- Hide menu

Blog

march into the tournament

I received a phone call on Wednesday night, asking if I could join fellow Star staffer Shane Keyser in Omaha to help cover both Missouri and Kansas playing in the opening rounds of the NCAA Tournament. Star basketball guru Rich Sugg was ill over the weekend, so I made the journey north in what I hoped would be Mizzou’s starting run to the Final Four.

Sadly, and as every fan with a tournament bracket knows, Mizzou wouldn’t get far….in fact, losing in the first round, 86-84 to relative unknown Norfolk State, who gave the Tigers all they could handle (and two points more) for a quick and shocking loss for the second seeded-Tigers. In the closing seconds, Mizzou’s Phil Pressey had an open look at a three-point shot to win the game but the shot fell outside of the basket, sending Mizzou home.

After a couple of games covering Florida (who crushingly dispatched Norfolk State two days later), on to Kansas, who cruised in their opening round game against Detroit. Sunday’s matchup featured Purdue, who started the game off with a blistering offense of three-pointers and held the lead for the entire game until the 3-minute mark. As Kansas is so good at doing, they chipped away at Purdue’s lead and the final two minutes were a true nail biter. Kansas stole the ball with 23 seconds left and Elijah Johnson sealed the win with a layup. Purdue had one final shot which fell wide and KU had a true celebration, dodging a bullet and advancing to the Sweet 16 in St. Louis next week.

 

Mar 19, 2012 | Categories: personal work | Comments Off

the inevitable cell phone photo essay

You knew it was coming. After 6+ years with Alexander Graham Bell’s rotary dial cell phone, I entered the modern era of smartphones with a phone that actually, you know, had a camera in it. As a huge fan of toy film cameras, I was looking forward to experiment around with apps for Android phones and such. I have three apps I like for the phone and I use them almost daily for little pictures I shoot for myself. My favorite one is called “Vignette” which is hugely customizable and I’ve set it up to mimic the look of a Hasselblad film camera with hyper colors and heavily vignetted edges.

The Star assigned me to a story on Metcalf Avenue and its future as the main north-south street in Johnson County, carrying a huge amount of vehicular traffic every day ferrying commuters home sealed inside their cars. The street itself is a bit of a time capsule with the northern stretches around 60th Street still looking like the 1960′s and every 15 or so blocks heading south, the shift in architecture and tenants becomes a decade newer. At 119th Street, the street has morphed into big box stores, office towers and strip malls.

In the meeting we had about the story, the idea of a cover collage came up and I immediately thought of shooting the story on my cell phone. I mentioned I might give that a try but didn’t really emphasize that part of it too loudly. I wasn’t sure how that would go over but I was pretty confidant that it would turn out OK.

Over a two-day period, I cruised up and down Metcalf with my cell phone, making pictures that would read quickly as small thumbnail photos. Pretty quickly, I had shot about 250 total photos clogging up my phone with images and shutter-lag misfires. Two things I noticed about shooting this story….one, no one noticed me making pictures, at all. It was like shooting with a Leica rangefinder, only with a glacial shutter lag. Secondly, the people who I photographed didn’t think anything odd of my using a cell phone to make their portraits. I explained that I really did have actual camera gear in the car. (The only photo I shot on my Canon gear was the second picture on the top row, the overall photo of the street, which I shot with a 400mm lens and cropped into a square to match the other photos.) I spent time at Mac’s 66 full service gas station, inside the desolate Metcalf South shopping center, and looking for the iconic buildings and landmarks on the main drag.

I think this will be a one-off kind of thing at the paper…it was a zone section story, in a square format tab and a photo essay approach. The very surprising part was I had a lot of positive feedback on it, which was kind of weird, but gratifying. I guess I need to work harder with the Canon pro gear now, right?

