In a senate bill ( SB 1246) filed Monday by  Sen. Jim Norman, R- Tampa, photographing a farm without written permission  from the owner would be a first- degree felony.

To read more about this unconstitutional bill see the article by Bruce Ritchie in the Florida Tribune.

Please let your local political representative know how silly this bill is.  Last time I check anything photographed ( not using a “super telephoto lens”) from public property was fair game.

Dairy cows eat, rest, and bask in the sun Tuesday afternoon in Cooper City, FL on "farm land" on the North West corner of Sheridan Street and University Drive. As this was once a normal scene in West Broward County, it is becoming more rare with the huge growth in population that the county has seen in the last 15 years. It will not be before long that this land is filled with a strip shopping center or townhouses.

RIP DON.

I am fortunate to get to photograph the music giants of today often.  However, it is much more rare that I get to photograph the legends of yesterday. One legend that I was able photograph was The Man with the Golden Ear: Don Kirshner.  Being a bit too young to have been a fan of The Archies,  The Monkees or Bobby Darin in there day, I became a fan while in the back seat of my parents car as we drove all over South Florida listening to  FM 102.7 the oldies.  I can still see myself seeing along to “ I’m a believer.”

I photographed Mr. Kirshner near his home in Boca Raton a few year back for a story that ran in the Washington Post.  I remember him being a real pleasure and easy to photograph.  In between setup he filled the time with some amazing stories from his days in the music industry. Even in his 7o’s he was full of spunk!!!  RIP.

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What do you get when you photograph a group of people that have been having their whole lives filmed for years……Great actors in a sad real life drama!

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Joshua Prezant Photography was contracted to take portraits and behind the scene photographs of the Entire Hogan Family as they entered into the 2nd season of VH1’s #1 reality show Hogan Knows Best being filmed in Miami Beach.

Little did I know that only a few months later the family that appeared happy and together, and in love in my images would turn into a huge mess….

Nick Bollea, Hogan’s son, was arrested and sentenced to 8 months of jail for charges of felony reckless driving stemming from a accident in Clearwater, Florida where he flipped his yellow Toyota on a wet road and collided with a palm tree, a crash so serious that his passenger John Graziano will need to be cared for in a nursing home for the rest of his life.

Terry ( hulk) and his wife of of over 24 years divorced in a very nasty and public battle that dragged on for almost 2 years.

Although I saw the stresses of being filmed 24-7 and having to always be “ON” I had no idea what was to come and that the marriage was about to end.

The family was wonderful to photograph. With  the help of my great assistant Noelle we were able to photograph several great family portraits as well as an array of individual portraits in a short amount of time. The crew doing the filming on the show were a pleasure to work with as well.  We were able to work smoothly and in synch with them to get the images we need while not interfering with the actual tapping of the show.  ***And no, you will not find Joshua Prezant in any of the episodes of the show.  I declined to sign a release to be featured in the show.

I wish the Hogan family well and hope that better, happier, and more loving time are are ahead for them all.

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Just saw this on Tv the other day while watching the news. Every photograph in the commercial was shot by Joshua Prezant Photography for use in a variety of print campaigns.   It is great to see a creative multimedia use of all my images for this advertising campaign. The M Network gave  justice to the images and did a great job producing this short commercial.

Joshua Prezant’s images featured in two books about the band Green Day.

Today I was informed that several of my images taken of the band Green Day have been featured in two separate books.  The first book is by author Marc Spitz ( not the gold medal winning swimmer, but the former senior writer at Spin Magazine) titled Nobody likes You: inside the turbulent life, times, and music of Green Day. The second, by author Ben Myers, is titled Green Day: American Idiots & The New Punk Explosion.

Being a big fan of Green Day since their Kerplunk album in ’92, I was really psyched to photograph them live.  I had been to their concerts as a fan in the past and was never disappointed. Outside of The Rolling Stones, Run DMC and oddly enough, The Barenacked Ladies ( in the mid 90’s), I think Green Day had always given one of the best live performances.  And shooting them during there American Idiots’s tour was no exception.  It was one of the few concerts I photographed where I found myself singing along as I shot. Now, having my images immortalized in 2 well regarded books on the band is just great.

What do you get when you put hip hop icon Missy Elliot together with a few wads of Bubblicious gum…

Missy Elliot by © Joshua Prezant

This is one of the images that people always ask me about. So I figured I would share the details:

Sometimes a photographer goes into a shoot knowing exactly what they want to do and how they wants to pose, light, and frame  the image.  And sometimes they just go with the flow and work with what they have.  I do both!  I try to have some conceptual ideas ahead of time after working with the client, editors, graphic designer, and art director.  But I always try for the unexpected during the shoot.  This was the case for this shoot.

When shooting celebrities time is ALWAYS an issue. You are eaither sitting around waiting for hours and hours for the star to show up or your waiting around for them to be finished with the 100 other things they are doing at the same time.  Then you usually have 2 minutes to actually shoot.

I know a lot of people think and assume it is because the celebrities are divas.  But this is not the case.  It is because they are working!  In order to become the top of your game in any field you have to work.  And the bigger the star the harder they usually work.  I was scheduled to shoot Missy Elliot and singer Monica on the set of a music video shoot in a mansion that was rented out for the video on Key Biscayne for InStyle Magazine.  I was set to shoot both artists in between scene for the video when they were not in the particular shot.    These video shoots are usually 2- 5 day shoots that start before sunrise and end late into the night.  On this day not only was Missy shooting the video and and doing the still shoot with me, she had 3 magazine interviews and a Tv interview as well.  The girl works!!  There was not more then 10 minutes that when by where she was just hanging out.  But luckily for me I sitting with her during one of these rare moments when she was relaxing and I saw her blowing bubbles and smacking them with her lips.  After doing a couple of enviromental shots of her in the house, I handed her a bunch more gum from the crafts table and asked her to ingnore me and everyone else and go to town with the gum.  She knew exactly what I wanted and was happy to have a a few more minutes to realx.  The image(s) above was the result.  Missy was fantastic her people were fantastic and the whole video crew was great.