Tag Archives: photojournalism

2007 Best of Tribune Photography Slideshows

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I previously linked to my Best of 2007 slideshow that Jeremy Harmon put together. Since then, the slideshows for the rest of the Tribune photo staff have gone online. This is the first time you can hear the voices of our photojournalists, talking about their work and what it means to them.

Much thanks to Jeremy, our #2, the ADOP, APE, or DDOP (whatever his title really is). Without him these would not exist.

Here are the links:

Paul Fraughton – http://166.70.44.68/multimedia/fraughton_2007/index.html

Al Hartmann – http://166.70.44.68/multimedia/hartmann_2007/index.html

Rick Egan – http://166.70.44.68/multimedia/egan_2007/index.html

Steve Griffin – http://166.70.44.68/multimedia/2008/01082008griffin_2007/

Leah Hogsten – http://166.70.44.68/multimedia/hogsten_2007/index.html

Francisco Kjolseth – http://166.70.44.68/multimedia/2008/01082008_kjolseth_2007/

Scott Sommerdorf – http://166.70.44.68/multimedia/2008/01112008_sommerdorf_2007/

Chris Detrick- http://166.70.44.68/multimedia/2008/0104_detrick_2007/

Jim Urquhart – http://166.70.44.68/multimedia/2008/01082008_urquhart_2007/

If you missed mine, it’s here:

Trent – http://166.70.44.68/multimedia/2007/1231_nelson_2007/

Red Rocks Gymnastics – Beam

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Above: Katie Kivisto

The first time I shot gymnastics was when I was sixteen. I was enlisted to videotape my younger sisters’ routines in an annual gymnastics showcase called the “Flip Fop Follies.”

I did a horrible job. In fact, I’m still taking heat for how horrible my camera work was. My sisters are still mad about it.

I think I’ve come a long way from the (and I love saying the name) “Flip Flop Follies.” The Huntsman Center, home to last year’s second-best college team in the country, is a long way from Diablo Gym where my sisters rocked the beam. In fact, I’ve photographed two NCAA Gymnastics Championships and the USA women’s team taking gold at the Olympics.

Above and below: Kristina Baskett

Red Rocks Gymnastics – Bars

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It always takes a day or two after a long vacation for things to start clicking. The rest and relaxation that comes from being away from the job clears out all of the deadline-caused tension, stress, and toxins: the very ingredients needed to create art (or in this case, creative photographs).

For me, the clicking resumed last night at the University of Utah gymnastics team (Red Rocks) preview. I was stuck with a 400mm lens (the 300′s were out on other assignments) and I tried to push my equipment to the limit.

Above: Katie Kivisto on the bars. 400mm lens.

Above: Nina Kim dismounts the bars. 70-200mm lens.

Shooting the dismount is often a waste of time. The athletes are spinning so fast that you can’t freeze the action in the low light. I got lucky.

The light in the Huntsman Center is so top-down that it can be rough on your take. Many images end up being discarded in the editing process from the poor light, especially when an athlete is looking down. These were all shot at 1/500, f2.8, ISO 1600. White balance at the Huntsman Center: 3600 Kelvin is perfect; just expect the blue cast coming up from the mats and pads.

More pictures next post…

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This is the best stuff I’ve seen, read, or listened to this week. Everything here is worth checking out and taking note of. Here we go…

Photography

1. The Bottom Line, Dallas Morning News.
A photo-essay by Mona Reeder tackling various problems in Texas – poverty, pollution, juvenile justice, teen pregnancy, etc. Absolutely amazing work. I can’t say enough. [rating: 5/5]

Film

The Kingdom, [rating:4/5]

TV

Extras Series Finale Special, HBO [rating:4/5]

Music

A couple years back, if you ordered merch from Manowar around the holidays you’d get a piece of Manowar fudge. That was great, but now comes the Warrior’s Shield, the Manowar-branded condom. Product of the year from any band, in my mind. And that’s even if someone else has done it already. Manowar does everything better and bigger. You can order a 5-pack by clicking here.

This week’s prominent tunes: Jimmy Eat World – Chase This Light, Motion City Soundtrack – Even If It Kills Me, Dropkick Murphys – The Meanest Of Times

BYU vs. SUU

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Above: Brigham Young’s Trent Plaisted (top) and Southern Utah’s Tate Sorenson look up for the rebound. BYU vs. Southern Utah Univeristy (SUU), mens college basketball, Friday, December 21, 2007 at BYU’s Marriott Center in Provo.

Just a few photos from the game last night.

Above: BYU’s Trent Plaisted runs into a forest of defense.

