Tennis

I like close sports photos, tennis is nice because you can get right up next to them when they're playing.

Disc golf

The minute I heard that we were going to run a feature story on disc golf I was excited. Not only is disc golf in my opinion one of the best things since pockets but it's also incredibly photogenic. Since I spend a good amount of time on the course already I should bring my camera out and try and get some good photos for the story. In the photo is my friend Peter getting his disc on the Rotary Club Disc Golf Course in Kirksville, MO. Fantastic course, it just so happens that the ground was covered in a carpet of tiny purple flowers. This was taken late april on a perfect spring evening. We ended up just running a brief on the story and it didn't need a photo, but this is one of my favorites just because it was such a nice day!

So a few years ago I went to the Ronald Reagan dinner before the primary election. Fred Thomson and Ron Paul were both presidential candidates that were goin to speak at this diner. I was really excited to shoot some high profile political figures and have a chance to meet them which I did after the speeches. I like both these photos, I am personally a fan of RP and in this photo I like to think that he's makes good sense. He's just a reasonable dude. And for Fred, I remember his presence very well, the crowd went nuts for him.

Basketball

So sports are really nice, just try and get the best action shot you can. I've noticed that a lot of professional publications go for the "scramble" shot when looking for sports photos. You seldom get the smooth slam dunk photos on the front page, what I see more of is players tumbling over themselves with the ball just out of reach. I guess this is a combination of both, one of our more acrobatic players trying to layup over a guy. I don't know basketball rules but I feel like this has to be foul or something.

Sax quartet

So this was not out on assignment for the paper but actually these photos are about 3 years old, right at the beginning of my days at the Index. Though they were taken for a friend they're a similar style as I would take as if I was out on assingment, the man with the soprano saxophone is actually my high school band teacher and I ran into him at Forest Park in St. Louis playing for a crowd in the middle of the park, they sounded fantastic. But what makes these photos strong in my opinion is the lighting, the focus of photos and the variety of angles. When I'm shooting for a publication, I try and keep in mind to get several perspectives and angles. Have subjects looking left, right and frame, get closeups and wide shots. The strong focus from the photos comes from the way they're composed, they're meant to have a natural flow of them. One thing I see new photographers do a lot to see a lot of cool stuff so they stand back and take a snap shot. But in doing so the try and capture the whole scene evenly. This first picture is a good picture no doubt, but it's a very flat picture without much depth to it.



The lighting is good for sure, but each subject is right there in front of me all standing next to each other. These guys can play a mean sax but they're not one for crazy stage presence, you need to use the lens that will allow you to get up close to the players and help give some more interesting perspectives to this scene. Make sure there is a dominant element to your photos, in the photo above you can see a band, but what not much more. You see everything at once and that's it. Below I have posted a few more photos that have used a telephoto for, the Nikon 70-200 2.8 on a D50. Shooting at 2.8 what this lens lets me do is get a nice shallow depth of field that helps to isolate subjects in the photo.







I really like this last photo because it add more to the set, rather then just having pictures of the musicicians with the additional of the young couple, now you have a whole new element to the photo. It gives you a better sense of the surroundings and wider view of the park.

The Heavy

So this was a feature story on professor of Criminal Justice Marty Jayne. So when I hear his job title and then his name the first thing that pops into my mind is law and order. Then when I finally met I saw that he had a cop feeling about him, so I told him to look smug, but not mean, and that's what I got. I really like the lighting and the lines all leading to his head. I used a flash bounced off the ceiling, I put a telephoto setting on the flash that helped keep the light on just him and making sure not to light up the walls around him too much. It's hard to make the light in a hallway look balanced just because they're so long. I also liked this photo because usually for a story like this, we get a professor working at their desk or doing something that would be considered "candid." This is due I think to the fear that if we pose anything we are in direct violation of some law of journalism, but there are some journalistic photos that do require photographer interaction. As long as the photographer is not trying to pose a reality, this is different then posing someone for a portrait. Instead of getting Marty teaching a class or working at his computer, I went for a strong portrait that gave a law enforcement feeling to give more relevance to the story.