Rockwood's a tattoo artist to the stars, and I photographed him in his Hawaii studio using just 3 speedlights:

-mainlight: HonlPhoto 8" Speed Snoot
-hairlight: HonlPhoto 1/8 Speed Grid with blue gel
-background light: HonlPhoto Speed Gobo pinked-up with a gel

If you get ink in Hawaii, go to Rockwood (I did!) Big Island Tattoo

My Dad Charles with his train collection

My family! Now that I've officially returned to photography full-time this week (even in this economic climate, when it's tougher than ever to be a photographer), I really need to thank my biggest supporters (equal to Claudia) for taking the HonlPhoto reins for me, my Dad Charles, and my brother Ryan.

My Dad was shipping the initial HonlPhoto products for me while I was still living in Istanbul and Kazakhstan (there was more than one occasion when I would affix velcro to my gel kits and FedEx them to my Dad in Indiana, to ship to customers from my website). Dad has been responsible for shipping every single order from my website, to this date. I grew up reluctantly taking direction from him in our family bakery business in northern Minnesota. I would "grease" bread pans at 6am before school every morning, smelling of bread and donuts before I arrived at my school locker at 8am, with an Olympus OM1 in a brown paper bag, so I could take pictures for the school yearbook. They say as you get older, the parent/child relationship reverses. But I'm not sure that's so, since I rely on my Dad even more at my ever progressing age of 44. And my mom Renae still packages HonlPhoto products, despite being screwed over by a brain tumor several years ago. My Mom is living proof that love and family does make the world go 'round folks.


My younger brother Ryan during the Planet of the Apes shoot

My brother Ryan is now VP of HonlPhoto. Although he's 7 years my junior, I've always seen him as the more responsible and elder one, and a helluva lot better at business than I. Ryan joined the Army at 18, in plans to get a free college education. What he got was a free ticket to the 1st Iraq war, where he was part of Schwartkopf's "Left Hook". Then, without much time to think, he was sent to West Point by the US Army through the Secretary of Defense (Dick Cheney himself), then on to a highly successful career at Johnson & Johnson, which most guys in his position do I guess. And now, he's much happier helping his older brother out, watching my back, and cheerleading my photographic efforts.

So I guess the bigger thank you goes to HonlPhoto, for all my Speed Straps, and Speed Gobos, and Speed Snoots, and Speed Grids, for ultimately making this Honl family a little bit happier and alot more close.