Mar 08, 2012 | Categories: editorial, personal work | Comments Off

the end of an era

As a Missouri graduate, I was thrilled to get the assignment to help photograph the final on-campus Big 12 conference basketball game between the Kansas Jayhawks and the Missouri Tigers at historic Allen Fieldhouse in Lawrence, Kansas. For ten years, while as a staff photographer at the Topeka Capital-Journal 30 minutes to the west, I covered the Jayhawks for the paper as my “home” team.

Since the Star covers particular sports teams as a “beat” for an individual photographer (so one photographer can be tasked to cover all areas of the season with more close collaboration with reporters), I hadn’t shot a men’s basketball game at Allen Fieldhouse since at least 2006, I honestly can’t remember exactly when. I was tasked to assist Star staffer and Big 12 college basketball beat photographer Rich Sugg in documenting the atmosphere at Saturday’s game, which was sure to be the event of the season in college basketball.

Now there is no love loss between the two bitter rivals. Kansas has the upper hand with more championships and titles but games against Missouri were always a special event, emphasizing the beauty and passion of college hoops over the less emotional NBA. For the first time, I spent the entire game looking at fans and the spectacle of a rivalry that will end as Missouri is moving the SEC Conference next year.

How passionate was the game? I never wear earplugs to sporting events but Saturday, I put in a pair and it was honestly loud WITH earplugs in. The old building was literally shaking. Missouri held a big lead most of the day but Kansas made its predictable comeback and the score was tied at the end of regulation. Mizzou had the ball with 8 seconds to go in overtime but Marcus Denmon’s shot was released after the final buzzer and KU won a classic battle, 87-86. The end of an era, sadly. These two teams should be playing each other every year.

 

 

Feb 25, 2012 | Categories: editorial, sports | Comments Off

monday night wackiness

Monday Night Football, at Arrowhead, on Halloween night….for the second straight season, the Chargers visited KC on a Monday night. On a scheduling quirk, I had a three-weekend break from the Chiefs so I was happy to get back on the sidelines. When I “left” the Chiefs, they were 0-3, reeling, with much discussion about the head coach getting fired. Cue up three weeks later and three straight wins and KC was playing for a share of first place (albeit very early in the season).

The crowd was raucous, the weather was unseasonably warm for October and following a slew of turnovers from both teams, the Chargers were marching towards a certain field goal and a win in the final minute. In one of those happenings that only happens TO the Chiefs, Chargers quarterback Philip Rivers fumbled a simple snap from center and even more improbable, KC recovered. The game moves to overtime (always popular among deadline photographers) and the Chiefs prevail, winning on a 30-yard field goal and move to 4-3 on the season. Chiefs defensive players donned “Scream” masks in a photo I never thought I would shoot in my lifetime. (The Chiefs have a sense of humor? Someone’s getting fined!) I’m still shaking my head as to how the Chiefs won.

Many kudos to Star staffer Mike Ransdell for his deadline editing skills and as always, John Sleezer for his prowess with the big glass…

 

 

 

Nov 02, 2011 | Categories: editorial, sports | Comments Off

O(wwww)-and-2

Earlier in the season when the NFL schedule came out, the Chiefs drew a home opener against Buffalo and a road game against Detroit. That’s a pretty good way to warm up before getting to the meat of the really outstanding teams. Well, with a combined score of 89-10, the Chiefs are clearly the worst team in the NFL right now. And to add insult to (another) injury, in the first quarter, Jamaal Charles goes down with a torn ACL, out for the season. The only thing that was missing was the Angel of Death walking out on the field and shaking a scythe at the Chiefs, because they are DONE.

Hey, it’s tough to show how bad a team is playing. Here is my best from the 48-3 loss to the Lions (read that again, a 48-3 loss to the Lions!). Thing is, I have 14 more weeks to practice on exactly that.

On more positive notes, my Mark IV and 70-200 work much better after a week at the Canon repair shop. And Slows BBQ is legitimately good pulled pork.

