Fuck.  I have been awake for 32 straight hours.  It is so fucking cold in Utah.  I took photos of celebrities holding products all fucking day today.  One party I tried to go to ended when I got there, the other was too crowded.  I just went back to this HUGE penthouse sweet I am staying in. Oh.. on the flight here they searched my bag and there was like 8 porn DVDs, a bunch of copies of my x-rated x-mas card, a book on pornographic motel photos and a clown mask.  Fucking embarrassing.

I have to sleep.  So busy.  Will try to update in future.

For now, I got nothing.

10 years ago today I was laid off from my job at Archive.org. I was digitizing books that were in the public domain so that anyone could read them without having a physical copy. Archive.org is a non-profit and a huge part of their budget came from Microsoft donations. The housing market collapse in 2008 caused a lot of companies to reevaluate their corporate giving and Microsoft massively cut their donation for 2009. 

Two days before we left for the holiday we were told that the late shift was being cut completely and that everyone from both shifts could reapply for their jobs the next day. They would pick the best from both groups for the shift. Unfortunately for me I was working part time as a nightlife photographer and there was no way I could get to a day job at 7am every day when I was getting home at 5am. I took 6 weeks severance, filed for unemployment and took a few weeks to figure out what I was going to do next.

I also ended up benefiting from the market crash because that January I was hired to photograph Sundance for the main liquor sponsor even though I didn’t even have a legit professional camera at the time. I did the job for way less than I should have charged, but it was a ton of money for me and everyone was happy. Right around that same time someone randomly found a photo I took of all my cameras and paid me a few thousand dollars to retake that photo for a poster for a Swiss photo competition.

So suddenly I went from going paycheck to paycheck to having a little money in the bank and enough to buy a better camera and by the time my unemployment ran out I still hadn’t run out of money. 10 years later I have had a lot of ups and downs but I still haven’t had to get a job. Given the state of the industry, I might not make it 11 years, but I made it 10 years as a professional photographer and I am pretty proud of that.

I don’t really have any other new content for you today, but here’s a bunch of links to the best photos I have taken over the last 10 years. I am also uploading a new set exclusive to Girls of Driven By Boredom today so if you want to see some new NSFW photos of Kasey Warner and her friend Damia, go sign up there.

Now here are links to my “Best of” posts from 2009-2017. I will start working on the “Best of 2018” post in January.

– Best Of 2009 – Best Of 2010 – Best Of 2011 – Best Of 2012 –

– Best Of 2013 – Best Of 2014 – Best Of 2015 – Best Of 2016 – Best Of 2017 –

10 years ago today I moved to New York. I had planned on moving to NYC a year earlier but I was managing a band called the Gaskets at the time and decided to stick around until they graduated. Eventually I made plans with a friend to move with a friend but it didn’t work out so I signed another year lease in Richmond and figured maybe I could try again later.

Two weeks after I signed that lease I was in Brooklyn for a Gaskets show and I ran into a friend at an after party. He needed a roommate and could probably get me a job at the restaurant he worked at. I went in and met his boss the next day and they hired me as a bus boy. I broke the lease I had just signed and a couple of weeks later I had moved to Williamsburg Brooklyn into the same apartment I live in to this day.

For the entire first year I lived in NYC I worked as a bus boy in a hotel restaurant. I still had dreams of managing bands and working in the music industry but The Gaskets were on the verge of breaking up and there weren’t a lot of music jobs available believe it or not… I started going to parties in NYC to meet people and hit on girls and I would always bring a camera. I was a photo major in college but that was more just to have a useful trade while I did my own shit. I never thought I would be a photographer but I knew I would always take photos.

In late 2006 party photography had just blown up. Cobra Snake and Last Night’s Party were all the rage and when I would take photos at parties people would ask me what website it was for. I had started Driven By Boredom in 2001 but I rarely updated it but apparently I needed a place to post my photos so with the help of some friends I redid my website and became an accidental party photographer.

