Damien Cooper

Whatup folks? It’s been pretty much a year since I posted the last time. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing, since it is going to be much easier to erase all memories of 2011 that way .

My poker year was horrible, my photography year hasn’t seen a lot of action since I was way too busy running bad in poker and my social life was.. well.. let’s say complicated.
After moving about 6 times in 2011, experiencing the really frustrating viennese real estate market and therefore nearly being homless for about a month, 2011 even started to lean in the right direction.
I moved in with my girlfriend, the apt is almost finished and I made some new friends I really appreciate and look forward to having around in 2012.

So what are my goals in 2012? Making some drastic changes in my social life, working out more and obv. winning. Also concentrating more on photography and get a more structured line through out my entire life in general .

But let’s talk some poker:

I decided to concentrate on plo in 2012 and therefore started learning the game. I played about 50k hands in 2011 and ended up pretty much break even, which I’m pretty pleased about. I moved to plo25 pretty soon and going to stay there for a while . My goal is to become a plo100 reg by the middle of the year and beat some juicy live games.

Here is what my plo25 looked like:

\”shuffle\”It’s been a while since my last blog post but since I moved again I didn’t have internet access at home and frankly, I was just to lazy to do it somewhere else. But there’s always the new years resolutions, right?

I returned to germany two days ago after I missed my flight, which happened not to be the worst thing, since I made some extra money playing cash that day and would’ve ended u not doing anything in germany anyway.

As you might know, I qualified for 1k buy in tournament earlier that year via satellite. This tournament started yesterday.

Due to a snowstorm in germany it was quite a ride to get there. My mum was so kind to offer me a ride and on we went. It took us about more than an 90 minutes to get there tho under normal circumstances the casino is about 25min away.
A small blonde austrian girl recently told me that germans can’t curse after a german player called her dealerfriend ‘Holzkopf’. After my mum called another driver “Seppel” in a furious rage. I came to realize, that might be true.

Anyway, I made it in time and tho I didn’t bring my start ticket they let me pass anyway.

Despite all my hopes it wasn’t a bad joke and the 1k buy in torunament I was about to attend had following blind structure:

30 min levels. 10k starting stack, no antes. WTF? Are you serious? And like this wasn’t enough they just missed some levels. They started with 20/40 (don’t ask), 40/80, 60/120 but then just jumped to 100/200 and 200/400. Did the tournament director bang his head or didn’t get enough air during his birth or something? I mean, c’mon. this is a freaking 1k buy in tournament. But waait. It’s getting better. Besides the more than inappropriate promogirls and the really annoying carnival like commentator who walked from table to table to comment on the action, they decided to randomly put an iPod in the pot. So whoever wins the next pot, wins the iPod. ARE YOU SERIOUS??

I always thought german poker won’t surprise anymore when a nice middle-aged lady entered the box and almost broke her hands trying what she seriously thought is called shuffling. I haven’t seen one single dealer who actually did the shuffle process even close to right, but this lady really hit it off. Shuffle, box cut! And what might be pitching but looked more like laying down the cards and pushing them around. This caused me to finally get off my headphones and say something. Geez. In those tournaments you are on tilt without even seeing a hand! Unfortunately I didn’t take a video of someone laying down the flop because this actually was hilarious. Everybody did it their own … let’s be gentle and say ‘creative’ way and some dealers literally just randomly threw the flop cards in the middle of the table. If I haven’t been able to mute the annoying commentator and my brain retarded co players, I probably would’ve saved myself a heart-attack and just left the tourney early.

Anyway, since the avg was at 10bb after only 3 hours of play, I managed to save half an avg stack for day two. I didn’t event wanna show up again but I guess I will and play some cashgame for the rest of the night.

The next great thing occurred after the tourney was done and we drove to the hilton hotel which was included in the price package I won. But since the tournament restarts tonight at 7, they actually wanted us to check out at 12 and re check in at 5. To let us walk around with about -14 degrees celsius and all our luggage After complaining for about an hour, they just let us stay in the room, from where I blog this post.

