Dolores Park, S.F. April 20, 2002 Anti-War Protest. I don't remember if I used a wider lens for this shot - I might have borrowed my friend's 35-80MM lens for this one in particular. I just like the juxtaposition of the green of the park with the gray concrete of the downtown skyline in the background.

Dolores Park, S.F. April 20, 2002 Anti-War Protest. Similar shot, but taken vertically and probably with my 85MM. Again, I like how everything rises in stacks of layers - the protestors, the trees, housing, then the skyline.

Dolores Park, S.F. April 20, 2002 Anti-War Protest. I saw these two dogs playing and managed to snap off a quick shot while armed with the 85MM zoom. This was probably shot using the N90S pre-programmed portrait setting, which just means maximum aperture which his why the depth of field is already really short here despite the fact that the grass behind the dogs is only a foot or two further.

Ikuko and Robin. Dolores Park, S.F. April 20, 2002 Anti-War Protest. I Photoshop-ed part of this photo and increased the contrast, mostly to hide some dust that got onto the photo during the scanning phase. Kind of a mistake on my part since the picture looked better before I messed with it, but nonetheless, I still like how my friends are facing each other in a way that isolates their conversation from the visual din behind them.

Unidentified girl. Dolores Park, S.F. April 20, 2002 Anti-War Protest. This was the little girl of one of the Japanese American Nosei Collective members and hey, it's hard for any picture with little kids in it to look bad.

Nerissa and protestors. Dolores Park, S.F. April 20, 2002 Anti-War Protest. Nerissa is the woman with her fist aloft and a sticker on her face at center. She's in my graduate program at Cal and I ran ahead of the march and quickly pointed backwards to get this shot. One of the qualities of the N90S is that it has a very fast auto-focus system. It also helped that it was bright daylight, and therefore, shutter speed was probably close to maxed out.

Unidentified protestor. Civic Center, S.F., April 20, 2002 Anti-War Protest. I actually snapped off quite a few shots at the rally in downtown S.F. but this was the only one I liked enough to keep. This guy is climbing up the flagpole in order to secure a Palestinian flag already attached. I like the angle of the shot and how it's nothing but sky in the background.

Cool Chris, Betalounge, S.F. Back in April, myself, Cool Chris and Vinnie Esparza (the latter who I have a monthly DJ night with) were invited down to the Betalounge for a web cast DJ gig. These next two pics show how depth of field works well for certain pictures - I'm not sure if this shot would have looked as good if Chris had been in focus.

Vinnie Esparza, Betalounge, S.F. Same deal as Chris' pic - I picked an object in the foreground for the focus and as a result, Vinnie is blurred out in the background, though not so much that he's not identifiable.

Ocean Beach, S.F. This was taken just before sundown - you can see the sun behind the low layers of cloud by the horizon. I like the balance in contrast though, if I could recompose the shot again, I probably would have moved the horizon a little lower and gotten more sky.

Cat, Golden Gate Park, S.F. This is a really dramatic example of minimum depth of field since you can't really make out anything behind my friend Cat's head at all. I took several shots in this particular shoot and they all turned out the same in terms of having her visage be the only thing in any kind of focus.

Golden Gate Park, S.F. Another good example of how depth of field can work - all these flowers are relatively close to one another but it's only a small handful in actual focus. I really dig on the density of objects in the composition though this probably would have looked even better in color.

Rebecca and Rani, Berkeley, CA. Taken indoors, with a large aperture but not enough light to prevent a slight blurring. But it's the intimacy of the moment which makes the picture work despite the soft focus.

Beau Sia, "Asians Are Coming", UC Berkeley. Considering I had no flash, this shot turned out a lot better than I would have thought, but it helped that both Beau and I were very still when taking this photo. Some of you might recognize him from the Summer 2002 Def Poetry Slam.

Dennis Kim, "Asians Are Coming", UC Berkeley. In this case, slow shutter speed makes for a better photo than if this had been crisp and motion-less. The fierceness of Kim's delivery comes through as his hands are caught mid-action.

DJ Phatrick, "Asians Are Coming", UC Berkeley. Ok, clearly, the shutter speed was very slow and I shook the lens a little too much. But I like how Patrick is almost in focus despite the chaos of everyone around him.

Linda & Dennis Kim, "Asians Are Coming", UC Berkeley. Yet another example of how soft focus (caused by lens blur) can actually work to your advantage. In this case, it works well with the general, warm, suffused white of the background and Kim's t-shirt.

Robin, Crissy Field, S.F. These were taken at the same time as the I just came down there with both cameras and shot away, and the next three pictures actually correspond with four Polaroids of the same basic shots. In this particular shot, the shallow depth of field isn't a real problem since you can clearly make out the Golden Gate Bridge in the background. And oh, don't you like how I try to keep the rule of thirds in effect here?

Junichi Semitsu, UC Berkeley. Junichi is a very talented poet, attorney and all-around creative wacko. He took over this last semester for an ailing (now passed) June Jordan and her renown Poetry for the People classes at UC Berkeley. He was dressed up in hat and tux for the Spring readings for that class.

Crissy Field, S.F. The funny thing about taking this shot is that I wanted the sun to be behind the kite. I was literally running back and forth, chasing the shadow of the kite on the ground in hopes of getting underneath and snapping off a quick shot overhead. I probably looked like an idiot but it finally worked!

Justin, Groove Merchant, S.F. So he's not looking too happy but I just like this shot for whatever reason, maybe it's the shapes of the 45s by his head that add some interesting visual hooks.

Junichi Semitsu, UC Berkeley. Junichi is a very talented poet, attorney and all-around creative wacko. He took over this last semester for an ailing (now passed) June Jordan and her renown Poetry for the People classes at UC Berkeley. He was dressed up in hat and tux for the Spring readings for that class.

Michelle, Berkeley, CA. This is my friend Rani's housemate and I'm amazed it came out as sharp as it did but maybe it helped to have a really bright lamp in the corner. The exposure is just right too - a nice balance of light, shadows and gray.