I took some shots for RedEyeChicago.com inside the freezer at 'The Sixth'. The Sixth is is a new Lincoln Square bar concept from the people who brought you Roots Pizza.
Last week at RedEye I had a nice variety of stories to shoot for that included a fund raising effort to reunite a security guard with his family, an interview with the stars of 'Everybody Wants Some!!', a sushi bowl, & Instagram fashion stars at the Macy's flower show.
My friend Heather asked me to retouch and color a photo of her grand parents on their wedding day. Its sort of fun to share the process it goes through so I made a video. Enjoy!
Another busy week at RedEye in Chicago. I shot 4 covers this week & a spread on c2e2. Today there was a great spread of Superman Vs. Batman content for which I shot a cover with Superman & Batman action figures having it out. Designer Sara Amato did a great job designing the cover and lending art direction on this one. To accomplish the image I held a smoke machine and threw foam pieces and sand while Sara hit the shutter for me. The strings holding up superman were photoshopped out while his laser eyes were photoshopped in. If my smoke machine hadn't set off the Tribune Tower's smoke detector I would have done the laser eyes in camera as well... cant win em all.
The wonderful, quirky Bric-a-Brac Records in Logan Square was nice enough to let me photograph musician Cullen Omori in their spot for a RedEye feature on him penned by Josh Terry that is out today. Check it here: http://trib.in/1R5980B
I thought it would be fun to share a photo from each of my 5 assignments for RedEye on March 15, 2016. In descending order (without giving too much away ) is from a night life project I'm working on with Heather Schroering, the second is for a story on a new watch company, the third is a charcuterie plate, the fourth is for a story on expanding the 606 to the east, & the last is for a story on the ever growing popularity and acceptance of tattoos.
I made a little video of Cheryl Cryer-Head & Bob L. Head 's roller derby wedding with the Chicago Red Hots & Chicago Bruise Brothers Roller Derby at Lombard Roller Rink
My fifth year at Chicago's RedEye was a creatively productive but tumultuous one. I wanted to share a gallery of a few of my favorite print covers and spreads I was a part of over 2015 as a photographer or illustrator.
I'm really proud of all the great reporters and designers I work with over at RedEyeChicago.com . We are a really small, but tight knit team. They've given a lot of trust and I'm thankful for that.
Looking forward to what 2016 will bring.
Happy Holidays folks!
I spent beautiful, happy weekend photographing my friends wedding in Brooklyn, NY.
The following are a small selection of my favorite photographs from that wedding.
Jake Anderson ( left ) came with me to photo assist , here is a instax of us after putting on our ties in the morning.
Photo Credit: Petya Shalamanova
If you are interested in booking me for your wedding fill out the form below.
Christopher Abbott at Tribune Tower. ( Lenny Gilmore / RedEye )
I've been thinking a lot lately.... trying to conceptualize a fine art project the last few weeks. Since graduating college I've gotten to be endlessly creative but always on behalf of someone else /realizing other peoples visions. I love doing that ( it's my livelihood ) but lately I find myself with something to say and wanting to find a way to say it.
I took it as a small, yet positive, omen when I sold two prints today that I made way back in 2009 ( via the Catherine Edelman Gallery ). In the series that the prints are from called Believed Imaginings I tried to speak about the beautiful but melancholy isolation of childhood... my own childhood.
in 2009/2010, after creating the series, I was surprised that anyone gave a shit cause it was so personal to me. People really seemed excited and to be trying to understand what I was trying to say. Having a small amount of approval from others became overwhelming, it freaked me out....I was excited by it but it became too much of a distraction. I stopped being able to make art for myself, I was too nervous about making fine art that people wouldn't be interested in so I didn't make any at all. I turned my attention to photojournalism & commercial photography.
I'm going to start sharing sketches and ideas as I work on whatever this new project becomes. I have a story to tell and I hope you'll stay and listen. ( Hope I'll get to hear yours as well. )
- Lenny Gilmore
Yesterday I found myself sitting Indian style on a carpeted floor across from the man who wrote my favorite film. So many questions to ask and delight to express but no time for that, 5 minute photo shoots are a near wordless sprint.
Photo will run with an upcoming interview by Matt Pais at RedeyeChicago.com
Happy Friday! - Lenny
Charlie Kaufman at the Public Hotel in Chicago. ( Lenny Gilmore / RedEye ) ©
I had a brief shoot with screenwriter Aaron Sorkin at Chicago's Peninsula Hotel this week for RedEye. My photos appear on the cover and inside of today's ( 10/16/15 ) RedEye print edition.
