Mishka’s 10th Anniversary – 9.26.13

The Brooklyn based street wear brand Mishka celebrated their 10th anniversary last night at Stage 48th last night. For me Mishka turning 10 was less about a party for a clothing company and more about seeing family grow up. When I moved to Brooklyn 7 years ago I happened to move a few blocks from Mishka’s base of operations. I vaguely knew a few people from the brand in nightlife and when they had a warehouse sale I stopped in because it was a few blocks away from my apartment. They didn’t even have a store yet, much less the stores they have in Brooklyn, LA, San Francisco and Tokyo. I ended up leaving their warehouse with a couple things including one of their Keep Watch hats, all black with the famous eyeball on the front.

I wore that hat pretty much every day for a year. Eventually someone from Mishka approached me about shooting a lookbook for them. They wanted to do a nightlife themed book and figured I was a fan of the brand because I wore the hat every day. The truth is I liked the hat but I didn’t want to shoot a look book for clothes. I had done two look books for clothes before and both times the brands failed before I even got the gear. The lookbooks were never even published. I had learned my lesson so I said no. They kept bugging me about it over and over again until I finally agreed.

The shoot ended up being the Spring 2009 lookbook  and while I am not a big fan of the photos I am so glad I did it. Yeah, I ended up with some free clothes but I also gained a family. Back before Mishka took over the world you would see people in Mishka and you could walk up and say hi because they were friends with somebody you were friends with. Wearing the eyeball meant you were down with all the other kids Keeping Watch.

In the nearly five years that have passed since we shot that lookbook Mishka has blown up like you wouldn’t believe. I recently got a chance to check out their massive new office space in Greenpoint and I just was excited for Mikhail and Greg. Their office has a god damn bar in it. So proud of those dudes and how far their little t-shirt company has gone in just the five years I’ve known them.

So last night I went to their party at Stage 48 and saw King Louie and World’s Fair and had some fun but the party isn’t nearly as important as what it meant… seeing the Mishka family grow up. And yeah, I took some photos and once again I shot something for Mishka for free because they will pay me back in a lot more than clothes.

Speaking of all this, I am going to announce it officially next week, but Mishka LA is going to be the location for my Route 66 book release party on October 11th and we are going to do something in NYC too but that’s a bit up in the air right now. This party in LA is going to be amazing and it never would have happened if I didn’t shoot that lookbook back in late 2008. Thanks Mishka and congrats on your 10th birthday!

Click here to see all the photos I took at Mishka’s 10th Anniversary at Stage 48.

Mishka's Mikhail Bortnik & Greg Rivera

World's Fair @ Mishka 10th Anniversary

Mishka 10th Anniversary

King Louie @ Mishka 10th Anniversary

Mishka 10th Anniversary

Mishka 10th Anniversary

Mishka 10th Anniversary

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Elm Street Tattoo Dice Game – 9.15.13

So I meant to get these pictures up a week ago but it didn’t happen. Remember when I went to the Sailor Jerry Presents Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival? Well there was a big fundraising raffle for True South, a charity that helps people injured in motorcycle and bike accidents. The big prize was a 1984 Harley-Davidson, but what I didn’t talk a lot about was the 2nd Harley that was given away.

Another bike was given away by Elm Street Tattoo’s Oliver Peck. A bunch of tattoo artists and some locals were offered the chance to play in a massive dice game that happened on stage at the end of the tattoo convention at Prophet Bar. 40 people gathered around a table and one by one rolled three dice in a game of C-lo. Four people managed to roll the best possible score of 4-5-6 and they moved on to the second round. In the end it came down to Chicago tattoo artist Keith Underwood and one of the members of the nightclub Trees staff. In the third and final round Keith won the bike and celebrated like a crazy person. It was pretty amazing. I’ve worked with Keith at a couple of Sailor Jerry events so I was psyched that he won.

I should also mention that Oliver rolled a 1, the lowest possible score. Everyone but Oliver got a huge kick out of that.

I video taped the whole thing as well so all the shots I took were one handed and a lot of people were in the way so they aren’t the best of my career. That being said I kinda love these photos anyway so I decided to make them their own update. It’s a lot of fun to see all these very serious looking tattoo artists laughing their asses off and high fiving each other over a game of dice…

Click here to see all the photos from the dice at the Elm Street Music & Tattoo Fest!

Oliver Peck Elm Street Tatto Dice Game

Elm Street Tatto Dice Game

Chris Nunez & Keith Underwood Elm Street Tatto Dice Game

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April O’Neil

I met April O’Neil years ago when she walked past me at a Vegas casino. I did one of those things terrible dudes do on the street where I just told her she was adorable when she walked passed my seat. I try not to harass strange women unless I have a camera in my hand and am working an event, but I needed to photograph April at some point and I had to talk to her.  She smiled and said thanks but kept walking and I am not so creepy as to chase her down, but luckily that same night someone introduced me to her. I had just picked up the first iPad and I showed her my photos and she totally wanted to shoot. She lives in LA and I was going to be there a few days later so we exchanged numbers. I was totally excited to take her photo.