Enjoy the images and the video.

My name is Damien Cooper and I approved this message

IMG_0155

I really felt like the last days were worth a blogpost, so here we go…

I took a time out from poker when my cousin came to visit. We went to the local pool, had drinks in cologne and partied hard on saturday, returning when the sun came up. I had a great time away from the grind, chilling, laughing and enjoying myself with my friends. I realized once again how rare those moments are and really want to keep them up in future.

With my cousin returning to his island, I returned to the pokertables. There’s a big one-week tourney going on in my home casino so I didn’t want to miss a single day of the action. So it happened that one idiot took my first buy in 20 minutes after the game started. The tournament was on break but this one dude wasn’t satisfied yet and joined me and my fellow grinders at the cash table. He raised every hand and was really eager to get some chips before he had to return to the tournament. I always felt like I had good reads on him so I took a shot at his money when I raised with 45 suited UTG. He called with 2 others. The flop came KQ6 and i continuation bet the flop. Everybody folded to him and he quickly called. The way he called I was pretty sure he had nothing. The turn brought another Q and I checked with the intension of raising him. He took a moment and made it 45euro. I waited about 20 seconds when I raised him all in for like 200 more (you remember the 250 max buy in rule -.-). He didn’t even think for a minute and called my raise for all his chips. I was upset, thinking I misread his hand and didn’t improve on the bricked river. He said he missed and turned over AJ. Really? He called my raise with a gut shot? If he was thinking his Ace high would’ve been good, respect buddy on the great call. But calling with a gutshot.. Oh dear. He left 3 minutes later with my money and I re-bought not liking at all how my new fresh week was about to start.

Everything turned out to the better of it when a few busted tourney player joined us and steamed away their stacks, letting me end my session with a profit of 900. So the week did start good after all.

Even tho I’m registered for day 1c I considered starting today, because one of my friends starts tomorrow as well. When I arrived I noticed a third of the field and most of them are more than decent tournament players so I sticked with my plan to start tomorrow hoping for an easier field.

I was pretty glad that they decided to start a 5/5 table instead of the usual 2/5 with 250 max and took my seat. We started 6 handed and by playing aggressively I could manage and early start with being up 350 when a cuban middle aged guy joined us. He bought in for 1000 euro, showing at least 15 more 500 bills in his wallet. He was drunk and he wanted to gamble. He was involved in every pot and raised 2 out of 3. Great. He even increased his action by randomly grabbing a chip stack and throw it in the middle whenever he pleased. I bet 35 on the flop, he took a stack of 10 euro chips and threw them in there raising me to 270.. With 60 bucks being in the pot, I laid down top pair waiting for a better spot. The whole table now aimed for his chips and didn’t even bother to play hands against each other.. So we moved on to following hand: I got AT in early position and limped in. The maniac raised to 30 and five people, including me, called the raise. The flop came QQ4, two diamonds. I checked, the maniac bet 40 and everybody folded to me. I called. I knew he had nothing. I picked up some tells the way he was betting earlier and I was very convinced he didn’t have anything at all. The flop came the T of diamonds, giving me a pair with the nut flush draw, since I was holding the ace of diamonds. I checked again and faced a quick bet of 100 euro. Still convinced my T is good, I quickly made the call. The river brought an offsuit J and I checked again. The maniac moved all in for 800 euro. I saw him checking Kings up on the river in position so I was more than convinced he was bluffing. But what good I beat here? There was a straight out there, a flush and two overs to my pair. I thought about it for a long time and he started talking with his broken german trying to talk me out of the hand. With me still having 600 in front of me it wasn’t an easy decision at all. He finally convinced me that he didn’t want a caller so I said call. He said good call and that I win. He turns over J9 of clubs and even tho I knew he was bluffing he got lucky on the river and took down this nearly 2000 euro pot.

