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I do a lot of business portraits for people, but it was really fun to photograph my uncle, Bob Cox.  He has reinstated his real estate license (something he used to do many years ago) and needed some new business portraits.

A lot of people tell us that we look alike, which I always like to hear.  There have even been times when I’ve been stopped on the street and asked if I’m Bob Cox’s son.

Anyway, I really liked the suit and finished the image as a nice, classic business portrait.

BryCox - Bob Cox 1

With this finished image, I designed up and printed his business cards.  Here is the finished card design.  I opted for a more artsy look, bold and light colors on black rather than the stuffy and traditional look of black type on white.  I finished them as a glossy card 4/4, with an extra layer of coating for a nice tactile feel and some real punch.

BryCox - Bob Cox 2

I’m excited with how they look.  If you are a business person and need a new portrait, give me a call.

- Bry

It was a real honor for me to photograph a wedding for a very well-known photographer and PPA Master, Gary Weitzeil.  Gary’s son Anthony, was getting married and I was their choice as the wedding artist.

Photographers, more than anybody, know just what to look for in another photographer, and they also know how important photography is as both an art piece as well as an heirloom.  Needless to say, it was a real joy to be apart of Nikki and Anthony’s wedding.  And this couple was very fun to work with and had a joy and excitement about them that was incredible.

BryCox-Weitzeil

Here is one of my favorite images from the wedding day.  Their wedding was the only day that week that didn’t rain, but we still had the ominous clouds.  I was going nuts because I absolutely love storms and turbulent air, especially as a background.  I love the drama of a great stormy sky, especially on a distant establishing image like this.  Their wedding was fantastic.

Congratulations, you two.

And until next time, America!
– Bry

Yes, as some of you know, I was asked to go back and speak to the photographers in China again!  My last visit a month or so ago was for speaking at an international convention, but this time it was a multi-city road show.  Me and Louis Tonsmeire, Jr (next years PPA President) would speak to a group of photographers for an entire day, then we’d take a taxi to the airport, fly to the next city and arrive at out hotel around midnight, get up and speak all day to a new group of photographers, take a taxi to the airport, and so on from city to city.

It was a very rigorous but exciting schedule.  One of my favorite photo shoots came in Beijing, where I had an absolutely stunning model named Surui.  Normally when groups line up a model for me order for me to do a live demonstration, it tends to be a pretty normal person.   I was very excited to have such a captivating girl as my model.

Bry Cox - China Surui 1

I had a very limited amount of time to photograph her, and didn’t have the best backgrounds to work with either, and had to really improvise with other areas of the room to create better backgrounds. I’m happy with how these turned out but would have loved to have had more time on this shoot.  ;-)

Bry Cox - China Surui 2

Because of the tight schedule, I didn’t get the chance to get out and photograph a lot for myself.  But Louis and I did take one morning to go walking and photographing people for about a half hour after breakfast.  I didn’t get a lot of what most people would consider as art prints, but I did get a lot of very interesting images because everything was so different than what we are used to here in America.

Keep in mind that we were in all of the biggest cities in China too, the smallest having 15 Million people and the largest having 36 Million people.  In comparison, my entire state of Utah has only 2.7 Million people.  So needless to say, these cities were very dense and very dirty.

Bry Cox - China 3

I really like this old man framed by the public street toilet.  And this next image is very strange!  I found it very interesting all of the things that were just laying on the streets and in such interesting ways too.

Bry Cox - China 4

And here is a little boy playing outside his house.  I really is interesting to see such vast extremes so close to each other in China.  In each city we stayed in absolutely top of the line hotels.  But literally just across the street would be pure poverty like I’ve never seen before.

Bry Cox - China 5

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This image to me really shows the contrast.  I framed it so that the old and impoverished woman is in the strongest part of the photograph.  Surrounding her on both sides are some young, beautiful mannequins and some fancy stores.  She is actually sitting in front of her home, the little door between the two stores.

The constant extremes were everywhere.

