Whats Wrong with Baseball.

Two Words: Scott Boras.

I love baseball more than any sport. I love photographing baseball. I consider myself primarily a sports photographer. More and more media access is being controled for sports teams by either the teams or the agents. Its all about publicity and getting your name in the spotlight. And there's no man in the world of baseball who does more to disparage the sport (while maiking himself a crapload of money) than Scott Boras.

Here's the deal. Scott Boras is the Super Sports agent who's latest infraction against humanity is to announce during Game 4 of the World Series that Yankee Alex Rodriguez would opt out of his multi-zillion dollar deal. In the Mmiddle of the World Series, where Boston swept the Rockies, Boras steals the spotlight for himself and his player, showing zero respect for the Red Sox, the World Series, or even baseball itself, including Red Sox outfielder & Boras client J.D. Drew ($70 mil). Don't forget Red Sox captain Jason Varitek, who's Boras' client and got a $40 mil salary from John Henry and the Sox. Assuming that Boras gets a meger 10% of those deals, it sure looks like that even $11 million of the Red Sox's money isn't enough for him to keep his damm mouth shut until the Series is over.

In a rare show of restraint, the Yankees decided not to announce their managerial turn until after the World Series was over. Shame that Boras couldn't wait one day. At least the "Old guard" of Major League Baseball - Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago - still have some class.

Boars doesn't care. He's the one who got Red Sox CF Johnny Damon to turn traitor and go play ball for the Yankees.... for $52 million. And then there's J.D. Drew. As a rookie, he wanted $11 mil from Philly for the first round pick. Philly said "F off" and he eventually got redrafted by the Cardinals.

And since the BoSox won the series, here's some from Spring Training.

Florida - Georgia

Probably my best game shooting football thus far.

Only complaints were the 12 hours spent in the car and the typical, incompetent, pain in the ass security people.

It threathned to rain the entire time. I ran my ass off up and down the sidelines, which ended up as a precurser to running with Mark Richt all over Jacksonville Municipal Stadium. Georgia beat Florida 42-30. Somehow i ended up on TV, sporting my Murphys shirt.

Fun with Designers

Prince Avenue Wolverines senior middle blocker Anna Cearley on Wednesday, October 24, 2007.

Working at a newspaper, there are some things you learn to expect. Odds are you will get assignments that force you to get as creative as possible so you have something you can print. And then there's sports, which you would think brings the least nightmare possible.

Sports is a combination of artistry, reaction time and prepositioning. You have to put yourself in the right place for the photos. Then there's the sportrait, wherein *I* have total control over everything. Or so i thought.

That being said, it really irritates me when a desk editor crops a photo to suit their liking or their preconceived page design. The last time it happened was in college (He's now a guest of the commonwealth) but now it's happening here to all four of us. They crop our sports photos, action, portrait, or whatever it is to suit their whims. The news department and the style desks don't do this, but for some reason, sports feels obligated to do so.

So this simple sportrait was massacred like Sonny on the causeway. They made it a square. Ick.

Raining Pop Art

McDonalds. Its an iconic (and nauseating) image. But every kid worldwide can recognize the golden arches. It was raining and i needed a clean bathroom, so i pulled into one on the way back to the office and made a photo.

Its the iconic bit that makes the photo work for me. To pull off these raindrop photos where you have the inverse of the main image reflected over and over needs to be large enough to be readable as well as some reader interest. No matter what it is, you have to be able to understand at a glance what it is.



.... And today marks 200 visits over the past 30 days! Woo-Hoo! So hello to Indy, Chicago (i wont mention the Cubs if you don't mention the Phillies), Boston (Go Sox. I mean it. Really.), So Cal, Deutchland, London, Sweden and Brazil.

Fun with Smoke Machines

So i've been wanting to pull off the Smoke Machine sportrait for a couple of weeks now.

Of course I didn't test the machine out before hand! A highly motivated person (meaning smart) would have teched that thing out in the living room before hand. Me? I opened the box for the first time at the shoot.

It turned out pretty well. I used the target branded one for $20. Its pretty much.... eh. You get what you pay for. I really wouldn't recommend it to all that many people. I feel i need more control over the smoke and its direction. It turned out nice i think.

The smoke was behind him and really behaving badly. The light was clearly behind. (Yeah, that was an oopsie) And the main light was a 10 degree grid spot with a CTO gel over it, shot in tung/incandescent to make the smoke really blue.

(Next time I'll probably shoot it on cloudy and toss that CTO gel on the rear light giving a big orange glow.)

At least i wasn't sick.....

Every once in awhile, when you ask, someone says yes. Case in point, a bunch of High schoolers going for a ride on an Air National Guard C-130. It was a lot of fun but a lot of bumpy as well. I felt very sick midway through so i passed on a few pictures towards the end.

Okay, i passed on some REALLY COOL pictures but i thought sitting there with my jello legs enjoying the 40 degree a/c blowing on me seemed like a much better idea then trying to take pictures of a student looking over the pilots' shoulder while he flys lazy-8's and me keeping mexican food in my tummy.

Which isn't to say it wasn't a lot of fun, because it was. Those military boys sure know how to fly.

Salsa

I photographed some Salsa dancing lessons the other day. Horribly dark and a flash didn't help much. Somewhere between 1/30th and 1/10th of a sec of people dancing. It was a lot of fun to experience; i've never seen true cuban salsa dancing done that way before.




I think that the low light really adds to capturing the intimacy and the passion of such a dance. The interesting part is that its a group dance. Usually three or four couples.