Weekend shooting and snoqualmie pass

Well after my last post was cut short due to what I was told was a house on fire, turned out to be a shed not the house. But Ive got to go to those things, you never know when your going to get a great shot, not that I like to see peoples things on fire, just part of the job. Well to finish off Friday evening, after heading to the fire, I went to EHS basketball, I shot the second half of the girls game and the first half of the boys. Here's what we ran from the girls game.

Ill get to Saturday in a sec, but a quick complaint about the cold weather here. After getting back into my car on Friday evening from the fire, my hands were hurting even with gloves on. I started the car and it promptly said -4 on the temperature read out. That's ridiculously cold. I know its off probably a bit, but still a little chilly to be working in. Makes me feel for those who are always outside in these temps working. Ok, I'm done with my little rant about the temperature.

Saturday morning was good, I got to see one of my best friends, whom I haven't seen in a while. Casey and his brother Tony and their girlfriends came to eburg for some portraits, for a Christmas present, for their madre. We did some very informal shots with a black background, consisting of two sheets, super high tech I know and som strobes. After shooting the two of them, They each wanted shots with their significant others, which we did. It went well, then came time for shots of the dogs with them.

They had two small dogs, one was a English Bulldog, Casey if your reading this I'm gonna steal him from you, and a Chiuaua (the yo quiero, taco bell type dog). The first couple shots we got were ok, then I was informed of how to get the animals to look at me which is helpful. I have used squeaky animals toys for dogs, shaking oats in a bucket to get a horse to look, along with string to get a cats attention for pictures. We had none for the above.

To get these two to look, the key words for Napoleon, the bulldog I'm going to steal, the key word is "hungry" in a high pitched voice. He perks up like a champ at who ever says it. The yo quiero dog's key word is "pupperoni" also said in a high pitched voice, which I'm am suited well for, thanks dad. yes its pupperoni, not pepperoni. I'm guessing thats a treat for the yo quiero. Anyways said in tandem, Pupperoni and hungry can roll right off the tongue, and get the animals to look. This made the photos better, getting them to look that is, and causing considerable laughter in the room every time I said it, myself included. I wish It would have been on video.

Anyways, after that we went to a local park and got some outdoor shots with the snow. Other then the fact it was cold, hence the snow, it was fun. its always nice to photograph people who are comfortable in front of the camera, three of the four were. Tony got better toward the end. It makes my job easier, when people are comfortable, things seem to flow better, it lets you capture those candid moments that wouldn't normally occur if someone is not comfortable.

So after all this I was ready to head to the West side, plan was to go home and pack quickly and grab some food and leave. Well "was" was the key word. Remember how its been freaking cold here, well I'm about to leave and look over at the kitchen sink and it should be dribbling slowly. Its not, I accidentally turned it off after getting some water the night before. I turn it on and nothing. I check under the sink and see some ice, Awesome, the pipes froze. Call the landlord, he really cool, we put a heater on under the sink and he tells me to head out if I want to, after making sure he is ok with that I head out. I guess he had to crawl under the house to put another heater there too.

Then comes the pass which wasn't so bad, had to do about 45 miles an hour most of the way, visibility wasn't great, but oh well. I made it to my friends house in Bellevue, where they were having a Festivous celebration. It was me and the four of them, others were invited but stayed home because of the weather. We had the airing of the grievances which was hilarious, kind of got to roast each other while we were at it. Its something that I hope continues. We then went out and had some fun in the snow with the football. We threw it around the street, in between cars.

The next day it was the Seahawks game, I shot it and Ben and Arron went to it. It was cold but the snow made for a cool atmosphere especially with the photos. Ill get some up here in the next day or two. it was Mike Homgren's last game as the coach in Seattle, so he did a lap around the stadium, which was a circus trying to get a photo of, but I got one. Another thing that made the game different then usual was all the snowballs flying from the stands onto the field. The last 5 minutes of the game they were flying from every where you looked, being on the sidelines I got nailed a couple times.

Following the mess of snowy roads surrounding Qwest Field we made it back to Bellevue and then I headed back to Eburg. The pass was again alright, just took it slow and made it. As far as today, went in to work for a bit this morning and then a whole lot of nothing, which has been nice. Ill get som photos up from this weekend soon.

Had an uneventful day so far, Im currently waiting to go shoot some prep basketball, Ellensburg is playing Cashmere I believe., There are two games, the girls followed by the boys. I got my first taste of prep bball this year earlier this week at Kittitas. I got lucky to get a shot of the girls game as it was ending when I got there. props to my sports editor for calling me and telling me they started early, otherwise I would have missed it all. I got into the gym with about 2 minutes left in the 4th quarter. I did the best I could in two minutes of game time. here is the photo we ran of
the girls game.

