Category: Miscellaneous

Everything else.

Kyle Dee Goes To American Idol!

tasha
My friend Kyle (from the Frantic, who often grace my blog) made it to Hollywood on this season’s American Idol! Kyle is such a genuinely sweet guy who truly loves music (seriously, he has photos on his Facebook of him performing when he was just a kid). He’s the kind of person who will hang around after a show until he has talked to everyone who attended, even if it takes hours. He has boundless energy onstage, and he and rest of the Frantic have been an important part of the Chicago scene for years. Basically, we’re so excited for him, words can’t even describe it.

It’s almost unbelievable, right?! I swear it’s true. Here are a few videos to prove it: Kyle’s Idol Interview and St. Louis, Behind The Scenes.

Until the beginning of Hollywood Week on Idol airs tonight (and y’all better be watching), a few favorite Kyle photos of mine are below to keep you busy.

PS. Brett, Chris, and Ian… I love you guys too, obviously.

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

tasha 2 Comments
JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

The fantastic (and maybe crazy?) Christian and Britton Picciolini opened their home to their musical family – people from JBTV, bands that Christian manages through Goldmill, and a random assortment of others that somehow fit into the mix (me included!).

They had one of these parties last summer, and we weren’t able to attend, so the second that Christian sent out the save-the-date email, I marked it on my calendar, swearing off all other activities for that date, no matter what. Luckily, it worked out, because it was a fantastic time. I mean, there was a 112 lb. roast pig, ladder ball/bags/badminton/volleyball, friends, campfires, sing alongs, smores, etc… what else could anyone possibly want?

As a side note, I know I haven’t been posting on this blog much lately… there will be blogs forthcoming. It’s wedding season right now, so my energy is devoted to that, but there are great things coming (Company of Thieves and Ludo come to mind…).

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party
(Christian’s such a good sport :))

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party
(must give love to the Treaty of Paris tattoo ;))

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party
(Aaron looks vicious when playing badminton… don’t worry, he’s all bark, not much bite)

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party
(one of my favorites from the day)

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party
(Molly died after volleyball)

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party
(Kyle & I have a longstanding ritual. I take pictures of him, he flips me off.)

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party
(The beautiful and gracious Britton)

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party
(The one and only Jerry Bryant)

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

JBTV/Goldmill Summer Party

And, as a special bonus, a video of one of my favorite parts of the night. Please excuse the less than stellar framing – with the light quality, I needed to set the camera down on a flat surface, so I had limited composition options.


Untitled from Tasha Schalk on Vimeo.

Resources That Everyone Should Know About

tasha 5 Comments
Resources Every Photography Should Know About
I’ll take a little break from music photos to share a few free resources that I use daily and have made my life much easier.

The first is Dropbox. Dropbox is a file sharing site/program that allows you to just “drop” files into a folder on your computer to share with others. The files you drop into Dropbox are given a unique link, which you can then share with others. I use it for almost all of the files I need to send to clients, and also use it to share files between computers.

The main reason I love it is that you don’t have to connect to open an FTP program, connect to the FTP, then upload…. the time I save being able to simply put a file in a folder that sits on my desktop is amazing. The other reason it’s amazing is that your files are accessible anywhere… even if the computer you’re on doesn’t have an FTP program, or you don’t have the link for the file, Dropbox has an interface online where you just sign into your account and can access your files. Try it out here!

The other resource I use constantly is Signature Confirm. Signature Confirm is an online contract-signing service. You create your own contract and then email it to your client via Signature Confirm. The client can then review the contract and electronically sign it. I especially love Signature Confirm for my live music work because, so often, it’s practically impossible to meet up with the band before or after the show to get a signed paper contract. Getting the contract signed online before the show makes the day of the shoot much less stressful. You can sign up for Signature Confirm here.

I hope my little informative interlude has helped point you in the direction of some fabulous resources. If anyone else has any online services that they use and love, let me know!

TheyWillRockYou.com

tasha
theywillrockyou.com
I can’t believe I haven’t mentioned this before – for a while, I’ve been working with They Will Rock You (TWRY), which is an utterly fantastic source for music news, exclusive interviews, tons of pictures, and giveaways. You can often see my photos there and occasionally an article or at least a small news blurb on one of my favorite locals. My dear friend Mary Ouellette is TWRY’s creator and goddess of all trades. She seems to live and breathe music and is constantly introducing me to new bands via the site. Plus, she’s a pretty fantastic photographer as well.

Honestly, I can’t say enough good things about TWRY. It is a truly a labor of love, and I can’t imagine how much time goes into it to make it so awesome. It is definitely worth your time to check out the site or follow TWRY on Twitter.