I've done countless celebrity portraits at the Peninsula, so I'm always trying to think of new spots there. I was limited this time between shooting in a hotel room or in the hallway. I had a 300mm lens with so I dropped a chair in the middle of the hallway and backed up as far as I could ( 50 ft? ), taking advantage of the spacial compression of zoom lenses.
Aaron came and sat down after his interview with Matt Pais ( Read & watch it here: trib.in/1LmbBhX ). Maids scurried down the hallway for the first 5 minutes, preventing much photography from happening but allowing time for a staring contest with a certain famous screenwriter. As soon as the hall cleared I got my shots, Aaron thanked me & was gone.
Wish I had a chance to make some small talk, next time I'll bring walkie talkies.
Aaron Sorkin. ( Lenny Gilmore / RedEye ) ©
Marian Hossa met me in the lobby of the United Center for a 5 minute portrait shoot for the cover of the RedEye newspaper. I directed him over to a spot of light splashing across a nearby staircase. I made some small talk about what he'd been doing with the Stanley Cup during the off season, he told me about taking it back to his home country of Slovakia. He turned his head towards a nearby window and I quickly snapped a pic.
Hossa did an interview with my colleague Leonor Vivanco, read it by clicking here
MARIAN HOSSA. ( LENNY GILMORE / REDEYE )
As a kid, I would sneak off to Chicago late at night to photograph rock shows and rock stars. To take this photo, I found myself sneaking out of Chicago late at night to photograph actual stars.
I had to leave because the light pollution in Chicago is so intense that trying to get a photo of a star-filled sky in the city is impossible. I used lightpollutionmap.info to find a deep, dark area of Illinois. The closest/best spot I could find was near the intersection of state Route 26 and Maytown Road, some 15 miles south of Dixon, Ill.
There, without the flood of a million artificial lights, I could stare deep into the Milky Way and see some infinite number of stars while simultaneously not being able to see the fingers on my hands.
I walked along Route 26 until my eye was drawn to a leafless tree and a pole holding power lines overhead. I was looking for some earthbound object to give context to the brilliance above me, and the simple starkness of the tree and pole against the stars seemed appropriate.
Eventually, with unseen hands, I set my DSLR camera on top of my tripod, held my breath and took a 30-second exposure of our universe, during which a car's headlights flowed across my camera’s view, conveniently leaving my foreground rich with details and textures of the wood, wires and road in what would have otherwise been deep black silhouettes of those things against the starry sky.
After 20 seconds I remembered to breathe, and after 30 I had what I came for. I packed my equipment back into my waiting car’s trunk and made my way home back to Chicago and its bright lights.
I dragged my vintage / heaviest tripod over to a bus stop on Michigan & Congress ave. with my girlfriend Petyaphoto.com today to photograph dancers from the Joffrey Ballet. Petya photo assisted for me, holding a flash twenty feet in the air for the hour shoot. Really fun time, Joffrey is about as good of an artistic collaboration as you ever get in this life.
What an amazing week to live in Chicago and work for a newspaper. Earlier in the week I covered the Stanley cup finals and yesterday I illustrated a commemorative cover to go with an issue looking back at the hawk's incredible season.
I was heading home Tuesday night, about 10:30 p.m., maybe 10:45 p.m., south down Western Avenue near Adams Street where fireworks started popping off all around my car. Looking around I saw teenagers in two groups on either side of Western pointing Roman candles at each other, as sparks ricocheted off my car and the vehicles around me. I drove to Van Buren St. and turned my car around while pulling my camera into my lap. I parked my car and walked into the fray, aware that this might be the beginning of something less playful.
I made my way into the the group of men and teenagers grouped on the West Side of Western Avenue A man asked why I was shooting and I said I was a photojournalist for RedEye.
e yelled to the group to leave me alone and then told me to make them look good as I put my camera in front of my face and pulled my button-up shirt over my head to keep sparks from getting in my face or hair. I began photographing the group on the East Side of Western Ave as they ran at the group coming from the West Side of Western Avenue. Meeting in the middle of the street with Roman candles pointed towards each other, they engulfed each other in rhythmic streams of sparks.
I backed up to the sidewalk as a cop drove into the middle of the battle, breaking it up as one young teenager pointed his Roman candle over his shoulder sprinting away. The cop chased one group around a nearby vacant area until they had all dispersed in all directions. Turning around I realized the other hadn't stuck around to watch the cop's actions and I was standing alone. Pulling my shirt down I walked back to my car and finished the drive home.
An onlooker told me the two groups were rivals of some sort, but that you weren't sure. I think it was mostly all for fun; men of all ages like playing at fighting.
