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So my dad is in town… we decided to leave him with the kids and skip town. 48 hours on our own – no nagging, asking, crying, complaining, demanding pouting… oh wait, I was on the trip so there was still plenty of that… no, really.. it was quiet riding down to Palm Springs (we stopped at the Riverside Mission Inn ) and even though we didn’t have the kids in the car, we still played the ABC game…now, usually I don’t bother bringing my camera, my iPhone can do everything I usually need it to, especially fit in my pocket – but I took these two days to reconnect with what I like to do… so besides swimming, riding a bicycle, sleeping, eating, watching movies and people watching – I actually like taking pictures, so no other reason but actually taking them. Not for a memory, not for a documentation of a wedding, not because I am paid… but like I used to, 25 years ago, when I got my first camera, and took photos of doors, and shadows, and stairs, and clowns, and homeless people and dead cats…I wanted that – to be able to stop and snap. I wanted to reconnect with the magic that once was photography for me – and in order to do that – I needed to go “old school” … Ideally – that would mean get out my old Nikon, get a couple of B&W rolls of film and take that route… but film is not something I miss really, so I did the next best thing. I took my old, Canon 5D, set it to Manual, B&W, JPG Large, 28 mm lens with a polarizing filter – and used black gaffer’s tape to hide the screen on the back of the camera so I couldn’t see the result…It took me some time to stop looking at the screen after every shot – but it also made me make sure my exposures were spot on, or bracket a couple of shots.. an then I did what I used to do when shooting film – I couldn’t wait to see the results and prayed I liked what I saw.. I hope you like it too….

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I shot 251 images in tow day. I quickly narrowed it down to 118, then my next round brought me to 47, from which I picked my top 22 above and the rest are in this gallery….
Karen D - Very cool project! Great way to become less reliant on the screen :) Love it!
Leonie Barel - Oh wow. I love the old retro look, seems the Ace swim club was the perfect place for retro photos!!! And chairs, yes!!
Great idea, creative and the results are well worth it.
helen djukic - Shani, your photos transport me. Bravo!
Vi Johansson - Loving all these black and whites!! Beautiful!
Stephanie Overstreet - Great job!! I love that you took time for yourself, and to get back to what you love! You had some beautiful results.
Sadi Lane - Wow this is an awesome series, I could totally see these hanging in a snazzy coffee shop, great work!
Tori Shults - This is awesome! I need to shoot more personal projects. The image with the single palm tree would make an epic huge canvas!
Danielle Bacon - These are great! They have a really cool cinematic feel to them. So many of them would make some awesome wall art!
maria garcia - how fun! and what a great idea… they came out gorgeous!
gloria gines - love love love the b/w! so jelly! i want to go to the ACE even more now..!