Over 11 years and 570 episodes, John Rabe and Team Off-Ramp scoured SoCal for the people, places, and ideas whose stories needed to be told, and the show became a love-letter to Los Angeles. Now, John is sharing selections from the Off-Ramp vault to help you explore this imperfect paradise.
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Chris Rivera is one imaginative Instagrammer. His feed is filled with multiple limbed friends, vampires, flying books and cyborgs.
He is also the winner of our fourth Instagram challenge with IGLA (Instagram Lovers Anonymous) called "Double Exposed." His winning photo is a self-portrait collaged with the LA skyline and a few of his signature bird silhouettes.
Rivera first got interested in photography in high-school where he started off as many photographers do -- taking photos of flowers, close ups of water drops and a few friends. Then he started experimenting with Photoshop and putting his creations on Instagram.
Even though he puts out his images through a mobile medium, all his photos are taken on his trusty Canon Rebel T2i then run through a gamut of apps and Photoshop.
Yes, some instagrammers would say this isn't in the spirit of mobile photography, but for a while Rivera didn't have any other way of shooting.
His first forays into Instagram were on his camera-less iPod and once he started experimenting with the many megapixels on his DSLR camera he couldn't give into only shooting on his phone.
Method aside, Rivera is attracting quite a few followers and his subjects are all too happy to oblige to his strange requests.
"I'm thankful for my models," says Rivera, "because I tell them to do crazy stuff and they're like, yeah sure why not?"
He's inspired by fashion and editorial photographers like Annie Leibowitz and one day hopes to make his splash into the professional photo world.
Right now, his next step is joining the Air Force as a combat photographer this year.
"I think it's an honorable way to build my portfolio," says Rivera.
Rivera plans on keeping his military portfolio more reserved than his surrealistic Instagram feed, but he may work in a little art project on the side to keep his followers happy.
You can follow Chris at @xxcrjxx and be sure to follow @kpcc for our next contest!