I would go out around midnight every night and shoot until 4am. I would come home, dump photos, and then shower and head to work. I had to be set up by 6am so I would get there around 5:30. I would work until 3, head home, upload photos, update my website and sleep for a few hours by doing the whole thing all over again. I hated being a bus boy and being broke constantly so every hour I had I free I spent working on photography.

Almost one year to the day after I started I quit my bus boy job. I really thought I could make it as a photographer and I did… for about 8 months. When I ran out of money I ended up getting a job digitizing books for Archive.org. It sounded like a cool job, working for a tech non-profit, and I got to work with cameras, but it was really closer to an assembly line factory job than anything else. I would turn the page and press a button and two cameras would fire and then I would do that again and again, thousands of pages a day.

When the economy crashed in 2008 a massive amount of Archive.org’s funding was cut and they had to lay off the night shift. They said I could re-interview for the day shift or take 6 weeks severance. So on December 23rd 2008 I worked my last day at a “real job” and tried once again to make it as a full time photographer.

Right around the time I got laid off I got a freak advertising gig. A Swiss ad agency saw one of my photos and asked me to re-shoot it for them. They paid me $2500 which was probably way less than I should have asked for but it was way more than I had ever made taking a photo before. In January I decided to go to LA as a little severance vacation and while I was there I randomly got hired to work Sundance for the main liquor sponsor. It turned out that because of the economy crash the company couldn’t afford to hire a real photographer so they paid me $3k to work five days. Again, it was not nearly enough but more money than I had ever made as a photographer before.

Within a month of being laid off I had nearly $7000 in my bank account and was on unemployment. I kinda looked for a job but mostly I was just trying to find as much photography work as possible. I was hoping I could make it longer than 8 months this time. When my unemployment finally ran out I didn’t have a job but I still hadn’t run out of money and many years later I still haven’t.

To this day I have no idea how I haven’t run out of money yet, but somehow I keep paying my bills. I still live in the same apartment and I have rent stabilization so my rent has only gone up about 10% in 10 years. The rents in the neighborhood have basically doubled so basically I can never leave.

And that’s my New York story. NYC isn’t nearly as inspiring as it was for the first few years, and I certainly have a lot less fun than I did in my 20’s but I still love it here and haven’t made that move to LA yet despite thinking about it all the time. So here’s to my 10 years in Brooklyn and to the next 10 years wherever I end up but I wouldn’t be surprised if I was still in this same god damn apartment.

To celebrate my 10 years in NYC my friend Betty Rose hooked me up with a New York City tattoo. Someone once told me when I first moved to NYC that if you make it 10 years you can finally call yourself a New Yorker. Not sure if that’s true or not but I guess I finally made it.

Over the past I have no fucking clue how long I have been organizing every photo I have taken since I moved to NYC in 2006. The idea is to eventually have a big fucking folder of images with all the best stuff from the last 8 years and to have things organized so that I can pull images that I need. I also notice I have found a ton of stuff that didn’t stand out at the time, for example just today I found a photo of Adam Scott I took before I even knew who Adam Scott was.

Since I started this project I have done a great job of organizing my 35mm archives. I worked pretty much 10 hours a day on that for a couple weeks and got it done. The digital stuff is a lot harder to do because of the sheer volume of the images. On a slow month I might shoot 4000 photos but during an event like South By Southwest I might shoot twice that many in five days. Getting through stuff has been fun, but I can only do so much a day without going insane.

Just today I finished going through 2009 which is a pretty serious accomplishment because in early 2008 I had a shitty camera so could go through that stuff very quickly and by the end of 2010 I had started shooting a bit less nightlife. In 2009 however I was going out nearly every night and sometimes shooting two or three events a night. So despite having more than five years to go I think I am nearly halfway through my digital archives. The last couple years are pretty organized anyway…

So, in celebration of finishing 2009 I decided a Throwback Thursday post was in order. I have put up a pretty massive gallery (over 300 images!) from 2009 that includes a lot of my favorite shots from the year. It’s probably less than a third of the images I pulled, but it gives you a nice look at one of my best years photographically. It’s amazing to see how far I progressed. The early 2009 stuff is terrible while the late 2009 work is better than anything I am doing now. It’s inspired me to work harder when shooting nightlife and makes me miss how much fun I used to have.

