the first

This is one of the first "isolated on a white background" pictures I ever took. Without any lighting equipment or backdrops, this was achieved using natural light (cloudy morning on my balcony) with a couple shelf brackets holding a seamless sheet of white paper behind the object. It was fun experimenting with something I had never done and I was pretty happy how it turned out, considering my lack of equipment. This experience, however, is not "the first" I refer to in the title.

My wife Stephanie and I began dating in April of 2000. As a result of summer employment abroad, we didn't get to spend as much time together as we hoped, so by Christmas we were still in that awkward stepping-on-eggshells stage. You know what I mean--you want everything to be perfect...you don't want to make any stupid mistakes to ruin this good thing you have going...like getting the wrong Christmas gift.

I was stumped for quite some time. I wanted to get something thoughtful and we weren't exactly spending a lot of money on each other while in school. That's when I found this figurine, who reminded me of Treebeard from Lord of the Rings. He was an incense burner that allowed the smoke to rise up through the top of his head. Steph, as it turned out, was a routine incense user at the time. Better than that, she had always been a huge fan of Lord of the Rings (long before all the mainstream hype of the movies), having read ALL of Tolkien's stuff before we ever met.

So, did she like the first Christmas gift I ever gave her? I think so. She doesn't burn as much incense as she used to, but Treebeard has his own permanent little roost on a shelf in our living room to this day.