Unfortunately when I got to LA something came up and the shoot didn’t work out. For YEARS this kept happening. I was sure she hated me and I kept giving up but every time I would run into her she would seem really excited to see me and promise that we would shoot soon. I felt like Charlie Brown. She was Lucy and her boobs were the football that she would yank away from me at the last moment. It was pretty frustrating but April is not just a total babe. She is also really fun, really tiny and has the best boobs ever so I kept try to get her to shoot with me.

And then it finally happened! I was in Vegas this year working on this thing for Hustler Magazine AVN Awards behind the scenes thing I keep mentioning (I still have one more post from that shoot!) and of course I asked April. She told me she didn’t want to do any work on this trip but she did really want to shoot with me. I knew I needed shots of people getting ready so I pitched her the idea that I would come over while she did her hair and make up and just shoot while she got ready. To her credit she was totally cool with getting photographed without her make up finished and let me come over before she went out to party.

We shot a pretty fun shoot in less than 20 minutes and I thought the shots were a perfect addition to my Hustler article. It’s a small set and the hotel bathroom light is really ugly but I was so glad to have finally photographed her! Don’t worry, I won’t give up until we get to do a real shoot! One of these days April! One of these days!

By the way, there are three bonus April butt shots that are on the Girls of Driven By Boredom app and all the photos were posted yesterday. Clearly you need to get on that shit for exclusive content, higher res images and photos up before anyone else gets to see ’em.

I had to put stamps on her boobs below cause I didn’t actually take any photos that weren’t NSFW. My bad. BUT make sure you click here to see all the uncensored images of April O’Neil!

April O'Neil

April O'Neil

April O'Neil

 

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Charlotte Stokely

I first shot Charlotte Stokely at the AVN Awards in January and we instantly hit it off, and then a few days later we went on a road trip for an article in Hustler and then a few months later she came on part of my massive Route 66 road trip. She has become pretty much my favorite model to shoot and I pretty much scheduled my 66 trip around her availability. I have posted a ton of photos of her on my Instagram and Tumblr but I realized I have never actually posted any photos of her on Driven By Boredom (although our first shoot is available on the DBB Girls App). So clearly it is time for some Charlotte Stokely!

Back in January we went on an adventure to Joshua Tree National Park for a 10 page interview/photo shoot that was published in the October issue of Hustler (which actually came out several months ago). It was one of the first time Hustler has ever combined a feature story about someone with a girl pictorial. They used a mix of 35mm film photography for the interview and digital photography for the pictorial. It ended up looking pretty awesome.

On our trip we stopped off at the Cabazon Dinosaurs, the world famous giant dinos in Cabazon, CA. They were in Pee Wee’s Big Adventure and the Wizard, two of my favorite movies ever as a kid. It was the middle of the day so there weren’t any kids around so we snuck about the park taking photos until we got inside the T-Rex and did a photo shoot in his head! There were cameras in there but we did the shoot anyway.

Originally the dinosaurs were built as a tourist attraction to promote the Wheel Inn Restaurant but they are now their own separate park. The Wheel Inn is still there so we stopped off for some food. On the way out we did one more shoot in front of a giant brontosaurus. She got completely naked and then ran to the car and drove us all the way to Joshua Tree naked! Well, almost all the way. She put some clothes on when we got off the highway.

By the time we got to the park it was getting dark so we had to do the whole shoot in about 20 minutes. We had bought some cheap champagne to spray all over the place because she was wearing pearls and figured it would be classy. The only problem was that we were in the desert in January and it was pretty damn cold once the sun started to go down. She was naked, covered in champagne and freezing her ass off but she didn’t complain. She even fucked up a brand new pair of heels but she just shrugged it off. I became a huge Stokely fan at that moment.

After that we headed back to her place in LA but we stopped off for dinner at Denny’s. I thought it would make for a funny couple of shots. We finally ended the day back at her place where she smoked and relaxed in some hilarious bunny slippers and not much else. The whole day was pretty great.

Because I shot these photos for a Hustler pictorial there are a bunch of much more graphic photos that I had to shoot. I don’t post stuff like that on this site, but I posted all the extra dirty shots on the DBB App. As I mentioned there is another whole set of Charlotte on there as well so if you are a Stokely fan it’s probably worth a gander. But if not there are still a TON of free NSFW photos in this gallery! So get excited!