01

I like the photo, but I think the backround takes away from it, a little bit with the people in the stands. Im starting to notice my backrounds more then I ever have, not that I didnt before. I gues its part of my evolution if you will in my attempt at becoming better at photography. The way the gym is set up does not afford the opportunity to get back more then two feet from the edge of the court on the ends, makes offensive shooting tough sometimes. Its only a couple of years old though and the lighting is nice, which is rarely said about gyms.

I had more time to make some photos of the boys game, I stayed for the first half of that which seemed like an eternity as the whistle blew alot. The photo we ended up using was a Kittitas player under his own hoop looking to pass around a defender. the Coyotes did not com out looking good and had scored 12 at halftime when I left, but somehow pulled it out in the end. Heres the shot we used from the game.

So Im hoping to improve upon my bball photos this year, Ive shot a couple CWU games too, but again nothing great. .....Had to leave quickly was told of a house fire, turned out to be a shed on fire.

Blue Munkee, with a gobe thrown in

So as you may have read, I'm sitting in my clean office posting this, I'm rather proud of it, If you cant tell. A quick rehashing of today goes as follows, wake up to a call from a co-worker around eight a.m. asking how to fix blue munkee, apparently its not working. Not fully being awake I tried to explain what to do, no dice. Next get a text from the boss saying they need me to fix it. for anybody who does not know, Blue Munkee (its spelled that way on purpose) is a color correcting piece of software which we have at the paper. I don't call it a program, because in my opinion its not finished. There are random errors which all anyone can do is clear, because for the most part we don't know what they mean. the program did however come with this sweet stuffed animal (a blue monkey) which adorns my desk at home, in my clean office. (had to sneak that in).

I respond to the text saying I should be in about 9 a.m. I end up getting in about 20 minutes after nine. Hadn't looked outside to see the snow I would have to clear off my car, when I told him 9.

I get there and think I have taken care of the problem, but no such luck. To make a long story short, i ended up hand color correcting our photos this morning. I try messing with the program for about thirty more minutes and finally call the tech person for the blue munkee company in Georgia. He walks me through five or six steps and its up and running. While I was on the phone with him he tells me its usually hot there "about 80" he says. I'm thinking awesome as I look outside and see snow flake coming down the size of quarters. I will trade snow for 80 degree weather any day of the week.

After playing fix it on the software with tech guys help I'm given some extra responsibility as my boss is going on vacation for the next week or so. Nothing to really worry about, just a bit more content to update on one of our three websites, here, here and here. Soon to be four I think. Then its off to find some more snow photos, happy ones I'm told to look for. Apparently what I took yesterday for a snow shot was not happy. My boss told me I glared at him when he said happy snow shot, I'm sure it was more of a glance, that's what I'm going to go with at least. So I'm thinking maybe some kids playing or a snowman or something along those lines, to make a happy shot.

I head off to get the keys to the company car from the publishers office, he has wrapping paper hanging from his office door frame all the way to the floor. I though maybe he was in the holiday spirit, i peek my head in his office to ask him for the keys and all over his floor a inch deep of so are green packing peanuts. Apparently a gift form another employee. Thankfully hes not mad. They later sent an email out about the prank in his office. I wouldn't have done it, but its funny never the less.

I head about and get some shots of a snow plow and a scenic type shot with some snow covered trees with a horse near them. Nothing spectacular. But its content. Then its back to the office, download and then head over to the library to get some other art for a future photo illustration. I was shooting a globe for our person of the year illustration. Kind of a pain to get what I wanted, but after some experimenting with a couple different lens combinations, and focal lengths I settled with a 200mm with a teleconverter to get the portion of the globe as big as possible in the frame. It really was not that exciting, although I'm sure I looked out of place in the Ellensburg Public library with a telephoto lens set up on a tripod and shooting at a globe 5 feet away or so.

After getting my shots I was about to leave and said by to a Ellensburg city council member who Ive taken photos of before. We end up talking for a bit about scandals and national politicians and tonights meeting. The meeting is a continuation hearing on development at the West interchange in Ellensburg. A family who owns land there is trying to get their land rezoned so they may develop it with stores among other things. I have no Idea when a decision will come but it is a pretty hot topic in this town. the process or idea has been going on longer then I have had my job and that's about 3 and 1/2 years.

