Yet another brush fire...

We had a few more brush fires last week. The only one I shot was on Tuesday. Area-wise this fire was pretty small, only about 200 acres. However, there were quite a few homes in the path of the fire, and a couple were destroyed. I shot this photo as I was walking down a road following a local volunteer fire department fighting the fires. I liked it because of the surreal look it had from the smoke rising up between the burned trees. It was also one of the last shots I took before everyone had to leave because the forest service was going to make an air drop on that location.

Arena Football, and covering someone I haven't covered in 10 years...

Monday was the opening night of the new arena football team in town, the Ruff Riders. We've been covering the crap out of them, so Monday was no different. I had to work on my day off (horay overtime!). It was interesting covering this to say the least. I had never covered arena football before, and still don't understand a lot of the rules compared to "regular" football.

With this being minor league I was expecting the game to be pretty bad, however, I was pleasantly surprised at how good some of these guys were. Now in no way was it the NFL, but still entertaining nonetheless. There were a lot of players from some major college programs, as well as a few from some of the local programs. It was nice to see, a couple of the local kids I've been covering since high school, the ones who were plenty talented but just a little too short to be recruited to the big programs. Or, played for a school that wasn't "on the radar" so they slipped through the cracks.

The crowds were into it too. Abilene has a history of supporting its minor league teams at the start but they they go away soon. However, there are two things different about the Ruff Riders: 1) This is football, and there's no question West Texas loves football. 2) For the first time beer is being sold at sporting events. Reason two alone may keep the team afloat longer than most.

There was one other major attraction for fans to the Ruff Riders... Quincy Carter. Carter, a former University of Georgia quarterback, whom I covered his freshman year at Georgia 10 years ago is the starting quarterback for the Ruff Riders. Around here though, Carter is better known as the former Dallas Cowboys quarterback. Abilene is a big Cowboys town, and plenty of people showed up to see Carter and see if he'd still be worthy of the Cowboys job. I'm not sure about that, but he still has a rocket arm and threw for a league high in yardage for the week and scored five touchdowns, four in the air and one rushing.

Shooting arena football... outdoors

Last week was the final week of practice for the Abilene Ruff Riders, the new local professional arena football team. The irony about shooting this is everything I shot of them was outside. But since that was where they were practicing there wasn't much of a choice Plus, hey, the light is better than the light's they'll be playing under at the Taylor County Coliseum.

I had quite the list of things that needed to be shot for the team preview including individual player photos. But also, a front page story on the outlook of the team and whether the team could make it or not, since the last two minor league teams in town, the baseball and hockey teams, both folded after only a couple of years. I also had to get shots of a couple of the local people on the team, including the kicker (bottom), who is the boys soccer coach at Wylie High School. His story is actually kind of funny, I think he said he's only played about 8 football games in high school, and never in college, just soccer. He actually made the team as the kicker though because of great leg strength and accuracy. For the front photo (top) I was looking for something more featurey, the sports front could have been anything. I had a shot I liked with the coach going over a play with a few players (middle) that I though worked out best for the sports front.

Softball...

I shot softball Friday, nothing too exciting, I was working on a bunch of other stuff and this was sort of a last minute add. I showed up in the fourth inning (high school baseball and softball only play 7 innings) and the game had already gotten out of hand, Abilene High was ahead by 6 and had runners on base when I got there. The game was kind of boring, even all the scoring was hit after hit, nothing too exciting. I did make a couple of shots I liked. The team isn't as strong as it has been in the past, I thought the bottom photo sort of told that story, although I doubt that's why she had that look on her face since they were up 8-0 at the time... but the light was nice

Basketball Players of the Year...

I was recently talking to another photographer who shoots a lot of portraits of pro athletes, we were talking about how much time these pros would give you. He was telling me 10 minutes is an eternity to shoot these guys, if you get 5 minutes you're lucky. Now, this is also someone who gets the luxury of hiring an assistant, so often when he shoots the subject, the photo is ready to be taken, all the person has to do is stand in.

Every year for football and basketball we do a "Super Team," basically the players of the year. For football its four players (overall MVP, offensive and defensive MVP's and a newcomer of the year) and a coach of the year. But for basketball season we have a whole lot more. There are five players, a coach, and an MVP for both the boys and the girls. A total of 12 players and two coaches. For the MVP's, I need to get two different photos, one for the front page and one for the doubletruck inside. For the front shot I try to do something vertical and similar for the boy's and girl's shot to be able to play off of each other. The inside shot isn't as important to be similar for the boy and girl, but the shape needs to be the same, or close.