Forest of defense? I didn’t send that caption in for publication. Maybe I should have – it might have attracted some coveted young readers.

Just a thought: what if I got paid based on how many clicks my photos got on the Trib site? I could start creatively inserting popular search terms like “thong” into all of my captions to drive up the traffic. You know, if we got paid by hits, it might start a rash of creative captioning. But I guess the reality would be this- whenever I photographed a high school girls basketball game, I would only shoot players named Britney or Paris (or Jamie Lynn) or other names that were popular with search engines. Okay, this idea is so over. There is no one named “Anna Chakvetadze” on any Utah sports team.

In the second half, little worth watching was happening. But a couple of times guys were diving into the photo box, nearly splitting open their heads on 400/2.8′s.

This guy (Sam Burgess) just about took me out chasing down a loose ball. With a couple minutes to go and a comfortable fifteen point lead, Lee Cummard went flying into the fans diving after a loose ball.

Camera Guy – SportsShooter.Com

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Here’s the first paragraph of my latest piece for SportsShooter.Com, about a friend who recently left his job at a small newspaper:

2007 was an interesting year for newspapers. And I mean interesting like this: Imagine you’re parachuting into an orchard of spears. That’s how the future of newspaper journalism sometimes looks to those of us drifting slowly down, trapped in gravity’s pull.

You can read the whole thing here: http://www.sportsshooter.com/news/1887

I’ve been involved with SportsShooter.Com since 2001. I’ve written regular pieces for the monthly newsletter and I’ve taught at three of their workshops. But my real claim to fame is being (I believe) the 12th member to sign up at that popular sports photography and photojournalism community.

Here are the names of the members ahead of me:

Burfield, Gruber, Mangin, Mar, Hanashiro, Niemeir, Snyder, Seale, Rickman, Deutsch, and Peter Read Miller.

Each of these names brings to mind not only amazing photographs but a great person to match.

And don’t forget Grover.

Bobsled World Cup

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A few outtakes from the FIBT World Cup 4-man Bobsled Competition at the Utah Olympic Park back on the 8th. Above, the sled from Romania, piloted by Nicolae Istrate.

I covered bobsled during the Olympics. Here are the things to remember when photographing bobsled:

1. Never walk uphill. Get a ride to the top of the track and walk down.
2. It’s always too cold. Count on freezing.
3. The sleds are always faster than you think.
4. Figure out who is going to win so you can get creative with those who have no chance of a medal. If there is a team from a country without snow, that’s the perfect sled to try some crazy angle or risky technique on.
5. There are two runs in a lot of winter sports. Shoot action (on the track) on the first run, then head to the finish line to shoot reaction on the second run, like this one where the teammates of Steven Holcomb (USA) celebrate their gold medal:

Below, the sled from Monaco.

Below, Latvia. It’s a lousy photo, I’m just wondering what that photographer’s picture looked like.

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This is the best stuff I’ve seen, read, or listened to this week. Everything here is worth checking out and taking note of. Here we go…

Photography

B. The Whale Hunt / A storytelling experiment / by Jonathan Harris

A. Classics in Lego – Balakov/Mike Stimpson on Flickr. Only 4 photos (so far).
News & Journalism

Crunks 2007: The Year in Media Errors and Corrections, Regret the Error. Best and worst corrections through the year. A long read, but rewarding.

In The Land of The Juggalos, Vice Magazine, with photos by Brad Troemel. A well-written look into the subculture of Insane Clown Posse fans. NSFW.

Film

No Country for Old Men, [rating:5/5]

Music

When it comes to music, the above design says it all for me. You can get the t-shirt at diesel sweeties.

Pictureline Community

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I’ve got a bunch of posts flying around in my head, centered on a common theme that has been on my mind lately. It all started at that BYU – Utah football game, where I realized that one of the real benefits of my career hasn’t necessarily been photographing U2 from the front row, or standing on the sidelines of an NFL game, or sitting courtside watching Michael Jordan win two NBA Championships.

When I’m finally done with this amazing ride, I’ll fondly remember the people I have met along the way. The photographers. The men and women who have stood next to me at numerous events, who have shared a thousand pre-game meals, and who have the best war stories that you’ve ever heard.

To kick it off, I want to mention the Pictureline Community. Pictureline is the top professional photography store in Salt Lake City. They’ve always been web savvy and have now started the Pictureline Community as a place photographers from Utah and beyond can showcase their work as well as browse the work of others.

There is a wide range of style, genre, and skill level. Feel free to join up. It’s free.

