Day one: Lon(un)don(e)

After a most wonderful week photographing the 2012 WFDF World Junior Ultimate Championships in Dublin, my sights are refocused. Refocused from shooting a great week of sports and making new friends at the tournament and in the city pubs. Refocused to the big city. London. 

London. What can you say that's already not been said? Okay, tending to my new Dubliner friends, maybe the words are not always so complimentary. Even my last cabbie of my trip, all of whom were wonderful, two of whom got lost in their own city, told me the history of the street we drove on towards the airport, Collins Avenue and Michael Collins. His voice kept getting stronger and I feared more angry as he explained the fate of this early age IRA leader, not to be confused with the IRA of more recent history who have included acts that have killed innocent people. 

Anyway, I'm now in London. London is such a big city, it's hard to know where to begin. I knew I could not do it in a day. So thankfully, I've given myself a few days to try to take in this town for the first time. 

I browsed some books, but more often than not, I find talking to people is a great way to enter a city. Thankfully, one of my new friends I met covering the Ultimate event helped me to enter London. And how we met is fitting to such a role. You see, upon arriving in Dublin last week, seeking my way to find the Ultimate venue, I happenstanced upon Karen, team coach of the Australian U20 Women's team. Karen overheard me asking for directions to the pitches (fields) of the tournament on the Dublin City University campus. She kindly offered to not only provide directions, but guide me there. After trudging more than an hour from the airport via bus and walk with my 40 pound backpack of photo equipment, a side bag with my laptop and my two week supply of luggage (actually compacted as one week), I was more than pleased to have someone point me in an efficient direction. 

So on Saturday, the last day of the tournament, Karen and I got a chance to talk a little. She too carries a camera and we photo types tend to find one another. When I told her I was heading to London, she told me of her blog of visiting London by area, based on living there for a couple of years. Karen's never steered me wrong, so I was confident her blog would be my wayfinder once again. It was confirmed when her top points of interest matched up with my own independent list!

So away I went today. And how fitting. My first encounter with was Australia House. 

From there, I followed Karen's directions and walked eastward to St. Paul Cathedral. I admit. I'm partial to St. Paul. No, I'm not Catholic and have no idea what patron Saint he was,if any.  But my middle name is Paul (as in Sir Paul) and I live in the Twin Cities of Minnesota and St. Paul is our State's capitol.

Oh, yeah. And as I walked and peered, I was thrilled to see a Surly Cross Check bike, made in Minnesota! I have one of these. This is a biking city, as much as people I heard coming here said it was not. 

From St. Paul Cathedral, it was southward to Millenium Bridge. I literally chucked when I read Karen's blog post, "It's just a bridge."

Maybe this quote fits. 

Agreed. No reason to set too high expectations here. But personally, I happen to love bridges. They have meaning, hopefully, in both form and function. And beautiful bridges can bring people together in ways that not only bring differences together, but celebrate our likenesses. So here is one view of Millenium bridge from the perspective of how it can creatively enable movement both horizontally and vertically to connect us.

And connect them they may. Sitting nearby this bridge was a lovely couple. Tom, and, well, she was too shy to say. They agreed to my taking their photo. And what attracted me was that I loved the background as much as the foreground! (I'll send a copy to them.) 

And then, yes different, but perhaps better described as real oddities (e.g. "scary!") appear too. 

Walking on, following Karen's agenda, I headed eastwards and a bit southerly to the market. Smart move. Grabbed some chibata, cheese and bottle of wine that gave me a reason to sit on the grass and watch the word go by, with the Tower Bridge as the backdrop. 

I did my duty of taking photos of many a couples and families. "How much?" a woman asked. "No, your camera, I tried to explain, with her English literate son translating for us.That in itself was a joy. (People tend to ask those with bigger cameras  for help, and if the camera they are using is too small, it's quite intimidating to know how to actually use it!) 

But some beautiful views of the Tower Bridge appeared before us and hopefully many others too were able to capture it. Including the Olympic Rings that are in the horizontal position (strapped?) following these games and the forthcoming Paralympics. 