In this gallery you will find mostly party photos although there is some random stuff thrown in including a few old school naked girls in bathroom photo shoots. There are a ton of photos from the party Playhouse at Cain that was a really great party both photographically and on a hot babes I made out with kinda level. Unfortunately they stopped paying me and still fucking owe me money. There are also a bunch of images in here of kinda celebrity stuff or blast from the past images that are noteworthy for whatever reason. They might not all be fantastic photographically but they are cool to look at.

I think the big winner of 2009 was Roxy Cottontail who through two parties that were some of the most fun times I had in ’09. Check out her birthday party that year and the Pepsi party with Diplo that she through that year. Both great events. Speaking of Diplo… I photographed him and Steve Aoki a weird amount of times in 2009. Ninjasonik comes up a lot too and I shot a couple of great shows by Monotonix and Spank Rock who both happened to play the best Siren Fest I ever went to. A lot of girls show up a bunch in 2009 Alex Magnetic, Jocelyn and Chloe are particularly muse-worthy. Since then Alex was my intern and Chloe is a super famous model so that all rules.

Honestly there is way too much in here to cover… tons from Webster Hall when Trash and Boys & Girls were both happening on the same night… a bunch of big events like SXSW, Sundance, AVN Awards… live bands… burlesque… zombie crawls… comedy… fashion… Driven By Boredom tattoos… the list goes on and on.

But lastly I will mention there are a lot of pictures of my good friend Ease DaMan who sadly died recently. I met him in 2009 and took so many photos of the guy that year. He was so fun and so photogenic, rarely had his shirt on and once I showed up to a  party and the cops had shut it down because a fight broke out and Ease fucking bit someone. We all miss you tons Ease. Rest in peace.

I have no idea how I am going to come up with selects since I love so many of these photos, so I am just gonna put some random shit below here. Just make sure you look at the full gallery… and yeah, these photos are significantly NSFW.

Click here to see a bunch of photo highlights from 2009!

One of my favorite and longest  tenured clients is NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. I shot an event for them at Sundance in January 2008 and they have been using me ever sense. Months ago I shot two events for them but never posted the photos because they aren’t your standard crazy nightlife parties but they were both pretty cool so I figured I would share them with you as a bonus weekend update.

The first event was back in September. It was the 10th anniversary of the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music which is Tisch’s recorded music program. It was at Gallow Green, the rooftop bar above the The McKittrick Hotel, home of Sleep No More. Questlove DJ’d and there were performances by Kiah Victoria and Grammy nominated Elle Varner . Clive Davis was there as well which was pretty awesome. Strangely enough that same night I shot the 10th anniversary of Mishka on the exact block just several blocks north.

Click here to see all the photos from the Clive Davis Institute 10th Anniversary Party at Gallow Green.

The second Tisch event was their big yearly scholarship fundraiser the Tisch Gala held in late October. I have shot the event several times but this year it was in LA so I didn’t think I was going to get the opportunity to do it again. Fortunately I had another job in Vegas the next day so I flew into LA shot the event and just drove to Vegas early the next morning. The event was honoring Liza Chasin who is President of US Production for Working Title Films and Oliver Stone who is Oliver freaking Stone. As always it was a pretty epic event and they raised a TON of money to help kids afford an NYU education. Plus it took place in the Beverly Wilshire which is where Pretty Woman was filmed so that was pretty cool. Oh, and I started a limbo contest at the after party.

Click here to see all the photos from the 2013 Tisch Galla at the Beverly Wilshire in Los Angeles.

One of my favorite part of the Gathering of the Juggalos is the comedy tent. They actually get some really amazing (and sometimes awful) comedians and you get to see some great stand up sets and you get to see them react to the juggalos which is pretty funny in itself. The weirdest night of my life involved Tom Green & Gallagher at the Gathering and I met my homie Hannibal Burres there before his set. This year there were four comedians scheduled to play the Gathering. I skipped Ralphie May and Jamie Kennedy showed up three hours late so they told him to go home.