Where did I misplay the hand? I’m sure he is bluffing! Why don’t I grow some balls and raise him on the turn or even bet it for fucks sake? Seriously.. Well, I spilled away my winnings and my starting stack and didn’t know if I should be happy about my 1000 euro hero call or not.. I re bought again for 500 and didn’t have to wait more than one orbit to find JJ on the button. Meanwhile another maniac joined the table and I faced a 45 euro bet by the cuban, getting called by maniac number 2 and 2 other people. I wanted to isolate and three bet it to 150. Both maniacs called, the rest folded. I screamed in my head for not facing any overs on the flop and my wish was granted. But even before I could bet anything, maniac number one bet 200 and maniac number two moved all in over the top. Great. I didn’t really think about it and moved all in as well. What am I waiting for when I fold to two complete fish with holding an over pair? surprisingly the original raiser folded even tho he didn’t have to put in more than 200 but I was glad my Jacks held up and I was up again. Unfortunately maniac one called 900 euro with ace high when maniac two moved all in with a straight which led to maniac one heading to the roulette table and maniac 2 leaving with his 4 grand.. -.-

I played solid for an hour and shipped a few pots. The only interesting hand occurred when I trap limped AA under the gun. Of course no one raised and I now had to play AA in a 5 way limp pot with small and big blind. The flop came QJ5. The blinds checked to me and I led out for 20. The guy to my immediate right called and so did the small blind. The turn brought a 6 with 2 spades on the board. The sb checked again and I bet 40. Both called again and I decided to slow down. The river broght an offsuit T and the SB checked. I checked behind and the guy next to me instantly bet 150. The sb folded. 150? The pot was about 160. What does he try to convince me of here? Straight? No way. The only hand that I could imagine beating me here was QT. This unfortunately made a lot of sense and I didn’t see how I could call a pot sized bet with just one pair. I told the guy I was holding Aces and what tries to announce here. I started thinking when he suddenly starts to lift his hand so I could see his queen. He did that on purpose that was for sure. I started laughing and asking what that means? He replied grumpy and I called. he showed q4 of spades and left the table. what a weird night. After him leaving the table broke at about 11:00 pm. Being up 900 for the night, I wanted to head home. But since I already ordered a steak I chose to sit down at the 2/5 table for a while and eat my dinner. The table was dry as the desert until two totally drunk young lowlifes joined us. They started insulting the dealer, the players and each other. The whole table couldn’t stop laughing and I had to stay just for the entertainment . After I bluffed one of them for the second time showing him my cards after he folded, he threatened to cut me later. But in a nice way . The second they went broke and chose not to rebuy, I took another 100 I made at that table and took off. I made money and I had fun.. The week started more than awesome

Tomorrow I’ll play the tournament. My first big live tournament in like forever. I keep you posted how it works out for me..

bye bye

So I had a nice winning session in Dortmund tonight. I’ve been there early when they opened the spot and sat down at the fish-tank. Here are some things you have to know about german casinos: german casinos are weird. For one thing, they open poker at 7pm and close around 2:30am. That really sucks. Especially because there are just like 2 hours of actual poker around midnight when the table gets deep.

Here’s the other weird thing. Most casinos start with limits as high as 5/5 or 5/10. It’s more than rare to find a 1/2 game in a casino. I don’t mind that since I’m not playing 1/2 anyway. But here’s the thing: In the casino the closest to where I reside right now, they made some hilarious changes. They had a good 2/4 game running the last time I visited germany, but they changed it to 2.5/5 with a minimum buy in of 100euro and a max buy in of 250. 50bb? Really? That is just dumb and as half the table buys in even shorter, it really takes a while to play with appropriate stacks.