Bry Cox - China 7

And here is a man working on the street, as most people do there.  He was a cobbler, and would fix and resole shoes.  You can see his sewing machine with a shoe hanging in it.  The little parts of people on the edges of the image are people waiting for their shoes.

There’s a lot more to tell you about China, but I’ll finish it in the next post.

Bry Cox (Sep 2009)

Tonight while I was dressed up, I did a new self-portrait of myself.  Some of my contacts for speaking gigs have asked for an updated photo, and I can also use a new image of myself on the professional photography forums that I’m a contributer for.

I specifically did a photo of me smiling this time.  On a couple occasions people have told me after meeting me, that they were suprised to see that I’m a happy guy.  Somehow they thought that my serious self-portraits meant that I was a  dark and brooding type of person.  That’s so funny to me.

Yes I do smile a lot, but tend to photograph myself serious.  So this time I made myself laugh for a real genuine smile, and this photo turned out to be my favorite.

As far as the blog goes, I’ve got a lot to tell you all, and will get some of the highlights up this week.

Until then,
– Bry

I recently did the cover photograph for Katherine Nelson’s new CD, called “Most Requested.”  It is a beautiful album, released with Deseret Book under the Shadow Mountain Label and contains 10 of her most popular tracks from past albums.

BryCox - Katherine Nelson CD

Many of you will know Katherine as “Emma,” in the LDS movie “Joseph Smith, Prophet of the Restoration,” as well as the followup movie “Emma Smith: My Story.”

Here is the entire image from the design.  This was created on my road, out in front of my studio, with the sun behind.

BryCox - Katherine

Katherine has a wonderful voice!  She has sung on a lot of LDS albums, sometimes as the lead and sometimes as backup.  I’m sure that if you do not at first recognize her name, that you would for sure recognize her fantastic voice as she has sung on many EFY CDs as well as for Kenneth Cope and other LDS artists.

It was fun for me too to see that she either wrote or co-wrote most of the songs on the album too.  Congratulations on the new album, Katherine!  I’m glad that you had me be a part of it.

I was interviewed recently on LDS Radio which is KSL’s HD 2 station, and is also an internet radio station found at radio.lds.org with podcasts and mp3 downloads.  That interview just aired today at 1:oo pm.  I got an email from someone that I was on the radio and turned it on to hear the last half of the show.  It was really fun!

LDS Radio - On Air

I didn’t have a lot of information about the show, but just knew that the subject was ‘Creativity.’  This is a good subject for me because aside from working creatively as an artist, I’ve really had to analyze my creative approach over the years so that I could better teach creativity at the photographic workshops that I do all over the US and Canada (and now China).  I was glad that it was a subject that I felt prepared for.

When I arrived, I was happy that I knew the host already, Nancy Hanson, a local musician.  I’ve done design and portrait work for her over the years and have gotten to know her well from that as well as having mutual musician friends.  Here’s one of my favorite images I did of her a while back.

BryCox - Nancy Hanson

Also being interviewed was Vaughn Armstrong, who recently created a new LDS trivia board game.  I also know Vaughn personally because we were in the same singles ward a few years ago.  There was one other person being interviewed whose name I don’t remember now.  (I’m sorry!)  She has a blog and podcast about playing the ukulele all over the world.  The idea was to get us together and discuss and compare creative approaches in our different fields.

Me at LDS Radio (1)

Me at LDS Radio (2)

Me at LDS Radio (3)

Thanks again to LDS Radio and Tamilisa for inviting me over and having me on.  It was a great experience and a real honor.  I hope to find the MP3 and link over to it when it is available for everyone to listen to.

After I was done speaking, I took some time to create some art images of the people and places there.  A few of us photographers chipped in and hired cars to take us to some remote places in China so that we could see some unique things.

I hope to do an art book of just Chinese art images similar to my Italian art book I did a few years ago.  I will first need to sort and choose my favorites, as well as do some slight artwork on the images and adjust for contrast and proper cropping.

