Columbia Daily Tribune
Easter Bunny Nightmare
Saturday night I went out to a local haunted house, NecroPlanet, to photography a team of paranormal investigators checking the place out. I didn’t see any ghosts or spectres, but I saw what has to be one of the creepiest rabbits since Donnie Darko.
Independence Bowl
November and December easily saw the most travel I’ve ever done in a short period of time. Part of that came from driving down to Shreveport, La. to shoot the Missouri Tigers in the Independence Bowl for the Columbia Daily Tribune. I woke up at 5 a.m. and drove down from my parents’ house in Arkansas the day of the game. Something like a seven hour drive or so. The day after I drove back to Columbia. If I remember right I clocked about 940 miles in two days. Anyway…Photos!
Missouri linebacker Zaviar Gooden, right, snares the ball as it rolls off the back of North Carolina receiver Dwight Jones (83) for an interception during the Tigers’ 41-24 victory in the Independence Bowl in Shreveport, La.
MU quarterback James Franklin (1) — who accounted for 142 of the Tigers’ 337 rushing yards in Monday’s 41-24 victory over North Carolina — works his way past Charles Brown during the Independence Bowl in Shreveport, La.
Be sure to check out the rest of the photos at ColumbiaTribune.com.
A dream soars
I drove out to Macon, Mo. yesterday to cover a pretty cool assignment. Media and journalism get a lot of flak for giving a lot of attention to negative stories, but this one has heart warming written all over it – even if it is a little bittersweet.
Ruth Payton, 82, of Macon, in red, watches Watson, a 5-year-old American bald eagle, take flight yesterday in Long Branch State Park. Payton, who is terminally ill with hemolytic anemia — a disease that prematurely destroys red blood cells — said she had always wanted to see a bald eagle. Her hospice worker, Randi Petre, contacted the University of Missouri’s Raptor Rehabilitation Project, which arranged for Payton to come see Watson be released back into the wild. The eagle was brought to MU’s Raptor Rehabilitation Project last month after being found in Randolph County with severe lead poisoning, likely the result of ingesting contaminated fish or deer.
Watson takes to the sky after being released over Long Branch Lake on Sunday afternoon.
Komen Race for the Cure
Sunday I shot the second annual Susan G. Komen Mid-Missouri Race for the Cure. The 5k race is a fundraiser for breast cancer awareness, treatment, and research that actually started back in the ’80s but only made its way into Mid-Missouri last year.
I covered last year’s race as well and stretched myself a little thin trying to cover the entire course while carrying gear I didn’t need. So this year I packed light and hung around the starting and finishing areas for the most part. I was really pleased with the result. It would have been nice to effectively cover the course and do a slideshow like I did last year, but with runners ranging from very competitive to people just taking a stroll, I focused instead on a few key shots that I knew would summarize the event effectively.
I showed up early and got some pretty goofy shots of some women ‘break dancing’ during a warm up session. Hiked up the steps of Memorial Stadium to get a nice overall of the start of the race, followed the crowd for the first quarter mile trying to find some characters in the fray, and hung around the finish to get the overall male and female finishers.
I feel like I had a really good flow this year, and if I get the chance to cover the race again I’ll use what I learned over the last two years to finally get broad comprehensive look at the race without compromising the quality and visual storytelling of my photos.
Here’s a frame from this year with the first overall female finisher, Hannah Hassemer,
University of Missouri cheerleaders support Hannah Hassemer, the first overall female finisher, Sunday as she nears the finish line at the Race for the Cure.
Football Portraits
A couple of weeks ago I was tasked with covering Missouri’s football media and fan day. This included some portraits of a few players for featured articles in the Tribune’s college and high school football preview insert, First and Ten. It’d been a while since I’d done a portrait, and the room I was assigned to use at the stadium was the visiting locker room, which didn’t really have air so to speak. So not only was I nervous, I was sweaty. But then again, everyone in that room was sweaty.