You can check out the Pictureline Community with this link: http://www.pictureline.com/community/

BYU vs. Utah Football – Onto the Field

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Utah has a minute or so on the clock to run a few plays, and the photographers are all planning their post-game approach. Before the game we decided that two of the three Tribune photographers would focus on the winning team after the game and one would focus on the losing team. I’m assigned to the winners. I look around and see all these BYU security folk and cops with ropes around the field. I interpret this as meaning that no fans are going to rush the field and we’ll have a clear shot of the on-field celebration. I plan to sit tight and shoot from the sideline, rather than do a crazy run out onto the field.

I lean over to the photographer next to me, point to my super-telephoto 600mm lens, and say, “I’m going long on the postgame. Something tells me that’s the right approach.” He doesn’t say what he’s planning, but I’m feeling good about my choice.

A couple plays later the clock runs out and BYU has won the game. I start to take a couple of my long-view shots and immediately, something is blocking my view. The fans are loose:

A swarm of fans is rushing the field. Unless I do the same, I won’t be getting anything. So I get up with all my gear and start to run…shooting as I run…

In these situations, there’s always a big scrum in the middle of things. If you don’t get into the scrum as it forms, you aren’t getting a shot. As you can see, I’m not in the scrum.

After a moment I realize I need to find something else. There are two other Tribune photographers on the field and I’ll just have to assume that they are getting anything I’m missing.

To be continued…

BYU vs. Utah Football – The Winning Touchdown

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So BYU’s got the ball on the 11, down one point, about a minute left on the clock. I’m in perfect position for a game-winner. Put down the 600mm lens (above) and go to the 70-200. They’re that close. Check the exposure, white balance, how full my card is. It’s going to happen in a matter of seconds. I’m ready. Nothing can go wrong.

The ball goes to Harvey Unga, who runs straight through the Utah defense for the game-winning touchdown. I’m in the perfect position to capture it all. Here is my sequence:

I’ve got the perfect look at the play, until Mr. B steps in front of me. You can guess what B stands for.

I love how he’s still in front of me for the celebration. Keep in mind, there is no time to move to a better angle. This all took place in seconds.

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This is the best stuff I’ve seen, read, or listened to this week. Everything here is worth checking out and taking note of. Here we go…

Photography

1. Single Category Winners – 2007 Atlanta Photojournalism Contest.

A gallery of powerful photojournalism. Kudos to my man Chris Detrick, whose image above took a first place.

2. Philip Jones Griffiths, Photo Histories.

Philip Jones Griffiths, who’s seminal work Vietnam Inc. publised in 1971, defines goals for the thinking photojournalist. As he says, “There are millions and billions of sheets of paper in the world and millions and billions of ball point pens and pencils, but there’s only a handful of poets, great poets”.

3. Did Not, Did Too, Redlights and Redeyes.

An amazing set of images from Chip Litherland, who photographed “the Republican CNN YouTube Debate for The New York Times the other day up in St. Petersburg…I think I’m a little hungover too much Giuliani & Huckabee because something about the oversaturation of red, white, and blue in these photos just got to me.”

4. Nicolai Howalt “Boxer”, Galerie Poller.

From the page: “Throughout the years of 2000-03 the award-winning photographer Nicolai Howalt followed young Danish boys boxing in Denmark and abroad. The result is the book ‘Boxer’. The book portrays a series of young boxers in the moment before and after the match.”

I personally had this idea back in ’03 and tried it out at a Toughman competition. The problem was that the guys were so bashed up they wouldn’t sit for the “after” photo. The one guy I got to agree looked exactly the same before and after. Sucked.

News & Journalism

The Man From Fallujah – PDN

A thorough look at the short career of Bilal Hussein, the Iraqi photographer held by the U.S. military without charges for the past 19 months. I can’t tell you he’s innocent or guilty, but there are so many troubling pieces to this puzzle.

Polygamy

What Warren Said to William – The Polygamy Files

On my colleague Brooke Adams’ blog, The transcript of a call from a jailed Warren Jeffs to William E. Jessop.

Books

My review of Locas, by Jaime Hernandez, [rating:5/5]

Video

Thanks to Wooster Collective for pointing out this video, Chocolade Haas, by Sander Plug:

MusicBusy week, but this counts: Dropkick Murphys – The Meanest Of Times

25 Years of Saturdays

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We’re in the process of re-vamping our work schedule here in the Tribune photo department. I was talking with one of my colleagues, Al Hartmann, about things. Al said, “After twenty-five years of working Saturdays, I think I’m ready to be a Monday through Friday guy.”

I can’t get this thought out of my mind: What I wouldn’t pay to have a coffee table book of Al’s work, titled “Twenty-Five Years of Saturdays.” Any publishers out there?