But tonight there was this one guy who pretty much called everything when he held an ace in the hole. So I saw him shipping a 700 euro pot on the river with Ace high and just hoped to get my share of it. I didn’t even have to wait very long to sink my teeth into his stack a little bit. Here’s the hand:

He raised it to 25euro in an early position and the button raised it to 70 from the button when I woke up in the small bind with AK. The button just had about another 70euronen so what am I supposed to do? I never flatcall that bet having the maniac behind me, almost committing myself staring at a 70bucks (I know, it’s no dollar but who cares ^^) shove into a 250 pot if I miss the flop. So staring at my forced shallow stack I decided to move all in for my 240 eggs. The maniac smoothly called and so did the button after wondering aloud if I had kings or aces. My read from the beginning was that the maniac is holding any Ace and the button pretty much reraising with any pair higher than nines. After him wondering out loud, I was pretty convinced he’s holding queens. K high flop, no queen to the river and I scooped my first pot of the night and almost tripled up. The guppy showed AJoff and the button open mucked the expected queens. The elder guy smashed another pot with some ridic runner runner straight and everyone was eager to get a piece of it. The next 2 orbits I limped with QT type hands and small pockets, but always missed and gave away about 70euro.

A couple minutes later I limped with KJ in the high jack when the bb raised to 25. he got like 6 callers, including me and the maniac. The flop came T high rainbow and not connected. very boring. Everybody checked to me and I felt like trying to steal or at least going heads up to steal it on a later street by betting 40euro into the already 150 euro pot. It almost worked, except for the maniac who called my bet. But against him, I might actually already have the best hand. the turn card was an off suit queen which improved my hand to an open ended straight draw. The guppy checked. I didn’t semi bluff it here, because he would have called me anyway with pretty much everything. So I wanted to control the pot in position a little bit and checked behind. Bingo! The river brought an ace giving me the ultimate nuts. I didn’t even get to think how much I could get out of the maniac when I heard the beautiful words “all in” ringing in my ears. I asked the dealer to confirm, that this guy just moved all in with about 600euro into a 230 euro pot with me holding the nuts and having a remaining stack over 500. As he did, I snap called and hoped not to chop it up. The fish instantly flipped over J9 for a lower straight I raked in my chips while observing the disappointed looks my table mates made, watching the maniacs stack disappearing without getting their share.

10 minutes later the table got short handed and was about to break before they combined tables and I decided unlike my usual habits to bank the more than 1000euro profit and head home to enjoy the night since it was still very early.

I planned some upcoming ept trips with one of my table mates and headed home.

Tomorrow I take a day off from photography and poker as I’m meeting my friend Naomi who just returned from a 2 month trip to cyprus and catch a movie later the night with some friends.

I might play one of the ftp ftops events when I return, but considering it starts at 3am, I might as well just go to bed. The next couple of days are going to be pretty stuffed with editing images during the day and playing live poker during the night. But I might spontaneously head to Amsterdam for the weekend if I find somebody to join me.

Well, that was my day. See you soon.

Since I haven’t had the concentration and discipline to play very profitable online lately, I challenged myself to play babystakes and concrete on strict br management and try to build a bankroll online. I deposit 50Bucks on Fulltilt and try to work on my multi tabling. I started with 4 tables which is pretty convenient. I had a good session and made more than 3 stacks in like 2 hours. Maybe I try it with 6 tables the next time.

My BR is up to over 56$ now and my goal is to get it up to 150 by the end of September. Considering me having planned a lot of stuff for the rest of the month, I think this is a very tough goal, but who knows..

I keep you updated.

cheers

Since I’m the victim of huge swings the last weeks I wanted to post something and get to know you’re opinion on this subject.. Since I’m in my home-country germany due to a lot of photography jobs, I don’t have a lot of choices for poker right now. So Casino Hohensyburg is the place to be. Besides weird max buy ins and some other unorthodox habits like having 11 players at a table, it’s a decent way to grind. Which really bugs me the most is german opening hours which leaves you with an effective time to play for about 8 hours.