 

Sep 18, 2011 | Categories: editorial, sports | Comments Off

remembering the fallen, plus some football

Sunday, September 11, 2011. The tenth anniversary of the four terrorist attacks on New York City, Washington, D.C., and Shanksville, Pa. was remembered around the world on Sunday. One of those places was Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City, prior to the season opener against the Buffalo Bills. Back in 2001, the NFL wisely postponed games for a week and in their return, the Chiefs hosted the New York Giants. I can recall Chiefs fans, generally fairly rabid about their team, gave the Giants a standing ovation on their entry in the stadium. Signs papered the interior ring of Arrowhead in support of New York and its citizens. Today, a ceremony featuring first responders, firefighters and police joined with players in holding a football-field sized American flag with a military flyover. It was a gorgeous summer day in Kansas City.

The game itself, well, the Chiefs were run out of their own stadium by the Bills in a 41-7 loss, a game that the Chiefs were widely expected to win. The Chiefs won the coin toss, chose to receive the kickoff…..and fumbled the opening kickoff of the season! Now that’s a bad sign. Of course, Buffalo marched in for an easy touchdown and the rout was on. The offense was nonexistent and the defense was porous to say the least. Chiefs fans were so few in the fourth quarter that they were easily countable in their seats. The season may be a long one after a performance like this….much like in 2008 and 2009, where the Chiefs combined for a total of six wins.

 

 

Sep 11, 2011 | Categories: personal work | Comments Off

chiefs training camp, part 2

Here’s my look at the final eight days of Kansas City Chiefs training camp in St. Joseph, Mo….which is pretty much the same as the previous eight days, only significantly less skin-searing hot than when camp began. One day, a group of Air Force soldiers visited camp, which was a much-needed visual break in the day. However, another camp is in the books! Bring on the regular season!!

 

 

Aug 21, 2011 | Categories: editorial, sports | Comments Off

missouri + august + heat + humidity = chiefs training camp

One of my favorite things to photograph is football, so in order to do so, I have to get in training myself for the upcoming season. This involves drinking many, many Gatorades, fretting about getting a variety of pictures daily for nearly three weeks and not the least of which, standing in the broiler-ready sun in St. Joseph, Mo. for every practice of the Kansas City Chiefs summer training camp. At the halfway point of this year’s camp, I took stock of my coverage so far.

Due to the NFL collective bargaining agreement, players now can only be in pads for one practice a day, which has been a blessing, let me tell you (thank you NFLPA!). The challenge of covering a training camp for any team is overcoming the simple fact that every day, the team pretty much does exactly what they did the previous day. Rinse, lather, repeat. The other things you might notice is that every picture in this blog (and pretty much every frame I’ve made) is with a 600mm lens. I carry a 70-200 and a wide angle zoom but they go untouched nearly every day as still and video photographers at Chiefs camp are mixed among the fans. No inside the ropes access, no getting closer for anything creative….it’s all Hubble telescope photography. The Chiefs like to be insulated from the media, so we all make due the best we can.

As one of the few still photographers, I try to wiggle out a little access here and there but mostly I’m looking for the smallest of variety every day to leap open. At the end of practice last week, a fan gave a yellow flower to quarterback Matt Cassel after an autograph session. Thirty minutes after a hot afternoon practice ended, Chiefs center Casey Wiegmann brought his three-year-old son onto the field for a little instruction on how to hike the ball to Dad. Neither are important pictures for the sports department but it’s a little whimsy in the field of monotony of daily training camp.

 

 

Aug 09, 2011 | Categories: personal work | Comments Off

homage to Chip

One photojournalist’s work I dig are the vibrant visual stylings of Florida-based Chip Litherland (www.chiplitherland.com) who really, really, really loves primary colors in his pictures. I had an assignment to photograph a concert in Kansas City last week and right when the light show started on the headliner band, Umphrey’s McGee, I immediately thought, “man, Chip would love this show.” So here it is in its’ bright Pantone glory, Chip. (The opening band, Quixotic Fusion, a combination of music and dance, was actually the highlight of the concert with some pretty cool visuals and sound. Who doesn’t love dancers spinning with fire??)

 

Jul 08, 2011 | Categories: editorial | Comments Off