For right now though, here is an early preview of some of my favorite images, before post-production artwork.  It was a fantastic journey and I’ll be excited to show these images after they are finished.

By the way, feel free to let me know some of your favorites!

BryCox - China Art Images 1

BryCox - China Art Images 2

BryCox - China Art Images 3

BryCox - China Art Images 4

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BryCox - China Art Images 8

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…That night we were treated to an amazing awards ceremony and party.  The awards ceremony was for the best of the best images from the international exhibition, of which 25,000 photographers entered from all over the world.  From those final images chosen for exhibition, some images where chosen for Gold, Silver, and Bronze medals.

I WON THE GOLD!  It was very fun to actually be there to receive the award!  Even though I was there in China to speak at the convention, I didn’t expect to win any awards with so many photographers entering.  It was so exciting to have them call me up as the Gold Medalist too!

BryCox - PPA China Awards Night 1

When I went up to get the award, I handed my camera to Doug Box and asked him to take a photo of me winning.  After the shot, I took my camera back and took this quick pano of the audience photographing me!  Look at all the people grouped up on the sides!

BryCox - PPA China Awards Night 2

Here’s a close-up of one of the sides.

BryCox - PPA China Awards Night 3

But before they started giving awards, they event started with beautiful Chinese models coming out wearing some of the top images from the exhibition.  They were strutting to music with a heavy beat.  The lighting, fog, and bubbles made it look amazing.

BryCox - PPA China Awards Night 4

Here’s a close-up of one of the girls.  They were stunning women!

BryCox - PPA China Awards Night 5

The model on the right of this image is wearing one of my images, the famous portrait I did of Joe McQueen.

BryCox - PPA China Awards Night 6

Afterward some of the models asked for a photograph with me.  It probably didn’t hurt that I’d just won the Gold Medal in front of them, or that they were wearing some of my images, or that the place was decorated with my images…but I have to tell you that I loved the attention and felt like a rock star!  They were beautiful and stunning women who were amazingly tall.  Notice how tall they are compared to me.  I’m 6 foot 4 — especially tall for China.

BryCox - PPA China Awards Night 7

BryCox - PPA China Awards Night 8

Then before dinner that night the models changed outfits and came back out to do another dance.  I loved this one too!

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BryCox - PPA China Awards Night 9

The dinner room was decorated with our photographs.  That’s actually my image hanging behind us.

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Here’s another shot showing two more of my images on the wall along with images from the other speakers.

BryCox - PPA China Awards Night 12

This dinner felt like another awards ceremony because we were all presented with gifts from the Chinese.  Here is Dennis Craft and I getting some traditional cut-out art pieces.

BryCox - PPA China Awards Night 13

That night was fantastic!  It made me feel very grateful and blessed to do what I do — to be an artist and to be able to travel and meet so many people from all over the world.  It was a joy to be able to speak and share my artistic ideas with the Chinese photographers.  They were incredibly hospitable and kind.  I hope to get back over there again soon!

It was a real honor to be asked to speak at PPA Asia.  Someone in our group pointed out that not only was I speaking at the first PPA Asia, but I was the first speaker at the first PPA Asia!  That made me feel really good.  It was such a great group in attendance, and I was able to meet some fantastic photographers over there and see some really amazing photographs.

So the first day, I started things off by speaking in the largest room, giving my creativity program.  I revised it many times over to make it more applicable to the Chinese culture, and making it more visual as well so that it would translate well.  It was received very well, and afterward I was mobbed by attention from people asking for autographs and photos with me.

Cox - Speaking at PPA China 1

The second day I started out speaking again in a smaller room doing a variation of my creativity program, but with more specific posing and lighting ideas for single individuals.  This too was met with me getting a bunch of attention afterward.

Cox - Speaking at PPA China 2

I have to admit, it was really fun to be treated like such a rock star!  A crowd would gather for pictures and autographs and would last for about an hour each time I spoke.  We would have to break it up so that we could get out of the way for the next presentation.