The first couple of times I played in Hohensyburg I noticed the huge lack of skill 8 out of ten players have. I was thrilled at first and made a shitload of money and managed to leave being up 10 stacks. After playing there on a regular base I noticed huge swings without really finding the mistakes on my side after checking my playbook. But lets cut to the chase. Let’s say you flop top pair with top kicker, you want somebody to call you with a weaker kicker or even just second pair when you bet out, right? Otherwise you don’t make money. But do you really want to have half the table calling with second pairs, worse kicker or even just an over? Sure, you are ahead, but not that much the more player you get in the hand. How do you manage to dodge all these kicker and cards that gives other people the better hand? They draw on you no matter what you bet. No shit, I saw people calling over pot sized bets on the turn with nacked straight draws after their opponent flipped the top pair. So what I’m saying is, tho you are ahead almost every hand you play, but never that much with having 5 people drawing on you without having the slightest Idea what they might be holding. And I’m serious about that. You have people calling all ins on a 784 rainbow board holding A4. My aces got cracked by 85 off on an A75 board, allthough I shoved the flop. Anyway, how do you handle these games where your expectation is either win big or drop whatever you brought to the table? Are you licking your chops for a game like that or can’t you handle the variance and avoid these games?

Let me know.. I’m feeding my playbook and look forward to this years ept in london…

So, like I threatened on twitter a few days ago, changes are coming up.

Like most of you know, I do a lot of different stuff besides taking pictures. I travel a lot and also make a living out of playing cards.

Since I wrote that this blog is about my work and myself as well, I figured I’m going to extend my blog. Posting more pictures, blogging more stories and just mixing it up a little. Even sharing links and videos. Because, to be honest, my blog is pretty boring right now. But I’m about to change this up.

I have more photography coming up as well as travel plans to the ept in london and vienna and a long trip to either vegas or sydney.

So stay tuned..

Damien

Einfach für shits und giggles schreibe ich dieses kurzes preview der vergangenen Hochzeit einmal auf deutsch.

Nachdem Nina und ich Wuppertal verliessen haben wir nicht damit gerechnet, dass das Navi ausserhalb Deutschlands den Geist aufgibt und es im Umkreis von 100km zu der Luxemburgischen Grenze keine Tankstellen gibt, da es aufgrund steuerlichen Gründen in Luxemburg einfach wesentlich günstiger ist. Also passierten wir nach Verpassen der Ausfahrt und noch 2km im Tank die Luxemburgische Grenze. Dort warteten dann gut 7 Tankstellen auf uns und es ging weiter zum Hotel.

Ich glaube diese Hochzeit war die relaxte auf der ich je gewesen bin und mit dem neuen photobooth hatten wir Spass bis morgens früh. Freut euch auf die komplette Hochzeitsserie..

P.s. Ist gar nicht so einfach auf deutsch

p.p.s. for all english readers: It was a fun and relaxed wedding and I just realized that everybody who doesn’t speak english is long gone and keep writing is a total waste of time

And another great article about New york my friend from the kangaroo-country wrote. This time I got sort of mentioned, so there’s no way of me not supporting this article Check it out

CLICK HERE

hey, my dear friend Steph whom I met last year during my study in manhattan just published an article in an australian newspaper. I hope I got that right.

Event tho I’m extremely disappointed that I haven’t been mentioned though I gave her a roof above her head for a week in her beginning adventure , I still think her article is great and everyone of you who has ever been to NY or considers going here should read it.

Well done Flacks!

Article

Hello everybody! I need your help now.

i like to put one of my images in a photo-contest. The topic is a vacation image so it’s clearly going to be one Image you can find in my places category on my website. But which one? I asked some people and most of them were against my first choice. So what do you guys think? Vote for your favorite and do it quick. Deadline is in a few days.

Thanks for your support I really appreciate it.

You can send me a message on fb, studi, twitter, email, comment to this post (which might be the best so everyone sees everyones suggestion) or send me a pigeon. Whatever works for you…

.. or something like that.

I just wondered who is actually reading my blog. I rarely get voluntary feedback on anything I write or do (boohoo, I know). But every time I come up to somebody telling them what I did recently or what I’m going to do or whatever I surprisingly often get the answer, that they already know by reading my blog. Interesting. My facebook photography page has two fans (thanks for the support btw) and neither do I have followers on twitter. Not many at least. So peeps, follow me, support me, like me or tell my why you don’t.

Go ahead. constructive critique is always welcome. Won’t talk to you afterwards anymore. But I appreciate the try .