A few days before Parker, the photo editor, and I went down to the Trib’s studio and worked out some setups for the portraits. There is a basic look that we’ve gone with for the First and Ten and we wanted to stick to that while still visually alluding to the stories the photos would go with.
For quarterback James Franklin the premise was pretty simple. Franklin was raised in a relatively sheltered home and ended up becoming a pretty modest, well mannered, and nice guy because of it. So the light set up was pretty simple. Two speedlights set off to the side about even with his head. The rest was letting Franklin be the guy he was and getting that All-American smile out of him. Which wasn’t hard. The conversation when I gave him directions went like this:
Me: “Let’s see that smile you give all the ladies.” Franklin: “Nah, just the one.”
The second portrait of the day involved three of Missouri’s linebackers, which the sports department had nicknamed the God Squad. The gist of the story was these three guys have strong Christian beliefs that they believe help them to succeed not only off the field, but on it as well. This quote from the story pretty much sums it up:
“The fusion between faith and football is not unique in college or pro locker rooms, but there’s a particularly strong thread tying together the 2011 Missouri defense, a collection of mild-mannered, devout Christians who would like nothing more than to rip off your head.”
The concept for this shot wasn’t too much of a stretch. I wanted to do something with god light and Parker suggested grouping them for a single portrait. We were also trying to streamline things as much as possible since we weren’t sure who I would get access to first, so we didn’t want to make the portraits radically different. The result, in my opinion, kind of combines god light with a little bit of Bohemian Rhapsody.
There are a few things I would have done different, but overall I was pleased with the outcome.
Check out the stories on columbiatribune.com:
Strict upbringing shapes Missouri’s new quarterback
MU defense weaved together with strong thread of faith, ferocity
Golf can be a funny sport
On Sunday I covered the Kiwanis Columbia Golf Championship. Earlier in the summer, I just missed out on getting the chance to shoot one of Columbia’s resident celebrities, Lucas Black. Black, whose name you might recognize from films like Friday Night Lights or The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, stepped out of the last golf tournament to be with his wife, who had gone into labor with their first child while Black was on the course.
Nothing kept Black from finishing the tournament this time around. He entered into the final round in third place, but fell back and ended up finishing fifth. Coolest thing though, if you didn’t know who he was, you would have never been able to tell he was any different from any other golfer out there. And I think he likes it that way.
Actor Lucas Black attempts to encourage his ball to alter course after a tee shot during the Kiwanis Columbia Golf Championship on Sunday, August 14.
Anyway, I know from my own golf outing experience that golfers can do some pretty funny things when the ball doesn’t do what they want it to. This kind of reminded me of a Broadway performance.
Soap Box Derby
Much of my Sunday was spent covering the annual soap box derby in Columbia. The people running it were awesome and really helpful with educating me on different aspects of the races. The parents and kids were really great too. I had a lot of fun just talking with everyone and making pictures. Check out the full slide show at ColumbiaTribune.com
Levi Slate races down Broadway on his way to a first place finish in the Super Stock class during the 2011 Mid-Missouri Soap Box Derby on Sunday. Slate will travel to Akron, Ohio to compete in the All-American Soap Box Derby which includes racers from all over the globe.
Francis Hagan Match Play Championship
Had a busy Sunday with the Tribune covering the annual soap box derby and a golf championship. Here’s two grabs from golf featuring Nick Wilson, the winner, and Drew Wier, the runner-up.
Nick Wilson hits his tee shot on the ninth hole of the Francis Hagan Match Play Championship final. Wilson beat former Hickman teammate Drew Wier 5 and 4 to win the event.
Drew Wier pitches out of the sand on the 10th hole on Sunday during the final of the Francis Hagan Match Play Championship at Lake of the Woods Golf Course.