As you can see too, I got a lot of use out of my new Chinese tailored suits!  This black one is my third suit I had made out there.  They all fit so nice, I kind of wish I had gotten even more, except I just don’t need any more suits!  :-)

Cox - Speaking at PPA China 3

Then that afternoon, I spoke again in the large conference room and did a presentation on portrait lighting and posing for a more fashion approach.  It seemed that everyone’s favorite part was when I did live posing on stage using photographers in the audience as models.  They really loved it!

Cox - Speaking at PPA China 4

Everything I did was translated by a live interpreter.  I had to pause every two to three sentences to allow interpretation.  I found that I had to make shorter and more precise statements, and really had to get used to the flow of speaking in such a way with long pauses.  I also had to use simpler words and try hard to not use deep photography jargon that the interpreter might not know.  It was a real adventure and I made quick friends with my incredible and gifted interpreter, Kevin.

Cox - Speaking at PPA China 5

Here’s a photo of me sitting for a minute to start a slideshow, and my interpreter standing near by.  He was a great guy and was really fun to hang out with.

In the next post I’ll talk about the awards ceremony and the fantastic party that was held later that night.

Early the next morning I set out to photograph and document the convention center before people started to arrive, because this is the first PPA convention in China, and the very first PhotoAsia — four years in the making!

Cox - PPA Photo Asia 1

Here is the place all ready for people to arrive!

Cox - PPA Photo Asia 2

I walked out to the main gate to photograph the guard…

Cox - PPA Photo Asia 3

…as well as various landmarks that surrounded the convention center like this pavilion in the distance (above) in one direction and this statute (below) in another direction.

Cox - PPA Photo Asia 4

By that time people started arriving and as I tried to get this image of me in front of the convention center.

Cox - PPA Photo Asia 5

I had only a short 3 minute walk back to the hotel, but I got stuck in this location for about 45 minutes because someone recognized me and wanted a photo with me.  That got other people’s attention and within moments I was mobbed by people on all sides wanting to photograph me  and wanting me to sign their shirts.  I have to admit, this really made me feel awesome!  This is just one quick shot of the crowd at the end as I was trying to leave and get to the opening ceremonies.  There were still people wanting photos with me, but I didn’t want to be late to the ceremony of which I was apart!

Cox - PPA Photo Asia 6

Cox - PPA Photo Asia 7

We had a quick welcome meeting with the VIP’s in a smaller room where flowers were pinned on us by Chinese women in traditional dress.  These women then escorted us to the main hall, the location of the opening ceremonies.  This photo is coming down the escalator towards the main hall.  The women in the red traditional dresses are our escorts.

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As we approached, everyone began to take our picture.  So fun!

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And here is PPA President, Ron Nichols up on the stage welcoming everyone to PPA Photo Asia.

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Here’s me backstage with my flower pinned on, and wearing half of my second custom made Chinese suit.  That is also one of the custom made dress shirts too.

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The opening ceremonies opened up the print exhibit.  This is just half of the exhibit, and only the accepted prints.  If I remember right, there were entries from over 25,000 photographers from around the world, and I won a Gold Medal!  I’ll talk more on this when I talk about the awards ceremony in a later post.

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As you can see, all of us got mobbed for autographs and photos.  Here is Ron Nichols getting tons of attention.

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And here is one of my photographs in the exhibit.

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And I loved it when these women came up and asked to pose for a photo with me, so I made sure I got one with my camera too.  :-)

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And I loved this moment when the beautiful editor of PhotoWorld Magazine came up and asked for a photo with me.  She later did a one-on-one interview too for her magazine.  That was one of the highlights of the trip.  She gave me a copy of a past issue and the cover photo was incredible!  It is a fabulous and beautiful magazine and I felt honored to be asked to be in it.

After the opening ceremonies, I had time for a quick and fast lunch before going off to speak — the first speaker at the first PhotoAsia.  I’ll have more on that in the next post!