I actually wanted to inform all of my blogreader, that I changed my twitterpage-design when I realized that I never informed anyone of having a twitter page in first place.

Well.. guess what, I have a twitterpage and it has an awesome new design . Everything that wanders my mind, comes up and isn’t really enough to fill a whole post with comes up on my twitterpage first. So follow me @ Damien_Cooper.

Since I’m already writing I really have to get something off my chest! Is anybody familiar with common curses? Or better how to return them? I can’t really say I harmed anybody in my past or have people hating me so much that it’s worth the effort (or the potential costs) putting up a curse on me. But since I really feel like life is trying to give me hard time these days I have to wonder if my being absolutely non superstitious my entire life was a big mistake on my side. lenses break, iPads gets stolen. After I left home yesterday and had a pitch black cat following me 7 blocks to the train station I really have to admit I couldn’t help myself but being a little bit suspicious .

Hey, if you’re using Safari for mac and happened to go to my website without being able to see the sidebar, please use another browser instead. I had some issues with safari lately. Just letting you know, that it is the browser, not the website.

thanks

Oh, I didn’t cut out the bookmarks. So folks, that’s what I am up to browsing the web. I think I’m still getting away pretty decent without getting caught having nerdy mangasites or youporn in my favorite bookmarks

I always get confirmed that the guys from aphotofolio.com were the right choice to host my webpages and provide photographer-friendly templates. Now I got it confirmed once more by having an iPad optimized webpage.

So, if you have an iPad go to www.damien-cooper.com and check it out

So, I should be out shooting a crazy pokershoot in midtown manhattan but instead I’m sitting home and blog. How did that happen? We got a real nice loft in manhattan for the upcoming shoot but 2 hours before the shoot was about to start the owner sent me a text that he isn’t able to make it. I love it.

Well, I guess and hope we shoot later that week so I don’t have to shoot everyday for a week straight before I head to europe. I already had to postpone two shoots this month due to weather issues. I really love shooting bands, actors, singers or whatever is attached to this industry but boy I can tell, it’s never easy. They have a gig here, are on tour there or when they are finally back in town for what feels like 35minutes, I’m on an assignment out of town, country or even continent.

I really hope the weather play its’ tricks on us on our new scheduled shoot for singer Gabriella Caspi next week.

Well, besides all the organization and postponed shoots I had a little bit time to set up a twitter account to .. yeah for what did I set up a twitter account? We’ll see. Mainly to update you with infos and pictures before I find the time to put it on my blog. So follow me @damien-cooper

So far so good.. Fingers crossed for awesome weather and no more postponing

I already finished 2 images for danish model Maya.

Location was a nice rooftop in chinatown where you had a really urbanview over the city. We really couldn’t wish for better weather or circumstances. But even though we had a lot of fun and I call it a complete successful shoot, it wasn’t my days highlight. After the shoot was done we went to Cafe select to grab a bite where I witnessed an oxymoron which is def. unique. I heard a redheaded chinese girl talking switzerdutsch. Awesome! Living in NYC, I am rarely surprised by anything but after this night I realized again. EVERYTHING is possible in New Yooork!

So, enjoy the images!

As a retoucher I often get asked “wow, you must be good at painting and drawing, right?” When my answer is that my drawing skills never reached further than pathetic stick-figures, people often don’t take me seriously. I actually do paint and draw a lot with my wacom in my images. And so it’s always been a mystery to me, that I’m not joking when I say, that I have probably better chances at getting a job as a hair-model than winning a paint contest against a second grader.

Well, unfortunately that inability of mine doesn’t prevent me from embarrassing myself over and over again when I have to draw sketches for upcoming shoots. Most client-meetings end up with an impression on my clients faces somewhere to describe between “what the fuck!” and “what did I have for lunch on wednesday?” since they have no idea what I’m talking about. That forces me to make the desperate effort to visualize my mostly absolute unrealistic expectations of upcoming shoots.

To prove my point, here are two sketches for a photo-shoot for Zo2 in two weeks.