Kids, camping are distractions, but proposal paper must be done

            Working on my Master’s project this summer is harder than I thought it would be.

            There are several obstacles getting in the way of me focusing on writing my Master’s project proposal, which is due July 15.

            The primary detractors are my two kids.  I’ve been basically ignoring them for more than four years now. That’s how long I’ve been a grad student at Kent State University. They are getting used to me being “busy,” but it’s getting old for all of us, including the other parent who has been picking up the slack for far too long.

My justification for being absent for half a decade is that in the end I hope to land a teaching job, which will allow me to be home more often. I long for teacher’s hours. Being home with the family in the summer, in the evenings and on weekends is a luxury I do not enjoy now.

Life as a photojournalist is fun and exciting, but you know the old saying: “News never sleeps," and neither do I. I work at the Toledo Blade three nights a week and every Saturday. And nine months out of the year I spend four mornings a week teaching photography at Owens Community College. That’s a lot of hours away from my girls, who are 11 and 13.

They will need me in high school, so I am working hard now so I can be there for them then. I hope they understand that.

This is our new RV, with Cedar Point's water park in our rented backyard.

Another distraction is our love of camping. We just bought a new RV, which means we are in the process of trying to sell our old one. It takes a lot of preparation to go on a camping trip. A camper is meant to be used, and this summer is no exception. Camping is the only time I give my total attention to the girls. I won't give that up.

But hope is not all lost.

I have been slowly collecting the scholarly research I need for my paper’s literature review section. I’m also piecing together the required parts of the paper:  introduction, methodology, project explanation, etc. Before long I will have all the necessary components of a proposal paper!

Whenever I get to the point when I want to quit, I imagine myself doing really fun things with the kids during their final summers with us, before they go off to college. That’s all the inspiration I need to force myself to sit at the computer on a beautiful sunny day.

My hockey helmet

(Andy Morrison modeling the helmet the Blade photo staff made just for me...)

Oh, the blood, the embarrassment, the teasing...
I wish it was a hockey puck that nailed me in the head during the first Walleye playoff game against Charlotte last week. That's what many people thought when they heard I was taken to the hospital in an ambulance during the 2nd period of the game.
That would have been more glamorous. Much cooler than what really happened.
I was crawling under the bleachers to get to my photo gear (long story) when I came upon a steel bar I obviously didn't see! It wasn't the pain that the EMTs were concerned about. It was the blood. It's true that head wounds bleed A LOT.
Anyway, thanks to the Blade workers and Owens students/instructors who voiced their concern; to Margaret who taught my class for me; to Jeremy who came to St. V's to pick up my memory cards and transmitted my images for me.
A special thanks goes to the Blade photo staff who hand-made me this wonderful head protector. I'll cherish it always.

Journalism's future...

I met the future of journalism this weekend.
They are young, energetic...giggly, with a few jocks boasting their letter jackets sprinkled amongst the techies.
Kent State University hosted the Ohio Scholastic Media Assoc. state convention, where hundreds of high school journalism students attended dozens of workshops, and participated in shooting and writing contests. 
The students are being groomed to keep our profession alive, so it was wonderful to witness their enthusiasm in the workshops, taught by a mix of seasoned working media and college educators. I taught the photo ethics session, where I introduced them to the NPPA Code of Ethics and warned them of the dangers of Photoshop.
In Jon Wile's It's a Multimedia World session, he asked the students how they got their news. Very few read a newspaper. Most rely on Facebook and blogs to get their news. 
So, like it or not, the web is their future; they are the ones who will control what that future will be like in 10 years. These kids will be challenged with continuing changes in the multimedia world, like we were challenged with the beginning of it. At least they have the advantage of learning about multimedia in school. Remember when you were handed that first digital/video camera and told to go out and do your job?
Ah, the good old days... Okay, back to the future. 
The OSMA convention was a good training time had by all - the high school students, and their advisors and teachers, who also attended. High school media educators should not be overlooked because they are the ones tasked with the responsibility of preparing these budding journalists for college and beyond. 

Do photojournalists write?

Imagine this photo of Toledo Mayor Mike Bell without a caption. You wouldn't know what it's about; just a bald head against a white backboard.  He's actually pondering dozens of suggestions by local citizens to trim down the city's $43.8m deficit. (Blade Photo by Lori King)

During a recent Owens Photo Club meeting, a question was asked whether students have to write as part of the Intro to Photojournalism course curriculum.

Here’s my response: photo = photography & journalism = writing. Put the two together and you have a photographer who should at least write down the names of the people they photograph.

Writing is absolutely a part of a photojournalist’s career. After all, a photo never runs in the paper without a cutline or caption explaining what it’s about. The caption can be as long as an extended cut, like a mini-story, or as short as a name and title to label a head shot.

Either way, photojournalists must keep a pad and pen in their camera bags to document the 5Ws and the H for every photo we take, especially if subjects in the photos are easily identifiable.