Click here to see a ton of photos from my Joshua Tree road trip with Charlotte Stokely! 

Charlotte Stokely \Charlotte Stokely

Charlotte Stokely

Charlotte Stokely

Charlotte Stokely

Charlotte Stokely

Charlotte Stokely

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Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival – 9.15.13

Finally back from Dallas and I had a blast at the Sailor Jerry Presents Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival. Day three was a lot of fun because it was the slowest day and I got to hang out with a lot of the tattoo artists and other people at the convention. By 8pm people were mostly done tattooing or just finishing up and there was a raffle for a 1984 Harley-Davidson motorcycle, a Fender guitar and a Tim Hendricks tattoo machine. All the money went to True South, a charity that helps people injured in motorcycle and bicycle accidents. I video taped the raffle so there aren’t many pictures but they raised a ton of money and later people who donated to True South got a chance to play in a massive game of dice to win another Harley, but more on that later.

Sunday was also a lot of fun because my friend Alysha Nett showed up and I spent most of the day hanging out with (and taking photos of) her. After she left I did quick photo shoots with two girls I met on the first day of the festival but I think they chickened out and don’t want their pictures online. You can see a preview on my NEW Instagram though…

After the tattoo part of the convention was over there were after parties at Three Links and Wit’s End. Three Links ended the night with a solo show from Jim Heath of the Reverend Horton Heat. I left right after his set but I think all the tattoo artists and friends ended back at Oliver Peck’s place for some sort of insane after the after party that I should have attended since I didn’t get any sleep anyway. I skipped out early because I had to get photos to clients before I left for the airport and I hopped to get a few hours of sleep. At least one of those things happened.

In conclusion, the Elm Street Music & Tattoo Fest was an amazing time and I hope I get asked back again next Friday the 13th cause I had a lot more fun in Dallas than I thought I ever could. Big thanks to Oliver Peck & Elm Street Tattoo, Sailor Jerry and the Dallas Observer for having me out!

Click here to see pictures from day three of the Sailor Jerry Presents Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival in Dallas Texas.

Ps. There are random pictures of Rhett Miller from the Old 97s in this gallery because he happened to be playing next to Three Links and I stopped in for a second to check it out.

Alysha Nett & A Puppy!

Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

Forest & Chris Nunez Tattoo

Reverend Jim Heath

Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

Little Linda

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Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival – 9.14.13

Yesterday was day two of “Sailor Jerry Presents the Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival”. I didn’t get any tattoos on day two but I had a lot of fun. There was skate boarding, tons of rock and roll and of course more tattooing. Bowling For Soup were the headliners yesterday and there were a bunch of tattooed babes hanging out everywhere. No complaints.

I hung out on the half pipe out back and shot kids skateboarding for a while. I shot a bunch of skate stuff when I was in high school but I didn’t have that many friends that were any good so I have really only shot skate stuff a couple times in the last 15 years. Sports photography, and especially skate photography is such a specialized thing but I had fun anyway. I got a couple of nice shots but my favorite might be the one of a board flying at me. It actually hit me in the face but the shot was worth it. The shot is always worth it.

Bowling For Soup headlined Trees but I was more excited about the headliners over at Wits End across the street. Dallas Uber Alles were an awesome Dead Kennedys cover band and I had a lot of fun fucking shit up in their mosh pit. It also made me realized how many Dead Kennedys songs I don’t know. That was pretty surprising since they were one of the first punk bands I ever listened to.

This fest has been so much fun so I gotta thank the homie Oliver Peck and Sailor Jerry for bringing me out to Texas. Half my family is from Dallas and I have spent a lot of time here and this is the first time I ever had any fun… (Although I did fire a gun for the first time here.)

Click here to see all the photos from day two of Sailor Jerry Presents The Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival in Dallas, TX.

Oliver Peck Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

Bowling For Soup @ Elm Street Music & Tattoo Fest

Chris Nunez Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

Dallas Uber Alles Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

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Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival – 9.13.13

Yesterday was Friday the 13th and that means one thing, cheap #13 tattoos! Getting the #13 tattooed on you has historically been a way to ward off bad luck and in recent years it’s become a tattoo shop tradition to give out small inexpensive #13 tattoos every Friday the 13th. Tattoo artist Oliver Peck and his shop Elm Street Tattoo in Dallas, TX have taken that idea even further. Oliver has 13s tattooed all over his body and once broke the world’s record for most tattoos in a 24 hour period by tattooing 13s on people.