That was basically the extent work day, I'm tyring to get motivated to clean another part of the house, I don't think the motivating myself part is going so well. Cause of this stuff like this.

A little introduction

Let's start off with the basics, Im currently living in Ellensburg, WA. its about an hour and a half from Seattle. Im almost done with my degree in Broadcast journalism at CWU, its been a long road with a long break in between. But I wouldnt trade my experiances for anything, they build character, or at least thats what Ive been told, still not sure about it, but I will run with it.



Along with finishing school, I work full time for a small six day a week newspaper, the Ellensburg Daily Record. I do all kinds of things at the paper, but my main focus is photography and multimedia projects. I will inevitably talk about work quite alot, It kinda runs my life at the moment. Im in my mid twenties which is scary for me to say, not sure where the time has gone.


What else, Im origionally from Snohomish, Washington would like to eventually get back that side of the mountians. But as I have learned lately the best laid plans can fall trhough very quickly. I'm kind of a tech person, I love having and playing with gadgets, although Im in the worng field to pay for them. I also a sports fan, Seahawks and Mariners, and the sonics (if they ever some back or the nba expands, Im not a big clay bennett fan but thats another whole post.) Im also looking forward to catching a sounders game or two, and getting some good photos of them if the opportunity arises. Seattle sports are not our paper's priority, so whatever I do over there is on my own time. Im also into music, but not obsessed, I know its cliche, but I listen to a variety of things, just depends on the mood im in. Well thats about it



Any feedback I can get would be much appriciated as Im new to this.

Snow, accidents and cleaning

You may wonder what snow, accidents and cleaning have in common, well that's a damn good question. If I didn't have the answer I would ask it too. The first two seem to go hand in hand, the later, sorta sticks out. Lets see here where to start, the snow sounds like a good idea. Ellensburg Thankfully didn't get dumped on, which is good, but that doesn't mean I-90 is a gem to drive on either. Granted the conditions were not great but it was still drivable, just at some slower speeds then some drivers decided to drive today.

I grabbed the company car and headed to Elk Heights area on I-90 Three accidents blocking one side or the other of the interstate within three mile either partial of completely. So I get some safety shots of the backup from the overpass. Time to park the car and see what better shots I can get of the closest accident, Out and walking. Now its no that often that you get to walk in the middle of a major freeway, its not recommended. Thankfully for me it was closed at this point for an accident further up. Walking/ jogging up the westbound lanes, about a quarter mile up I see some lights. A trail blazer has rolled over and is getting up righted by a tow truck. Traffic is being guided around by state patrolmen. I'm in the median at this point, getting some photos that tell the story, snowy freeway, traffic being guided by the scene and the tow truck driver tossing belongings that had spread across the east bound lanes when the vehicle rolled. The vehicle is in rough shape, but sill held its form, minus the windows. After getting a couple shots off, I was introduced to another state patrolmen who I had never met before, he was wondering what I was doing, after a a quick exchange, he graciously let me get what I needed and I headed back to the car. They were not the greatest photos, but better then the safety back up shot I got before.

We ran one of the trail blazer on our website here.

Not being satisfied and apparently not cold yet, I give the boss a call and let him know I want to try to get a better shot of another accident. I was told a semi had rolled a mile or two down the freeway, he gave me the go ahead, off I went. The freeway was still closed so I took a back road which paralleled the freeway to a point. After finding the accident, I pull off and sure enough there is a ten to 12 foot tall wire fence (to keep these guys out) in may way, did I mention the foot or so on snow on the ground. After tromping though the snow without boots, smart decision by me, and climbing the fence I climb the embankment to the accident. Sure enough the semi is on it's side along with the trailer, they are separated already, blocking one of the westbound lanes. I composed a couple shots of the state petrol car and the semi truck and then move to the median to get some overall shots of the scene. Traffic is starting to come by and some more photos follow, I hang out for about 30 minutes and head back to climb the fence and the heat of the car.

Getting back to the office, I get a chance to look at the photos and like what I see, hind sight being 20/20 I would have stayed there a bit longer to try and improve what I got, but my jeans were soaked. After putting up the trailblazer photo on the web and writing a caption for it, I headed home. I normally don't get to leave early, but I'm playing catch up on some hours.

Now the last part, the cleaning, my office at home was getting pretty

cluttered, so I started cleaning it and believe me it needed it. here's a post cleaning shot.

Its not totally done but its getting there. And it needs to be followed by every other room in the house. So That about covers it

This being my first attempt at blogging, I would appricate any feedback you have.