be honest with her. Be vulnerable with her. Not because you want a photoshoot, but because real intimacy grows out of honesty. Out of trust. Out of being brave enough to show your cards instead of always keeping them close to your chest.
Your relationship will get better because of it.
And if it doesn’t, if honesty breaks it, then it was already breaking. And you deserve a relationship where you can be fully yourself, not just the carefully edited version.
Trust me.
I’ve tried it the other way.
Stone Mountain Reflections
Stone Mountain Reflections
It’s funny how memory stretches things. Childhood recollection is a funhouse mirror, bending scale and perspective until everything feels monumental. Maybe things only seem bigger because we were smaller, but when I dig through the mental shoebox of my early years, the world feels oversized. Trees were taller. Distances were longer. Hills were mountains. And Stone Mountain, in my memory, was a towering slab of granite that could casually swallow a child whole.
I was in single digit age territory when my family visited Stone Mountain Park in Georgia, and I remember the mountain being enormous, overwhelming, and just a little bit terrifying. I was convinced that one wrong step would send me tumbling into oblivion. Gravity felt personal back then.
Fast forward a few decades and a professional conference later, and I found myself back at Stone Mountain. This time, armed with adult knees, a conference badge, and a slightly more rational relationship with gravity. On the first day, we rode the lift to the top, and that was when reality gently reminded me that nostalgia has a flair for exaggeration.
Stone Mountain is… fine. It exists. But the towering, epic beast from my childhood memories had somehow been reduced to a rather unimpressive boulder. Setting aside the deeply uncomfortable and racist confederate carving on its face, the mountain itself is, aesthetically speaking, not great. It is basically a giant rock plopped in the middle of an otherwise pleasant forest. The carving does nothing to improve this situation. If anything, it makes it worse.
At the summit, I expected sweeping views and that familiar sense of awe you get when you reach the top of something. Instead, I felt mildly underwhelmed. I have stood on some truly beautiful peaks, hiking parts of the Appalachian Trail, wandering through Philmont Scout Ranch, climbing Abernathy Peak in Washington State. Stone Mountain does not belong in that company. Compared to those places, it felt small, ordinary, and oddly anticlimactic.
Every morning brought a different sky. The colors and fog spilled across the water and slowly pulled the day into existence. Those moments alone made the trip worthwhile. I photographed them digitally and also on 35mm film, because some scenes deserve to be slowed down and trusted to chemistry and patience. I cannot wait to see how those frames turn out.
So that was my week. A gentle collision between nostalgia and reality. A reminder that memory is a generous editor. A mountain that failed to live up to its legend, and a sunrise that quietly stole the show.
And yes, I still think we should stop building parks that celebrate confederate generals. But no one asked me.
Nothing Happens on a Photoshoot
Nothing Happens on a Photoshoot
I got this message today and it stuck with me. The kind that keeps bouncing around your head long after you’ve read it, like a loose screw rattling around a subway car. So instead of letting it fester, I want to talk about it.
Let’s clear something up right out of the gate.
Nothing happens on a photoshoot. Not like that. Photoshoots aren’t sexy. They’re work. They’re lights and cables and someone asking you to stand right there no the other right. They’re too hot or too cold, with at least three extra people watching and one person about to trip over a tripod. The vibe is closer to hour ten on a film set than anything remotely romantic. So let’s kill that fantasy now. Nothing is going to happen.
And even if the opportunity magically appeared, no professional photographer I know would cross that line. Ever. That line isn’t blurry. It’s bright, obvious, and surrounded by common sense. You don’t step over it.
That said, I’ve heard real horror stories. Not internet rumors. Real people. People I know. Real experiences.
One model told me about a photographer she’d never met who wanted to shoot alone, deep in the woods. No assistants. No plan. Just trust me, which is never a sentence that should end there.
Another showed up for what she thought was a normal shoot and was suddenly asked to use adult toys on camera. No warning. No consent. Just that awful moment when you realize you’re in a situation you didn’t agree to.
Another was pressured into sex by a photographer who abused his position and her trust.
This should never happen. Not once. And while it’s true that when this kind of behavior comes to light, word spreads fast and those photographers get shut out of the community, that doesn’t undo the damage for the person who was put in harm’s way.
So here’s what actually matters.
Bring a safety buddy. Always. Any photographer who has a problem with that is not someone you should work with full stop. If you ask a photographer not to share an image, they should respect that without pushing back. If they argue, that’s your answer. If they post something and you ask for it to come down for any reason and they make a fuss, they’ve just disqualified themselves from future work with you.
Yes, bad photographers exist. Every industry has its share of them. But most photographers are good people who understand that trust is everything in this line of work, and boundaries are not optional.
Be careful. Ask questions. Ask for references. Talk to other models and clients. Ask how the experience actually felt, not just how the photos turned out.
Because at the end of the day, your safety and your comfort aren’t bonuses or perks. They’re the baseline. The bare minimum. The most important part of any photoshoot.
When there is safety, and trust, beautiful images and art can come from photoshoots. These images of Natalie were taken on just such a shoot, and I am grateful for the trust Natalie and I showed each other while working together.