It’s true that copy editors end up rewriting our captions much of the time. After all, they are the true word doctors in the newsroom. They’re armed with the AP style guide, dictionaries, spell checks, and experience. But we provide the basic facts; proper spelling of names and hometowns, and a short version of what’s happening in the photo.

It’s also true photographers at the Blade and at most other medium to large news organizations do not write stories. But photographers at smaller papers and the military do.

In fact, that’s how I started out. I was an award-winning Army journalist (journalist of the year 3 times) who took photos for my own stories. So I’m one of the few who can do both. I couldn’t image my life without writing, which is why I created this blog!

Anyway, Owens students taking the Intro to Photojournalism Course should have no fear: it’s not a course that involves a lot of writing, just getting their facts right.

 

A life, restored

A recent story on Perrysburg wrestler Nick Hyndman is a story worth reading. Nobody writes a human interest story like Blade columnist Dave Hackenberg. 

It was an honor to photographically portray this wrestler's sheer physical and mental ability on the mat.  Like the headline reads, cerebral palsy is no match for Nick. 

To read Hack's story and see my photo slideshow of Nick at practice, click on this link: Hack

The battery and the pink purse

This photo of a TV camera battery sitting on a roster next to a woman's pink purse struck me as humorous. It was at a girl's soccer game last night and I couldn't help but document the oddity of it. The owner of the purse was a reporter/photographer for Channel 11.

You see, not long ago, a woman photojournalist working on the sidelines of a sporting event was a rarity. Covering the sporting world has traditionally been a man's job. For most football, basketball, hockey, baseball games, etc., I'm still pretty much the only woman shooter there. 

I love shooting sports, being a former athlete myself, so I am often struck with the feeling that I'm lucky. I wonder if men feel the same way. Do they feel fortunate to be there, or entitled? 

I'm noticing a gradual shift in the ratio of men and women sports shooters, however. At the OSU/UT game, there were actually about 2 or 3 of us - total. Men still dominate, but hey, Rome wasn't built in a day. It's going to take women wanting and/or demanding to be there, on the field, with their male peers.

Let me share a true story that happened to me. 

When I was an intern at the Warren Tribune, I worked Sundays. An LPGA was in town one weekend, and my boss actually took me off the schedule and sent the male intern in my place. The pathetic part - he hated sports. The full-time photogs told me to go shoot it anyway, so I did. I took my own film camera with a 300mm lens (which I hand carried because I didn't own a monopod at the time), and shot the entire day. 

Know what happened? I went back to the Tribune, processed my film with the intern, and he admitted I had the better shot of the winner reacting to making her final putt. He graciously suggested I turn it in. So I did, and it ran huge on the front page. 

My pay for that day = $0.00.  My boss realizing women can shoot sports = priceless!

Jeremy the Platypus

(Photo of Jeremy Wadsworth by Dave Zapotosky)

         Blade photogs have finally turned into bonafide platypuses! 

We've been shooting video stories for our website, toledoblade.com, for a year now. All of us are equipped with Canon FS100 camcorders, the camera Jeremy is shooting with in this photo. They do the trick for a website, but I wouldn't use them for making a movie that would be blown up on a large screen. The photo department also has two Sony video cameras. We edit audio and video ourselves, using Final Cut Pro (a mac editing software). 

         The term platypus originated years ago by forward thinking photographers who knew news photogs would be delving into the world of moving images and natural sound. 

Blade photographers eased into the platypus role several years ago by first shooting Soundslides projects. Soundslides is a slideshow software that marries audio with still photos. If an assignment has video/audio potential, we video shoot it for the web. Needless to say, we can be pretty weighed down with camera equipment - doing way more for less. 

         There are times when a photographer just can't do both, though. If we're at an event that happens only once, meaning it can't be repeated, then it's better to have a still shooter as well as someone capturing audio and shooting video. Our ethical code doesn't allow us to re-shoot or set something up. That's what Jeremy's doing here, while Dave is shooting the stills. 

These multimedia skills are essential for photojournalists to find jobs these days. So get on the bandwagon!

         

To run or not to run?

David Poller started a discussion on the Wired Journalists website in regards to the New York Times running a photo of a Marine getting shot and killed in Afghanistan.  

To see the photo in question, my comment and to comment yourself, go to:

http://www.wiredjournalists.com/group/newtophotography/forum/topic/show?id=1976249%3ATopic%3A81800

What are your ethical concerns? I'd really like to know. 

Shooting the game

It's fall, meaning football season is upon us! 

These are a few photos from the Perrysburg v. Clay high school football game I shot Friday night. 

Check out more photos from the game in a photo gallery posted on the Toledo Blade website:  http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/gallery?Site=TO&Date=20090905&Category=SPORTS12&ArtNo=905009997&Ref=PH

Another life claimed by silence

Three young children became motherless this weekend. 

Their mother, only 29 years old, died Saturday morning in a fire that destroyed the East Manhattan Ave. home. It was reported in the Toledo Blade that Misty McClung's death was accidental. However, it might have been preventable.