I did get a chance to see two, pretty awesome acts. The first was Cheech & Chong which seemed to be one of the most anticipated things at any Gathering I have ever been to. There were hundreds of people waiting in the comedy tent hours before they were supposed to go on. They went on late and people didn’t even care. They were just psyched to see Cheech and Chong.  Tommy came out first and they made him take hits from the biggest bong and biggest joint I have ever seen. After that Cheech came up as some hillbilly character and they switched on and off doing different characters while juggalos screamed things at them. It was a little dated but honestly hilarious and I wish I could have seen the whole set but I was off to something else.

On Saturday night I got a chance to see Bobcat Goldthwait which I was really excited about. I am a pretty big fan of both him as a comedian and him as a director. I met him on a press junket for his film World’s Greatest Dad and he seemed like a great dude and it was amazing to hear his signature voice when talking about serious things like scriptwriting. I was expecting him to be good, but not as good as he was. He delivered the best set I have seen in three years at the Gathering and everyone in the press area stayed for his whole set and the guy mixing the sound was laughing so hard he was crying. He was well researched and did a lot of great juggalo material, picked on some people in the audience and no one said shit or threw anything. At the end he put on an Insane Clown Posse shirt that Upchuck the Clown gave him. It was sort of perfect.

Check out all the pictures from comedy at the 2012 Gathering of the Juggalos featuring Bobcat Goldthwait and Cheech & Chong.

The Gathering of the Juggalos is a yearly music festival in Cave In Rock, IL created by the Insane Clown Posse that I have now photographed three times. Every year it produces some of the best photos I have ever taken. To see my complete GOTJ archives please click here.

I have talked about my friend Teddy many, many times on this website but it’s been a while so it’s time for a refresher. Teddy Blanks was the front man for The Gaskets the band I managed for 5 years. They broke up in 2008 and Teddy started making solo music. During this period he released a free EP called Complications which we will come back to in a second. Teddy started playing shows out and he scored the soundtrack for the very successful indie film Tiny Furniture (out Tuesday on Criterion DVD).

A few years ago Teddy co-founded what has become a very successful graphic design studio and put his music on the back burner a little bit but he has now shifted back into full on music making mode. Yesterday he released a bunch of new music starting with a re-release of Complications. Complications has been remixed and is fully ready for you to put into your face. The album is a concept album based on the writings of New Yorker staff writer and surgeon Atul Gawande. If you have never heard pop songs about medical oddities and songs using disease as metaphors for life this is your lucky day. The album is completely free you can listen to it below or download it here.

Teddy also has released all the music that he wrote for Tiny Furniture. Much of it didn’t make it into the movie including a Sinead O’Connor cover that they couldn’t afford the rights to. Most of the music is instrumental but there are a couple pop gems in there including When You Come Home, the song used in the trailer for the film. You can download all the Music From & Inspired by Tiny Furniture for free here.

On top of all that Teddy has released three new demos.  You can download all three demos here. Teddy is hard at work on a new album but these tracks didn’t make the cut, but they are still great songs. Somewhat Hasty is a personal favorite of mine.

Lastly, yesterday Paper Magazine debuted Teddy’s video for the opening track to Complications, Faint & Shaky. The video was directed by Ry Russo-Young who’s new film Nobody Walks was a hit at Sundance and was picked up for distribution by Magnolia Films. The video is peep show themed and Teddy does a little strip tease for your viewing pleasures. So watch this video and if you enjoy it, as I know you will, go back and check out all the other amazing links to music I just sent you!

Finally I am ready to start dropping some sweet Miami pictures on you.  Honestly my Miami trip was a bit disappointing from a productivity standpoint. I only have 6 galleries total and only 4 of them art Basel related. We have one Miami Dolphins related gallery and one half naked girl gallery as well as the parties. Many of the clubs I partied in were no cameras inside and I don’t have the hook up in Miami like I do in NYC so I sort of had to just go a long for the ride. I had some adventures though and I might have to tell you a few stories while showing you the pictures.

