Hunting for... Airplanes

The DRI annual celebrity quail hunt is a pretty cool event to shoot every year. However, over the last few year the extreme drought we've been having in west Texas has been really bad for the local quail population. So, the organizers have had to come up with some different ideas of things to hunt. Normally on Fridays they do sporting clays and on Saturday afternoon they do some type of trick shooting competitions. This year they were shooting at RC planes. I was kind of nervous going into it since most of the time when I get really excited about something that sounds really cool, it ends up turning out really lame. So I headed out there with guarded optimism about the shoot.

When I got there I spoke briefly with one of the organizers and asked him about the RC planes. He just laughed and said "This is going to be really humbling for some of these guys." I knew right there this might end up being really cool after all. So, the basic idea of this is there is an RC plane with a bunch of pyrotechnic devices on the bottom of it and it flies past a team of about six shooters firing at the little plane zooming by around 60-80mph. When one of the shotgun pellets hits the plane the pyrotechnic goes off and the team scores. It was a lot of fun and the first couple of round almost no one got hits. But then towards the end some of them were really getting into the groove and getting some nice shots in. The planes aren't your typical RC planes, they're basically an engine on plastic board (that ends up looking like Swiss cheese at the end of the shoot). It was a lot of fun to shoot, both for me and the hunters.

Hunting for the Missing Birds...

In working in Abilene for more than 12 years there aren't many events that I haven't shot a few times over, and even fewer that I've never shot at all. Well, the DRI Celebrity Quail Hunt, now called the Big Country Celebrity Ultimate Hunt. I guess it has a lot to do with schedule and me usually working nights. Anyway, I was finally going to shoot it, and had to be up early to do so. For the newspaper, I was shooting photos for two different stories. The front page story was about the declining quail population in the area. I'm not a bird hunter, so I didn't really know this, but the population of quail in the area has been declining in the area for a while. And, with the awful drought from last year, finding wild quail in the area is damn near impossible... not that I would know, a bird looks like a bird to me!

When I got to the hotel I asked the guide I was going on the hunt with if we would even find any birds at all. I was told it was going to be a "canned hunt," basically meaning that quail raised in captivity were being put out there to shoot. While I was walking around the fields with the hunters a couple of the hunters told me even if they did see a wild quail they wouldn't shoot at it since the population is so low. They'd rather wait in hopes to preserve the current population. It was a really interesting statement given how often you hear people complain about hunting. Most hunters I've ever talked to seem to be more concerned about animal populations than most.

Dove Season... Again

I often don't give my lovely wife enough credit for all she does for me, especially outside the friendly confines of our four walls. But, if it wasn't for her this photo wouldn't have happened... as well as all the other ideas for photos, photo columns, stories etc. she has supplied me with. For the third year in a row we were doing a story about the opening of dove season, so as usual the plan was to have a portrait of a hunter to go on the front page of the Sunday newspaper. This year there was a catch... someone mentioned the last two time we had featured a young guy the first year, and an older guy the next year, so we should have a female hunter this year. Well, in thoery that's a great idea but... I don't hunt, and don't know any hunters. So, just finding a hunter was going to be hard enough, not to mention a female hunter.

So, while I was having lunch with my wife the Monday before this was supposed to run, I asked her if she knew any hunters (it was sort of tongue in cheek, thinking I already knew the answer). And she says yes, then I ask if his wife hunts. She tells me no, but I think his girls do (SCORE!!). So, with her help I got it all set up. Then called my boss to clear my schedule to shoot it, and told him I got two high school girls who dove hunt for the photo. Well, lets just say, my wife made me look really good on this one, and I was quick to point out to him my wife found them for me. After that it was just a matter of shooting the photo... that has become the easy part, I try to keep it the same relative style, it's worked out well so far. I probably should have asked for my boss to pay for lunch that day.

If you do it too good the first time, you have to do it again...

Sept. 1 is the opening of dove season. I don't know this because I'm a hunter, but because we do a story on it every year. As I've said in the past, I'm not a hunter. I don't have a problem with it and and if that's what you're interested in I say go for it. I'd just rather do my hunting at the grocery store since I know I'm going to catch what I want and don't have to clean or gut anything.

So, last year I was asked for a portrait for the start of dove season that looked like a "magazine cover shot." And, despite all the mosquitoes that were out there the photos turned out really well. This year I'm thinking it may have turned out a little too well, since I was asked for the same thing again this year. The basic photo was the same, hunter, gun and dog. This time though, I was a little more prepared. I knew what I was looking for and was able to set it up a little earlier, so it wouldn't be pitch black when we got done.

I still think I like last year's shot better, it just worked out a lot better plus the lighting etc was nicer. I just like the image better as a whole. But, I still like what I did this year too and got a lot of compliments on the photo. So, I guess I need to start thinking about how I'm going to shoot next year's dove season photo.