Now, I don't have the budget to hire assistants. However, I usually have kids that haven't been in the spotlight long enough to get an attitude yet. In fact, most of these kids are having their photo taken for publication for the first time. Most of them come in kind of apprehensive about how things are going to work. This is how digital photography has made a big difference in the way I work. After I take a few frames, I'll usually show the kid how it looks and tell them what exactly I'm going for in the shot. After seeing this, their attitudes usually change from "ok I'm here" to seeing how they look pretty cool and will give you all the time you want to make it look really good.

For the MVP's I usually go out to the schools so I can shoot them in the gym, since I can't get a full-size basketball goal into the studio (although that would be great for those rare nights where there's nothing going on). Plus it usually takes a lot longer to shoot these, and I see it as going the extra mile for the best players in the area. For the other players I still want to make a nice shot, yet have them fairly uniform, which is why I prefer to shoot them in the studio. I don't want one standing out more than another since they are all on the same level.

The Cramer Twins, I still can't tell them apart...

For a feature on the first round of the soccer playoffs one of our reporters was doing a feature on Wylie High School's Courtney and Caitlin Cramer. They are standouts on both the soccer and tennis teams. They are the defending Class 3A state champions in girls doubles in tennis, and they are both starters on the soccer team. The request for the photo came in kind of late, the reporter called me as I was heading home on Thursday night and the story was running Monday, the only time I could shoot it was on Friday after practice, the same time I was shooting a baseball game, luckily it was on the same campus, so I could go shoot the portrait and only miss a few innings of the game.

Since I was shooting this on a tight time schedule, I didn't have time to set up lights along with finding power for them etc. So, I just used two strobes on light stands, they are more portable and you don't need to plug anything in, the only difference is they don't put out as much power, but for something like this, that wasn't a problem. I just needed to get enough light on their faces to balance the light. And, after getting the two to lighten up (keep reading), the portrait was really east to shoot.

The funny part about the Cramers is they never look happy, I wasn't really sure what to expect of the two of them. After practice they went and changed into their uniforms, they still looked hesitant. That's pretty normal though, most kids do before having their photos taken, it's my job to make them comfortable. As we were walking over to the tennis courts I asked them about always looking miserable when they played tennis. The answer I got was unexpected, one of them points to the other (even after shooting the portrait I couldn't tell them apart, I made the note at the end of the shoot to get them right for the paper) and says, "she always pisses me off, it happens just about every match." After that, things went really well, they were actually really sweet and even smiled for the photos and it turned out better than I expected. They are just very competitive. I can't complain about that, I'm often told I look pissed off when I'm shooting a lot of times too.

Lining the field.... with wedding bells

I had to shoot a baseball game and a wedding as two of my assignments on Saturday. And the best part of it was I didn't even leave the ballpark. Al Scott is a huge baseball fan, his dad is the namesake for Abilene Christian University's baseball field. So he figured what better place to tie the knot than at home plate between games of a doubleheader.

This wasn't a traditional wedding, the groomsmen were ACU's baseball coaches and the bridesmaids, ACU head coach Britt Bonneau's four daughters (bottom photo). Judy "walked down the aisle" through an archway of baseball bats from the team. For a baseball fan it was one of the coolest weddings you would find. I guess since these two were later in life and it isn't their first wedding (Al's first wife died about five years ago) they could break with tradition some.

One of the best parts about it for me at least was there was only a 30 minute break between games. Normally I don't shoot both games of a doubleheader, time constraints prevent me from doing that. But there have been plenty of times I've shown up in the last inning and didn't get much so I had to sit around waiting for the second game to start and had nothing to do. This time, however, I planned it that way. I had a few assignment before the game so, I told the reporter to call me when the fifth inning was starting (college games are 7 innings when playing doubleheaders). This way I could show up and shoot the end of the first game and the wedding and still be there for the second game should I need to. I got a few decent shots in the first game, but since I had nothing else I figured I'd stick around for part of the second game to see what else I could get.

I got a few shots I really liked after the wedding, but it turned out to be a pitchers duel... one of those game I'd love to sit in the stands and watch but not shoot since there wasn't a whole lot. About the only big play in the first few innings was when ACU's Chris Hall took out the shortstop on a double play (above). I was shooting from behind home plate in the stands and got a nice shot of it, including the base runner rolling into the shortstop and the ball flying errantly away. I stuck around for a little bit after that, but didn't get anything and figured I needed to get back to file photos since the wedding was slated for the front page.