You can see a small sample of Al Hartmann’s work by clicking here:

http://extras.sltrib.com/tribphoto/PhotogBios.asp?GID=Hartmann&sort=photog

Warren Jeffs Sentencing – The End

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There weren’t any more cameras than usual when polygamous sect leader Warren Jeffs was sentenced last week. The difference was that everyone crowded around the courthouse door.

Here’s Lamar Johnson leaving. After the FLDS members (a collection of top-tier Warren Jeffs’ supporters) had left, the only shots were attorneys being mobbed by cameras.

Defense attorney Tara Isaacson. Inside the court, the Spectrum shot the pool coverage. Once again, no reaction from Warren Jeffs. In the courtroom, he’s shown very little emotion throughout this trial.

Defense attorney Walter Bugden.

Washington County Attorney Brock Belnap.

Here’s the view from the other side, in a photo provided by an unnamed photographer. (That’s me at center right in red.)

Fall Leaves

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So many differences between now and twenty years ago in this business. Film to digital, primes to zooms, NPPA to SportsShooter, etc. But another one is this: In the late 1980s, I could drive around neighborhoods and actually find people outside doing things that lent themselves to feature photographs. Now, with videogames, television, fear, and general American laziness you don’t see as many people outside.

I used to drive around and find kids flying kites, having water fights, rollerskating, riding bikes. Once I even photographed a kid throwing a dead fish at a rock.

Saturday I was assigned to look for “Fall Weather” photos. I drove through Davis County for a couple hours and ran across only two situations where people were outside engaged in some kind of activity.

A couple I did find was Stefanie and Heidi Warren, raking up the leaves from the maple tree in their West Bountiful yard. The photos were pretty standard stuff until Stefanie started flicking the leaves into Heidi’s face. It made for a nice moment. Again, this is photojournalism. The moment wasn’t staged. It just happened, and I was there to capture it.

Now if only I had found a better place to park my car. It’s ruining the shot.

Less is More

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I’m a big fan of letting photographs tell the story. Fewer words allow the viewer to fall into the moment and interpret the scene the way they want to.

Ten years ago I had a photo column in the Tribune. Every sunday we ran a photograph of some slice of life I had wandered into somewhere in Utah. The captions were very short, allowing the viewer to take it any direction they wanted.

For the photo at right, the caption was simply, “Salt Lake City – Model and photographer.”

I knew what I liked about the moment, but I wanted people to look and figure it out for themselves. Explaining it in a caption would end the game too quickly.

One editor disagreed. He suggested that I do some reporting. He said I should have put in a paragraph about modeling in Utah with statistics of how many people model and how much they earn, etc. To me, that would have ruined the whole idea, so I ignored his advice.

The other day I linked to the photo essay Burma: Aftermath, by legendary photographer James Nachtwey. Something I noticed in that essay was the utter simplicity of the captions. Some were so obvious and lacking in content that I wondered, why caption at all?

Here are a few:

A shopkeeper gives change to a customer at the open air market in Rangoon.

Porters take a break from work.

Workers unload produce at the commercial jetty.

Men unload a truck in Rangoon.

A monk begs near the river.

(This isn’t about taking a shot at Nachtwey, so don’t even start. Any number of people could have been responsible for these captions.)

My point is that your caption information is part of your presentation. And whether your caption is long or short, make sure it’s right for the photograph and how you want it to be consumed.

Utah vs. San Diego State – Crops

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Utah quarterback Brian Johnson scrambles. Utah vs San Diego State (SDSU) college football at Rice-Eccles Stadium.

Back to football. For the above image, I’m flat on my stomach, lucking out with that guy’s legs. That’s the full frame. I’m still trying to compute the best crop out of it.

Above is the full frame, below the crop. Notice the difference in impact.


A group of Utah defenders including Greg Newman (left), Stevenson Sylvester (bottom) and Joe Jiannoni (right) bring down San Diego State running back Atiyyah Henderson. Utah vs San Diego State (SDSU) college football at Rice-Eccles Stadium.

Again, above the full frame and below the crop.

Utah defenders Koa Misi (left) and Alex Puccinelli sack San Diego State quarterback Kevin O’Connell. Utah vs San Diego State (SDSU) college football at Rice-Eccles Stadium.

This one really ticked me off. I was in the right spot to catch a wide shot of the touchdown dive, but there was a penalty called and the play didn’t count. Full frame above, crop below. I kept this one pretty loose.

Utah’s Derrek Richards dives into the end zone for what would have been a score, but a penalty nullified the play. Utah vs San Diego State (SDSU) college football at Rice-Eccles Stadium.