The Graduates of 2011

2011 was an amazing year for me. So many things went right I have no room to complain about the day to day problems in life.

I don't want to focus on my year in this post, you can check out A Year in Review for that. I want to focus on the individuals who made my year special by accomplishing what I'm gearing up to achieve in a few months, graduating.

Essence Peasant 

My tenure at The University of Alabama has been phenomenal. There is very little I can say I haven't done as a student. Most importantly, I'll be the first male in three generations to finish college. 

Crystal Pope

College isn't a privilege. It isn't a given right. I have a lot of friends whose family members all went to college. To them, attending an institution is another inevitable step in life. They rarely realize for the majority of individuals, college is a limited secondary option. For the most underprivileged, it is only a dream. 

Scott Hill 

I am blessed to say I had options. I had five or six schools offering full scholarships. I ended up choosing to go to Alabama to stay near my family. I didn't want to be too far from my younger siblings.  I have some misgivings about my school, but I know I made the right choice. I wouldn't have stayed here for nearly four years if I didn't.

Caitlin Jones

I know a lot of people who attended UA and didn't come back after the first semester. I know a lot of people who attended UA then transferred to another school. I know even more who couldn't handle the amount of money required to attend college and couldn't finish. 

Charlsa Mitchell

I'm just happy to be where I am. I don't take my blessings for granted. There are so many people who wish they were in my position. 

If you'd like to check out more of my graduation photography check out my Flickr! Click HERE. 

All I Do is Work

It's been a long time, but I finally finished up my work with Alabama rapper, Drama.



In my post, I Gotta Hustle, I talked about two rappers I met because of my affiliation with North Greene Records.

After sitting down to talk, both Drama and Trent showed interest in working with me. Trent actually came to me with the idea of working on a music video first, but Drama ended up being getting the process rolling.

Pre-production to post-production took around three months. I decided to downsize my role to Director and DP. I soon realized I was far too swamped with other projects to earnestly sit down and edit. Also, some of the stylistic choices Drama wanted were out of my editing capabilities.

That's when I decided to bring in one of my colleagues, Douglas Dillingham of Zombiesquid Pictures. Douglas' work speak for itself. When I first checked it out I was thoroughly impressed. The editing skill he displays at this level are far ahead of most individuals I know. Plus, I needed someone who could get the work done in an efficient and quick manner.

Doug definitely proved he was the best choice.



To contact rapper, Drama, you can DM him through his twitter page @MrNBADRAMA .You can also contact Doug for editing jobs through his website or by his twitter page @ZSquid.

Working on this project definitely taught me I'm more comfortable shooting over editing. I still love editing and I appreciate the necessity, but I'd rather be out in the world with my camera instead of sitting at a computer. I now honestly realize how important a good editor is for a production team.

When all you do is work, having a strong team behind you can make all the difference. Also, be sure to follow @QueTheLights and check out my updated portfolio page QTL Images.

11/22/11 Update: Music Video work featured on website This is Ham. Click HERE to see.

Not An Isolated Incident

I'm almost back in full swing. October has been an unbelievably stressful month for me. The deadline for UCLA's graduate school application is November 1st. Writing this post can be considered my break time before diving back into my work. There is little time to relax. Every other school I'm applying to has a deadline of December 1st. I'm gearing up to shoot another short film, plus I'm currently working on a short documentary with a few of my classmates.

College has taught me there is a trifecta concerning most student's lives. The three points are education, social life, and love.

If you are doing exceptionally well in two of the categories, you're more than likely suffering in the last one. There is no such thing as being phenomenal in all three. What you consider multitasking I define as doing multiple things very poorly. At the moment, my educational goals and love life are quite prosperous. Unfortunately, I've had very little time to just kick it with my friends.

For most, senior year is considered the final coast. You should've been setting yourself up these past three years to glide effortlessly into the post-graduate lifestyle. I know me. There is never a time where I'm not working. It's the nature of staying above everyone else. Being honest, if I had to choose between friends and advancing towards my goals...I know what I would choose.

Recently, The University of Alabama student body got its feathers ruffled when unknown perpetrators plastered racial slurs on campus buildings. The administration consistently plays events like this as rare occasions on campus, but most students at UA realize racial animosity is a constant enemy. Racist incidents happen on a regular basis on campus. The administration has just become very adept at damage control.

A good majority of students were fed up with the problems, so a protest and march was assembled by university students to condemn the ongoing racial and homosexual slander prevalent on campus.

The protest march was known as "Not An Isolated Incident." I've been far more hands-off around campus because of classes, but I knew this was an event I should capture.

Sometimes I'm not absolutely sure if this campus will ever rise out of its past, but it's good to know people are willing to stand up against people who like perpetuate discrimination of any kind.

To view more of the Not An Isolated Incident pictures go to Que The Light's Flickr. Be sure to look up Que The Lights on Twitter.

Travis Cooper

Que The Lights is moving forward. I'm happy to say I finally finished up a two month project between me, Boomtown Management, and Couper Models.

The project was a photo shoot done by me with the help of colleague, Kevyn Bryant, and a collaborative effort between models Travis Cooper, Margaret Holloway, and Synetta Hawkins.

If you don't remember I first spoke about the project in the post, Behind The Scenes-Travis Cooper. Joe Field, another colleague, recorded the first section of the photoshoot (in the video section  of QTL second from the top or the video with a camera as the title image).

Now, I'm finally done with the entire set and I'd like to present what I feel are a few of the strongest photos in the mix.

For more of the Travis Cooper's set check out my FLICKR.

Behind The Arts & Sciences

One of the key reasonings behind starting this blog was to build a portfolio. An ever-changing expression of what I've done and will be doing.  When I first started I can honestly contend I had absolutely no idea where this would lead. I understood I wanted a portfolio.

The question then became how. The simplest answer I received was just do stuff, anything and everything. In the beginning that seemed somewhat annoying since I didn't know where to begin so I opted towards the most reliable choice, just start making movies.

I began with a Flip camera which I used for my short film The Crayola Contract. When I was in California I picked up the clips for Can't Be Friends with the same meager, yet efficient equipment.

If those were the kickstart, I'd say the ignition stemmed from my trip to the Cannes Film Festival. The trip conveyed what could be the future product of my work. If I pursued this idea with a passion I could be walking the red carpet in the same manner as the people I was privilege to work with. In contrast, I could be one of the multitude of scalpers there picking at the bones of others accomplishments, embellishing the products of my work with no substantial roots.

Definitely don't want that. When I got back to the states I picked up a new camera, the Canon 550D, and started grinding out any kind of project I could get my hands on. This would lead to me branching out beyond just filmwork to photography, modeling, commercials, & small videos. I still have so much more to achieve and even more to learn, but I believe the benefits are visible now. One of the most recent ones (and the main reason for this article) was to showcase the most recent benefit from my work and the website.

Before school ended one of my teachers noticed the work I'd been doing and recommended me Educational Technology Department of my college. This referral led me to my current job, video manager and photographer for the College of Arts and Sciences Educational Technology Department at The University of Alabama.

I haven't had the chance to do a high amount of video work for the department, but I've been out taking pictures on a constant basis and I love it. You can check out my work for the department at our Flickr account HERE. I'll most likely set up a constant link on the site at some point since I consider the work I do for etech and my website to be separate, but I'm pretty sure I'll share some of my work here at some point as well.

Merry Belated Christmas,