Old film

I'm reorganizing my storage hard drive and I found this old film scan from my neighbor's wedding. I shot this the summer after my first year of college. I wish my exposure was better and Hilary's face was sharper, luckily I got the experience of not just shooting a wedding but shooting a low key no pressure wedding. I don't think I'll find many of those later on in life.

Final Video

This is a video that I worked on with my friend Anna Solo our last quarter of college. We followed a student, Sherice Barnes and teacher, Mr. Fitta through their first play at East High School.


http://vimeo.com/26514085 <- check it out

View from my desk

I've been in Saginaw for almost two months and finally feel like I can call my desk my own. May it's because i'm the only intern now or maybe it's because I finally cleared a space for myself. Either way I've found myself really enjoying working here.

The Saginaw News is a different kind of paper and the news room is a different kind of office. The paper only prints four days a week so not every shoot is for deadline and not every shoot will appear in the paper. The newsroom itself is a large open space with large tables replacing to half cubicles that form most newsrooms.

Saginaw County Fair

Just some funny things I saw at the Fair.

Cage fighting at Hooters

This was my day

A 20 year old's funeral to cage fighting. This was my day.

I've never shot a funeral before. I never even attended a funeral. It's was hard. There is nothing you can say to make someone feel better. I was so fortunate to get the access I did.

Aaron D. Ullom died is combat protecting a fellow solider. He was far braver than I can even image. Here are some photos from his funeral.

it's hot hot hot

Feature hunting for weather because it's very very warm here, especially when you live on the second floor and don't have ac.

Sweating at work

I shot some more little league and I felt so bad for the losing team. 1-14. Poor kids. Here's some shots I like.

Before my time is up I want to get a really great huddle picture. One where everyone is screaming with excitement, their eyes are open, and the composition is just right.

storm-a-brewin'

The sky pre-storm yesterday afternoon. Too bad it didn't cool the place down. Another 90+ degree day.

A little more little league

On Saturday I shot some more little league. The team from Bay City celebrated #8, Brandon Harding hitting a home run.

 The kid in the center is why I love little league.

National Junior Disability Championship

I got to shoot the National Junior Disability Championship swim meet today. I've never shot swimming before so it was a little difficult to get use to timing when the swimmer would come up for air. In the end none of my action shots were great but I liked this photo of the kids lining up.

Girls H.Y.P.E summer program

late summer nights

Just some shots I took after my photos finished transmitting. This time of day makes me nostalgic for warm evenings spent catching fireflies.

The hardest thing

Something that I've discovered is the most difficult thing to shoot is concerts. Not pop/rap/hip hop concerts, actually I have no idea what it's like to shoot those, but concerts where people sit in lawn chairs and listen to a band. I'm sure it's a very nice thing to do on a warm summer evening but to photograph, it's a challenge.

A professor use to say to my photography class "there's no there there" which I've recently discovered he didn't coin but rather Gertrude Stein did. Sometimes it feels as though these events are staginant and there's nothing there. The other photo intern and I were talking and determined that a great photographer has the ability to at least make a good photo in these situations. That is what I aspire to do. Make great photos in mundane situations.

For something new, more little league

I only had one shoot today and it was little league. I'm not a big baseball fan nor was I really a big sports fan, at least when it came to shooting. Recently however I've become a little fonder of sports and shooting them. I need to flush out my sports action shooting and what better way than to shoot lots of sports. Here are a few photos I like from the game.

Senior Little League

16 years olds shouldn't be in a league called "little". Some of those boys were taller than me. Got a few action shots that I liked and this always seems to happen when I use the newspapers laptops, I always over lighten. Unfortunately they don't look that way when I'm toning them. I think a calibration is in need. Here's the sequence that I shot for a runner sliding into home. Hurray for fast shutters!

Hello Suburbia, it's been a while

Today I had to photograph a story about the increased number of vacant houses in Saginaw County. Well the writer wanted to take a different angle and I went to photograph the new subdivision in Freeland. So many homes!

Once I finished shooting for the paper I took a quick driver around the neighborhood and was reminded of my second year photo professor Jen Moon. She told about her time in suburban neighborhoods, shooting with a 4x5 camera, at night. She then showed my class a multimedia piece she made where the homes looked like they were being pulled apart to then show the next home and the audio was this crazy pulling/crunching sound. I can't seem to find the piece. But here's one of her pieces.

Here's my view of the burbs.

I also made a little video of my drive, seeing as blogger now lets you upload videos I might try it.

Feature Hunting

Today was a slow news day I went feature hunting around Saginaw. The only people who were out and about were kids so that's who I photographed. That nice thing about kids is that once they stop poising for the camera they will forget your there.

Cornfest

Today I got up early to hangout with a FedEx delivery truck driver then I got to go and shoot the CornFest set-up. I've shot a few festival set-ups and the people who work at the festivals/carnivals are usually an interesting group. Here are some of my shots.

4th of July

More firework coverage except this time it was on deadline and I got to work with the other intern Matt. I had a pretty good time and some shots that I liked. Here you go!

More Fireworks and it's still not the 4th

And one more thing

I don't know if anyone reads my blog or if they just skim through the photos occassionally but I was looking through one of my favorite blogs, Institute for Artist Management, and came across this post about the winner of the W. Eugene Smith Memorial Fund. If you have the time and are interested in documentary work this is for you. I'm offically adding Darcy Padilla to my list of things that inspire me.

I know lots of links but they're all worth the time.

Fire and Fireworks

Today I had my second spot news and shot fireworks in Bay City. So I got to shoot fire twice and I'll be shooting fire at least two times more by the 4th.