CON Artistry

10 min readAug 16, 2018

Photos in and around Black Hat USA 2018, DEF CON 26, and the SecKC The World party.

Technical

Photos taken with the Sony A7RII with the Voigtlander VM-E close focus adapter, with the 7Artisans 35mm f2.0 (M Mount) and Voigtlander 12mm f5.6 (M39 Mount). The shot of Jeff Moss on-stage is taken with an Olympus 100mm f2.8 (OM Mount), but otherwise that lens did not see much use in Vegas this year. Indoor photos are taken at whatever ridiculously-high ISO is required to get a good exposure (thanks full-frame sensor!), with not a single apology to be found for grain.

CTRL’s Set

In case anyone wants to buy me something for Christmas:

Ian Coldwater’s excellent OpenCTF team, girlstakingover

SecKC The World

@jotunvillur was kind enough to allow me to be the official photographer of the SecKC The World party, put on with great hospitality by SecKC, an infosec group in Kansas City, KS.

I had a great time, and so did other HORNE Cyber and Mississippi State folks that I encouraged to attend. The music was great (@sysaaron and @archwisp are very talented DJs), there was more dancing than at most DEF CON parties, and the entire SecKC crew were all very welcoming and friendly. I’m already looking forward to next year

I love low light photography. These photos scrape the absolute top-end of what’s possible in ISO performance, with as low as a shutter speed as I would dare. I welcome grit and noise, and I’m not sure a camera can catch Aaron in motion anyway. Any blur you notice was present in-person as well, I assure you.