The Unknown (2021)

I often find myself in places of the unknown, often overwhelmed with the things around me. Over the last couple of months I’ve been the most busy I’ve ever have. I’m super grateful for it. After all I did ask for this to an extent. I recently heard someone say that there is trauma in everything. They even said there was trauma in success and I think I’m living in that right now. Cant really put it into words but I feel like this part of my life is as full of being overwhelmed as it is full of being prosperous. I’m not sure if that was proper grammar but as I said I cant really put this into words. I like to write these things out and sometimes I remember I do have this Blog so here we are.

I can honestly smell this picture haha. I had just got back home from Aire here in Chicago, so I smelt like Chlorine from their pools. The sun was beaming super hot into my room. I have a love for self portraits, reason being that I feel its very intimate and only I know what that day was like and where I was in life, what I was feeling. This day was interesting for so many reasons but yea I just wanted to type something

Photo Taken: March 22nd 2021 (Around 5 I believe)

NEW VLOGG Shooting Portraits w/ My RZ67 and MAMIYA 7 II

Yo thanks for clicking the link in my bio. Check out my latest Youtube Video Below.

Starting Street Photography

I’ve always been interested in street photography but, its always been quite intimidating. Walking around with a camera and pointing it at people. You probably can tell from these pictures i was still quite scared to get right up in peoples faces. I did want to share these though and track my progress as I get more into the world of street photography.

Full Time Freelance Week Two ✅

Week two was a lot more chill than week one, i’d like to say although I shot a bit more. I shot three videos this week you can find them all here on my website and I have the timelines below. I linked with my guy Eric (@fli_hi on instagram) to put together a small dance video for him. Super exciting to put out content involving dance as always. I also put together two videos for a new mural being put up in the new Columbia College Chicago Student Center.

My Biggest obstacles for this week were staying focus on the goals for the month and also waking up and getting to it. Im enjoying this process but it’s kicking my butt. Im hoping to keep this shooting streak going on this week but more photography based this week. I recently took some headshots and it made me wanna challenge my self a lot more in the photography space.

I also am suppose to have at least 4 new youtube videos out by the end of the month and i’ve yet to create one. IDK if i’m just not dedicated enough for youtube or maybe i’m just being lazy lol guess we will find out on the next episode of Full-time Freelance Week three haha.

Overall i’m in the best headspace ive been in, in a while and im excited to see where it takes me. I’ll see you guys next Monday.

P.S: My girlfriend and I are coming up on half a year together I’m excited and really looking forward to that.

-BOC

📸: Gracie Hammond

Mural Day 2

Day two of Installing the Mural in the new student center. Tomorrow I’m really gonna challenge myself to find a different way to shoot this. Stay tuned

Mural Day 1

The New Student Center at Columbia College Chicago is getting a new install of a mural. I decided to cut together some footage I shot of it on day 1 of the installation check it out.

First week of FULL-TIME Freelance ✅

First full week of August went pretty good got to shoot with @jamalmiller and the @millermediagroup for their annual pray for your future spouse challenge. Which is coming up next week check out his page for more info. Super dope week. Great energy! Full-time Freelance week one ✅. This week I’ll strive to do even more. What are your goals for this week?? BTS: @gracie__hammond
#ambitiousstars #productioncompany

Summer School Starts Tomorrow :(

So the spring semester at columbia has ended. Which i’m super happy about but, I only got a week off and today is the last day of my little break. So I made what I think is a pretty Informational video today as well as a dope video at the beginning of the week with Kierah King. Check both out. One is on my film page and the other is on my youtube channel. I hope to shoot a lot this summer and so far so good.

Great Opportunities!!

Back in September I was on Instagram one night and I was scrolling through peoples stories when I came across a post that said “Videographer needed in Chicago.” Usually I ignore things like this but this post came from a pretty notable person @yayadacosta. So I replied back with my website and a will to help out. The next morning she replied and we met to discuss what she was needing. I ended up being hired for that job and everything went great. Fast forward to now and I'm working with Yaya again which is exciting cause she’s great to work with and has to be one of the most down to earth people I know. We created a video for “Women’s Empowerment.” She was challenged by Tika Sumpter to do the #womendancingtogetherchallenge which was created by Oscar winning Wardrobe stylist Ruth E. Carter. We started planning things out on Monday night and Continued into Tuesday and we shot everything on Wednesday. Everything we shot was on the fly. I suggested the Garfield Conservatory mainly because it matches her as a person and when you stick to story and compliment everything together you get good results. We ended up getting there around Golden hour, and man did that do this video wonders. A tip for creating on the fly: make sure you are choosing the best times to go out and film lighting wise. If we would’ve shot this in the morning I don't think it would’ve come out as great and probably would’ve been very dull. Fun fact about the AirPod she’s wearing, we didn’t wanna bring a speaker to interrupt peace in the conservatory so we used the AirPod so she could lip sync to the music; she had one and I had the other so I could move the camera with the music so it looks like a purposeful camera movement, and I just linked it all up in post. Yaya came up with all of the choreography and I just directed her where to be and this is what we got. It was a fun process and right now has about 64k view on her page which is crazy to me that so many people saw something that I put together. Below are some stills, if you haven’t seen the whole video it is on my film page here: Women Empowerment Video

My Camera setup:

Sony A7RIII
Metabones Speedbooster

Canon 24-70mm 2.8 L Series

Ronis S

Sick..

So today I’m slowly getting over a little sick feeling i’ve had the past two days so I decided to re edit a video I made last year (2018) feat My friend Daniel Livingstone who is a photographer in Chicago. We went out a couple months back to just shoot I had an idea for a video that changed as soon as we started shooting. After I reedited this short video I chilled around the house for a bit wash some clothes and then patiently waited for my 6 o’clock class. I got there only to sit in class for an hour and then be dismissed. Lol Im def not complaining though. One more week until we are out for spring break.

BTS For Director Claire Stanton

This pass weekend I got to work on the set as the BTS Photographer and Videographer of “Hope” A short film Directed by my friend Claire Stanton. The shoot was from Thursday through Sunday I only got to work from Friday-Sunday. Each day was pretty cool its nice to just be able to sit back and watch other people work sometimes. This Short will be coming soon. Check out some of the BTS I was able to get.