March Madness

Could there possibly be a better sporting event than March Madness? I know it’s a stretch to think of the NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship as one event when there are actually 68 teams in the field and somewhere around 862 games played. But for three weeks, a big chunk of the world’s male population forgets that they really don’t care that much about basketball and glues themselves to the television to see if Butler, Gonzaga, or some other underdog will emerge as this year’s Cinderella in sneakers, dashing their bracket and bragging rights to smithereens.

I was recently asked by a friend to take some photos of a local basketball league for his church’s website. Not exactly the big dance, but an opportunity to learn, nonetheless. The only problem—his church’s gym is lighted with a minimal number of fluorescent fixtures. No high-bay metal halides. No downlights from the overhead scoreboard. From a photography standpoint, it might as well be lighted by a couple of lilac bath candles and a kid with a green glowstick. I’m talking dark.

Not to be deterred, I schemed up an idea based on my travels to college arenas, where real sports photogs use the built in light system. So with two 340 watt/second Alien Bee moonlights on lightstands bouncing off of the white ceiling and fired wirelessly with a radio trigger, I was able to get f2-1/50 ambient light to look something like f8-1/250. Just what I needed to stop some action. They aren’t great compositions or works of art. No matter how much I encouraged them, the players ran around wherever they wanted to go, oblivious to the rule of thirds or my needs. But I learned a new technique that worked very well, and hopefully populated a Baptist website with the best darn recreation league basketball photos ever taken in a middle-Georgia church gym in March. Now that’s madness.

On the Cover Again

I shared with you a few weeks ago about a photo of mine that was going to be featured on the cover of a local magazine. It's certainly not Vogue or National Geographic, but I'm flattered nonetheless. In an age of the instant gratification that LCD screens, computer monitors, and the Internet can bring, there's something very special about seeing your work in print, especially when it's a stack of magazines. Jones Living is a publication of the Jones County News, my hometown newspaper. It's a great local newspaper and a really well done magazine, even if my photo is on the cover.

Opportunites for photographers to see their images in print magazines and newspapers have plummeted in recent years. Since 2008, nearly a thousand U.S. based print magazines have either folded completely or gone to a Web only presence. That's a tremendous number of product, glamour, fashion, landscape, and photojournalistic photographers looking for somewhere else to sell their services. One of the latest is U.S. News and World Report, once the third largest news magazine, which will cease subscription sales in December 2010. And since 2008, 166 U.S. newspapers have ceased printing.

But while more and more content has either gone online or dark altogether, I do think there is a place for print journalism to survive. Local newspapers and magazines offer unique coverage that metropolitan, regional, or national news outlets, whether print or electronic, will rarely, if ever cover. And personally, I enjoy the tactile feel of a magazine in my hand. And, of course, I enjoy seeing my images in glossy print.

Happy Thanksgiving

I’ve been unbelievably negligent in both photography and blogging in the last month. Things have been hectic in most every regard. It’s so amazing how life comes crashing in at times and creates frenzy and chaos that consumes hours and drives out opportunities to stop long enough to contemplate what we have. It’s Thanksgiving morning, and I had a chance to get out and walk the forest. I was alone but surrounded—squirrels and wild turkey were all around. As I stood in the falling leaves and soaked in the solitude, it was easy to realize what the noise of the last few weeks has obscured. I have a lot to be thankful for. We all do. A kind and generous God. A loving family. Great friends. A good job. God given talent to create. A country where freedom is still celebrated. And a group of soldiers I’ve never met still willing to fight to keep it that way.

I wrestled a Sunday afternoon away from the hubbub recently to go shoot some autumn leaves. And for the therapy of looking through a camera lens. One of my favorite places to photograph near my home is a giant slab of granite (think part of Stone Mountain big), a creek, and a series of small waterfalls. It’s out in the county, lost in hundreds of acres of forest. Unfortunately, the water in the creek was very low, so the usual waterfalls were minimal. To get this shot, I had to lower and spread my tripod as far as it would go and submerge it in the shallow creek, with only the ball head and camera above the water. It’s a 1.3 second exposure at f16. As you might image, I got wet and muddy. But with any luck, this shot will end up on a magazine cover in the next month, my fourth cover in the last two years.

For all of you who find yourself on this blog, Happy Thanksgiving. I hope you can find some quiet time to contemplate what you and all you have been given. And if you’re consumed by the photography bug like me, find some camera time soon.