My first night in Miami was Wednesday. It was pre Art Basel and I got into Miami probably around 11pm. I met the girl I was staying at at Liv. Mark Ronson was DJing. She told me not to bring my camera in which was ultimately a mistake because tons of people were shooting. It was so fucking hectic in there I spent a lot of time wanting to leave so I never actually thought about going back for my camera. By the time I realized I was having fun in there it was too late and that part of the night went undocumented. What was weird about Liv is that there were so many damn people I knew there. A lot of New Yorkers in town for Basel but a lot of other Miami cats that I have run into over the years.  It ended up being a lot of fun.

After I headed over to Purdy Lounge which is pretty much a dive bar. They have a pool table and couches and that shit and it was pretty empty when I got there. But evidently that place is the normal Wednesday late night hang out spot because by 4am that place was packed and people were getting crazy. I ran and grabbed my camera but by that time it was nearly 5am and last call was ontop of us. Still I managed to meet some babes and take a few pictures which you will see below.

As we gathered outside the club to find the next party I saw Simon Rex aka Dirty Nasty outside. I met him at Sundance a few years ago and we have some mutual friends so I sort of knew who he was. All these girls were throwing themselves at him which was pretty funny to watch.  He was looking for Mark Ronson who showed up to the party late and was inside.  At some point everyone decided to go back to my boy Blu Jemz hotel room and I ended up driving Jemz, Dirty Nasty and Mark Ronson and my Miami roommate Malika to a hotel after party 5:30am.  The after party is probably best not mentioned for the interests of everyone involved but I will say that it was really funny to hear people kissing Mark Ronson’s ass who just an hour ago were talking shit about his DJ set at LIV.  I got home around 8 am. What a life we lead…

Click here to see all the (slightly too dark) pictures from my quick stop at Purdy Lounge in Miami.

A while ago I blogged about the soft launch of Unseen NYC. I reached out to friends and fans of this site to submit street art and street life pictures to Unseen and you did not disappoint.  Well, after a few weeks of gathering content Unseen NYC officially launches today!

So let me refresh your memory…

A few years ago an old college buddy of mine, Rick Ramos, launched a website called Unseen Denver. It was basically a Denver based street art site but Rick sees street art a bit differently than a lot of people. Rick isn’t really interested in graffiti and he is not active in the street art culture but he loves the little things that people don’t notice that make Denver a more interesting place to live. He posts a photo a day that people from around Denver submit of street art and graffiti, but also things like notes and signs and snow drifts and cracks in the sidewalk and moments that make Denver home for those people.

I had seen Unseen Denver before a while ago but it wasn’t until recently that I took a good look at the site and realized how interesting it is. I asked him if he had ever thought about branching out and making Unseen sites in other cities. He told me he would love to but never had a person to really push the site in other cities.  Enter me.

I have been reaching out to you guys and my friends and fellow photographers to get them to submit images to this Unseen NYC project and it has already been pretty fantastic. The blog was just a few photos on a blank page but we still received a TON of photos and have already been blogged about on the NY Times and Sundance Channel blogs. It’s pretty clear that if Unseen Denver could have so much success that the New York version is going to me 10x more amazing. We have way more people, way more art and way more streets and cracks for art to hide in. Unseen NYC has no choice but to be huge!

So last week Rick redid the layout so Unseen looks like a real website now. We added a few posts about street art happenings in the city and we stared adding a bunch more content and as of today Unseen NYC is officially ready to roll!

So this is it. This is your re-invitation to check out the site. We really want you to submit photos! You can also follow Unseen NYC on Twitter or join us on Facebook or you could even become a blogger for the site!  We really want to find more people interested in writing about this stuff so hit me up if you are interested in joining the team!

And please… do us all a favor and visit Unseen NYC!