Chippendales World Tour Auditions

I don't think this blog post needs any text accompaniment. The pictures are worth at least few thousand words.

Ladies of the Year

When I took the time to sit down and think about it, I realized that all of my most memorable photos from 2012 involved women. Everyone knows that images of women are used to sell Las Vegas, but those sex symbols are not the only kinds of ladies that live here. One of the great things about working for the local news is getting to expose the real people beneath the veneer of this often misunderstood city. This year, I've seen teen moms struggling to make ends meet, women trying to make their Vegas dance dreams come true, pageant princesses, dollar store divas, streetwalkers, proud strippers, prom queens, bingo stars, moms, boozers, athletes and drag queens.

These are my Ladies of the Year.

Blue Snow

The snow scene has always been my favorite in "The Nutcracker." It has beautiful blue light and pretty ballerinas in white tutus twirling and spinning daintily though falling snow. This year's retooled show by Nevada Ballet Theatre is even more gorgeous than ever before. New costumes, brand new set decoration, and ample use of a smoke machine make the snow world seem even more ethereal.

My Jubilee! Fantasy

One of my Las Vegas photo fantasies came true this week. One of our writers decided to do a story about the dancer auditions for Jubilee! at Bally's (Thank you, Andrea Dominick). Jubilee! is basically the last classic Las Vegas showgirl show left in town. They let me wander around as I pleased, and I now vow to go back every six months and photograph it again and again just for fun. Photographing things like this make me realize how lucky I am to live and be a photographer in Las Vegas, where showgirls still roam wild and free.