Softball Super Regional
Sorry for all the softball posts, but this is my last one for a while. Sunday, Missouri defeated Washington 6-3 to advance to the Women’s College World Series in Oklahoma City, Okla. (which I will not get the chance to go to). These are my favorite frames from the game. You can see more at ColumbiaTribune.com (Hint: Use the “Start Slide Show” button to avoid hitting the 10 click paywall, unless you’re awesome and already have a subscription.)
Catherine Lee and Rhea Taylor, left, embrace while the rest of their teammates celebrate their 6-3 win over Washington in the NCAA Super Regional on Sunday. Missouri will make their third straight appearance in the Women's College World Series.
Missouri's Rhea Taylor, left, and Catherine Lee mimic playing horns in the dugout between innings while Aretha Franklin's "Respect" plays over the loudspeakers.
Missouri's Nicole Hudson beats the tag at home from Washington's Shawna Wright to score in the first inning.
Softball
From left to right, Missouri's Lisa Simmons, Catherine Lee, and Megan Christopher carry Shana White, Rhea Taylor, and Abby Vock on their backs following Missouri's 8-0 shutout of DePaul on Sunday during the NCAA Regionals in Columbia, Mo.
I covered the last games of the 2011 NCAA Columbia Regional softball tournament on Sunday. Missouri needed to win two games against DePaul in order to advance to the Super Regional. DePaul had beaten Missouri in an early round the day before in 11 innings to put Missouri one loss from elimination.
But the Tigers came back on Sunday behind their ace pitcher Chelsea Thomas, who held the DePaul offense to just three runs in the first game and completely silenced them in a shutout in the second. Rhea Taylor took up the lead for Missouri’s offense by hitting a home run in both games and finishing out with a total of six RBIs.
Missouri will host Washington this weekend for the Super Regional.
See a full gallery of images on ColumbiaTribune.com.
Earth Day
I was covering earth day for the Tribune yesterday and found this little girl dancing away. I initially thought she was with the rest of the dancers but it turns out that they had no idea who she was. I found her mother and she told me that Laeabha hadn’t ever taken a belly dancing class, just a little ballet and tap, but they come every year and so Laeabha can dance with the other dancers.
Alexis “Alika” Nixon, left, and Laeabha Shearin, 6, dance inside the Deva Dance School booth on Elm Street during the Columbia Earth Day 2011 event. Nixon and her fellow dancers from the school welcomed Shearin, who has no association with the school, and let her dancing take center stage.
Check out ColumbiaTribune.com for the story and a slideshow.
Its okay, the zombies are safe…
This fall Fear Fest, a local haunted house/Halloween attraction, debuted a new feature called the “Zombie Safari Hayride.” The attraction lets visitors ride in a tractor drawn trailer equipped with paintball guns ride through a cornfield and live out every zombie movie aficionado’s dream – “shoot the friggin’ zombies.”
When I first heard about this I figured they had set up some kind of automated systems that popped up cardboard cutouts for people t shoot at. I learned later that Fear Fest was in fact using live people, dressed up as zombies, as targets.
When Halloween was just around the corner, Tribune reporter T.J. Greaney started to receive reports that the actors who played these zombies were poorly treated and not offered adequate protection. So T.J. and I went out before a Friday night to check things out.
Turns out the operators of Fear Fest provided plenty of protective clothing and padding to their employees and made certain safety precautions with the paintball guns. We got to watch an employee suit up and check out what I would call Fear Fest’s “armory” of costumes and padding for the zombies.
So don’t worry. The zombies are safe.
Set to Cute Factor 10. Engage!
I covered a few shifts for a sick coworker about a week ago and headed out to the Central Missouri Humane Society to shoot the employees moving animals back into their newly renovated shelter on Big Bear Blvd. They didn’t actually add any square footage to the shelter, but with new animal enclosures and specialized airflow systems it is a whole heck of a lot healthier for the animals.
I had actually done a bit of volunteering for CMHS over the summer, but didn’t really stick with it. So it was nice to actually get to see these people finally get what they had worked so hard for.