There's Something Going on in Seattle

After Macworld, I didn't head directly home. Oh no. Instead, I zipped straight past Portland and ended up in Seattle just in time to check out the MSE Garage Shoot put on by the Seattle Flickrites, organized in great part by my friend Ted Leung, and sponsored by Chase Jarvis. Chase provided the location in the form of renting out Hangar 30 at Sand Point in Seattle. Ted and Jeremy put in loads of organization work including securing models. Everyone else brought their equipment. By everyone, I mean the 50 people that managed to sign up in some insanely small amount of time. It filled fast. Really fast. Like rock concert fast. To top things off, David Hobby--Mr. Strobist himself--was also there as a surprise guest.

So why was I there? Well my friends, there's something going on in Seattle. David noted that out of all the Strobist groups all over the world, Seattle was the most active and was generating the an incredible amount of interesting work. In addition, Chase's involvement is interesting to me. He's a super jet setting pro who's taking a bit of time from his schedule and giving back to his local scene. And, he's bringing along his crew to help. I think it's working in a catalyzing fashion. When you have a bunch of photo geeks playing around with lights online, it's interesting. When you get 50 of them together in a huge hangar with enough space to try out all sorts of techniques and learn from each other as well as professionals, it's beyond interesting. Gathering lots of creative people in one place and letting them swap ideas is how entire movements in art have been fueled. Is this the start of something major? I don't know. But I wanted to see it for myself.

In the photo above, Ted shoots while Chase and Scott (Chase's right hand man) assist with lighting. You can see the result in Ted's Flickr stream. It may be just me, but I think that this kind of learning opportunity equals months of school time in a single concentrated packaged dose. The entire four hours that the hangar shoot was going on, I walked around and watched people work and gave some of my own input where I could. At times, I really wanted to jump in and shoot a setup of my own, but I was so busy drinking in the vibe. I didn't want to miss something. So I shot mostly documentary shots, conversed, and talked a lot of lighting. The next time I get this chance, however, I've already promised myself that I'll cook up some interesting setups and do some teaching myself.

After the shoot was over, a big subset of us wandered over to Chase's studio and socialized till the early hours of the AM. Beverages were had. Guitar Hero was played. Great conversations happened. And the scene continued to gel. I'm in awe of what the Seattle Flickrites have accomplished and can't wait to see what comes next. It's an inspiration, to be sure. Thanks Ted and Chase for the opportunity to drop in and witness this thing.