This year Oliver and his shop launched “Sailor Jerry Presents The Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival” on Friday the 13th in Dallas. On day one of the festival they had something like 100 tattoo doing Friday the 13th tattoos during the whole  24 hour period. The festival lasts all weekend and features tattooing all day and bands all night. The convention took over four venues on Elm Street in Deep Ellum. The actual tattoo convention is taking place in the Prophet Bar and bands are playing at Trees, Three Links and Wits End. Day one was a lot of fun and the Reverend Horton Heat headlined Trees and I used to love those guys so it was awesome to see them for the first time in over a decade.

I should mention, that I was supposed to be in Dallas at midnight but I didn’t get there until 4pm on Friday because of a canceled flight and a nightmarish runaround that had me spend 11 hours of my life at LaGuardia airport. To celebrate the worst travel day of my life, and to help ward off bad flight luck, I got a Friday the 13th tattoo myself… Rana Almiron, a tattoo artist who flew in for the festival from Argentina, tattooed the Delta Airlines logo on me with the number 13 on top of it.

Now click here to check out all the photos from Friday the 13th at Sailor Jerry Presents the Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival in Dallas, TX.

Oliver Peck & Dean Williams Of Elm Street Tattoo

Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

Reverend Horton Heat @ Elm Street Music & Tattoo Fest

Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

Party Police @ Elm Street Music & Tattoo Fest

Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

Elm Street Music & Tattoo Festival

 

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Bonnie Rotten

Way back in January I was working on my AVN Awards behind the scenes coverage for Hustler and I ran into Bonnie Rotten who was hanging out with Malice McMunn. I had met Bonnie the year before and even though she wasn’t even doing porn at the time she stood out to me because she was adorable and covered in tattoos. So when I ran into Malice & Bonnie I pitched them on the idea of doing this AVN behind the scenes shoot and they were down to shoot for it and after the article ran in Hustler I posted the gallery of my shoot with Malice & Bonnie here.

When I told my editor at Hustler that I was shooting Bonnie for the AVN story, he got excited and asked if I would shoot Bonnie for an interview feature as well. She had totally blown up in the adult world in under a year and he wanted to get her in the magazine. So right before I shot Malice & Bonnie together, I shot Bonnie by herself in her Vegas hotel room. A few months later I was in LA and Hustler asked me if I wanted to do Bonnie’s interview as well so I met up with her on a film shoot and interviewed her. If you want to read that you have to pick up last month’s Hustler but I will mention a couple of things.

There aren’t many super tattooed girls that are really successful in the adult world. There are a ton of tattooed girls out there that do sites like Burning Angel but not a lot of really featured girls. Bonnie is a legit star. I asked her about this and other things in the interview, but I can tell you why Bonnie has done what a lot of other tattooed girls haven’t. Aside from being really adorable Bonnie is a god damned professional. A ton of girls flaked on me at AVN and it’s a constant problem when shooting naked girls but Bonnie not only didn’t flake, but she woke me up to ask how she wanted her make up done. She hired her own make up artist and was ready right when she said she would be. When we did the interview she was dealing with some stuff, but she stopped in the middle, did the interview and then went back to what she was doing. She’s also very smart, very cool and very aware of her brand and what jobs to take and which ones not to take. I guarantee you are going to be seeing a lot more of Bonnie Rotten… on both sides of the camera.

Also, since I shot this for Hustler they asked me to shoot some graphic spread legged shots and stuff. I don’t like to post stuff like that on Driven By Boredom, but since I am always looking for new reasons to get you to sign up for my app, I posted all the extra dirty shots on the Girls of Driven By Boredom web app. Go sign up already!

Now click here to see all the NSFW outtakes from my Hustler Magazine shoot with Bonnie Rotten!

Bonnie Rotten

Bonnie Rotten

Bonnie Rotten

Bonnie Rotten

Bonnie Rotten

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Dolfans NYC Returns – 9.8.13

You might know that I am an insane Miami Dolphins fan and I run the NYC home for Miami Dolphins fans, DolfansNYC. We meet Miami Dolphins game and root on our team like crazy people. Sadly our bar, Third & Long closed it’s doors this off season and we were left without a home. Luckily we found Slattery’s Midtown Pub and they gave us a much bigger place to throw a party.

200+ people took over both floors of the bar and we even had some spillover at the bar next door. It was pretty amazing and everyone lost their mind and the Dolphins won. The bar gave us free shots. It was the best. It’s weird to think the most successful parties I’ve ever thrown are Miami Dolphins viewing parties.  I took a bunch of photos and you are about to get to see them.

But first, a quick apology. Sorry to post photos of Miami Dolphins fans. I of course won’t do it every week, but I like to get my Dolfans NYC crew a little love now and then… Now on to the pictures.

Click here if for some reason you want to see all the photos of a ton of Miami Dolphins fans at Slattery’s Midtown Pub.

Dolfans NYC @ Slattery's

Dolfans NYC @ Slattery's

Dolfans NYC @ Slattery's

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