According to the article, the home did not have a working smoke detector. Were there detectors at all? If so, were the batteries dead or missing? I posted an earlier blog about this very subject June 22. The odds of surviving a house fire when there are no working smoke detectors is tragically low. 

Those poor children are now homeless and motherless. Misty didn't have a chance against the smoke because it first puts you into a deeper sleep, then suffocates you. It's the smoke that kills sleeping occupants, not the fire. 

I've covered enough fires to make me extremely paranoid. I want you to be paranoid, too, especially if you have children, pets, roommates, whatever. Please check your house or apartment for working smoke detectors. Read my earlier blog for more fire safety tips.  

If you don't have smoke detectors, buy a couple. They're cheap compared to your life. 

Photos and Perverts

The other day a neighbor came to my house to solicit a signature for another neighbor who was running for the Toledo School Board. After a brief conversation, she realized who I was and exclaimed, "Oh, you're the photographer who put my daughter in the Blade!"

She then went on to explain how that photo of her teen daughter soaking up the sun in her backyard had gotten the attention of a prisoner in jail. He had seen the girl's picture, looked up her last name and street in the phone book and called her at home. Fortunately, the mother answered the phone both times, preventing her daughter from speaking or even knowing about this undesireable stranger. I don't blame the mom for being annoyed and frightened with that photo, because it prompted a man to call her daughter from prison! 

The photo, taken years ago, was innocent enough: She was sunbathing in her bathing suit and, because it was hot, and I mean HOT, she had brought out a typical household fan to keep her cool. I happened to drive by and saw this. In my defense, I don't think a single photographer seeking features for a paper would pass that up. I also admit I'm a bit naive when it comes to the mind of perverts. It never entered my mind that this young girl could be harassed by prisoners or stalked by predators.

To make a long story short, my fortune of finding an interesting feature turned into someone else's perverted fantasy. 

The pictures photojournalists take for newspapers wind up in all kinds of places: refrigerator doors, scrap books, wall frames, and in the hands of prisoners. It was just an eye-opener for me. Should we include street names with these kinds of feature photos? Maybe not. 

Yes, we are responsible for filling news pages.  But are we responsible to our subjects  once our photos are published? I don't think so. We just need to be mindful of who we're putting in the paper, and who our readers are...

The international language of winning and losing

The Jamie Farr Owens Corning Classic at Highland Meadows has come and gone, but the thrill of it still lingers. 

I posted a Facebook message before the final round last weekend wondering what the odds were that a South Korean would win the Farr: 3 to 1. I would have taken that bet, considering Se Ri Pak alone won 5 times! This year Eugjung Yi, 21, will have her own street in Sylvania. Not bad, since she's only been competing in the LPGA for two years. That's incredible, considering South Korea is the size of Indiana. 

The huge Morgan Pressel crowd was disappointed, of course. And so was Paula Creamer, the defending champion who had to pull out due to a thumb injury. But the competition was exciting, no matter who won. Quick recap: Yi takes big early lead Round 3, and keeps that lead until the last few holes. Pressel caught up with her on Hole 17 and forced a replay on Hole 18. 

This kind of drama is exactly why I like shooting sports. Yi desperately wanted that ball to go into the hole, and I needed to capture her reaction when it did, or didn't.  That's what sports photography is all about.  The photos say it all: Yi's ball did plop into the hole, and Pressel's didn't.

Let's hope we have a tournament to talk about next year...

The Art of Storytelling

Storytelling. It's not a new concept. In fact, storytelling is one of the reasons photojournalism was born; back in the late 1800s when photos began to appear in newspapers because editors realized photos sold papers.

 Henry R. Luce’s Life Magazine was one of the first national publications that used large photos to tell stories. It was first published in 1936.

I remember sifting through those huge pages and thinking how great it would be to be published in Life. I came close once. I shot a story for the Associated Press on Mexican farm workers who would take their children to the fields with them. I spent days in the Northwest Ohio fields documenting babies and toddlers confined in playpens surrounded by wheat and corn. The story went national, but in newspapers, not Life.

Remember when you first learned Life was going to stop the presses? Sadly, it was just the beginning of the continuing steady demise of magazines and newspapers.

After relentlessly documenting the job losses of other people, like autoworkers and mortgage brokers, we are now tragically covering ourselves. I use the word tragically, because photojournalists are the eyes of the world. Our world needs photos to continue documenting job losses, discrimination, health crisis, war, poverty and political corruption.

It’s our job to bring these atrocities to light, because the average citizen doesn’t have the power or the stage to do it. How would we know about hunger in Ethiopia or the existence of the KKK without photos to prove these things exist?

Storytelling can be done with just one photo (think firefighter carrying the baby during the Oklahoma bombing) or a whole series of photos. These captured stories can be printed in newspapers/magazines or on-line. Either way, it’s an art form that should absolutely never die.

In another posting, I'll highlight a few schools and organizations that are raising the bar on the art of storytelling.