And a final bid adieu to my first day in London. 

Sure it's large. But like anything that is big, it's often big because it's made of many small things. I see London as very approachable. Approachable if it's undone, taken apart, savored in bits and pieces. Better that than trying to jam it all down in one sitting. I appreciate I've got a few days here to let my own system digest it in parts. I expect it will only leave me hungry for more. 

Making Connections: MSP>AMS AMS>NBO

It was Thursday March 8, 2012: Embarking on this journey, I was certain of one thing. It was going to be about making connections. After all, the purpose of my visit for the next 2+ weeks was to use all of my senses to observe, seek and connect with my brand new place. A place I could hardly pre-visualize. 

The moon over the wing of Flight DL258
over the Atlantic Ocean

My first connection was an enjoyable one as I rested in window seat 24J. A young woman from West St. Paul sat with me who was flying to Kiev to re-connect with a college friend. A new adventure for her. That sounded like a great trip. But flight connections, even those that last 8-hours, are fleeting. And I found myself gazing out the window wondering what I would find. I couldn't help but feel a strange sense of being alone without connection as I peered out the window to a cold distant moon above and the Atlantic below. 

Airport hubs. That's where connections are made. Amsterdam's Schiphol is one of the world's most efficient if not pleasant places to travel. A place of constant motion, visual and verbal cues direct traffic and facilitate connections. 

Schiphol Airport is bound with people making connections.

Time and direction to connection

I love the kiosk that shows how many minutes you are from the gate from that point. In other words, can you pause to shop or eat, leisurely stroll, or if necessary make a dash to make your important connection. You don't want your name as one being announced on the P.A. system by the kind voice that says, "Mr. Kotvis. Please proceed to Gate C9. You are holding up your flight. If you do not board your flight now, your luggage will be off-boarded."

Dude's plugged in. Tuned out.

Sitting at my gate waiting for my connecting flight, I was itching to become open, talk with someone. Some are more open than others. I tried with an effort with the guy sitting next to me having his snack. But, oh it's hard to connect with someone who is plugged-in to their own world and tuned-out to the world immediately around them. My luck changed when he left and older woman replaced him in his seat. She was heading from Germany to Hawaii for a Crimson Circle conference. Interesting and entertaining connection.


All those travel related connections went fine, including the pleasure of meeting a guy from Jacksonville who was traveling to Nairobi to help a missionary with his orphanage. The man on my left was making connections to his homeland, visiting his family and friends who he's left to be able to work in the U.S for the past nine years. Those would be nice connections for him. 

Connected to warm and sweet destination

Stepping off the plane in Nairobi, my olfactory nerve was touched. There was a sense of warm sweetness in the air. 


Yes, warm sweetness would prove pervasive in the connections I would make yet to come. 

Many sights to come. But what's the insight?

In just a few days, I'll be boarding a plane for a trip of a lifetime. All trips are trips of a lifetime I have to admit, because there's a new experience to just going down to the corner store to buy a gallon of milk. But this trip really feels special because it will be to somewhere many people live but somewhere I've never been; Nairobi, Kenya. Best yet, I'm going there with the purpose of photography, videography and audiography. (If  indeed audiography is in fact a word.  But functionally it's on par with the two other visual components.) 

It's not fair to actually say that the purpose of my trip is to photo, video and audio record. Those are just the methods of collecting information. The real purpose is to create a hopefully interesting, insightful and perhaps even provocative story or stories. Stories that will help explain for my "client" Friends of Ngong Road. http://ngongroad.org/default.aspx 

Ngong Road is a wonderful organization of whom we have supported for a number of years through sponsoring a couple of children. As described on it's home page, The mission is, "to provide education and support for Nairobi children living in poverty whose families are affected by HIV/AIDS to they can transform their lives. Friends of Ngong Road pairs each sponsor with a specific child allowing mutually beneficial relationship to develop."

The reason I refer to Ngong Road as a "client" complete with the quotation marks, is because as much as I am making this trip as a volunteer, donating my time and efforts and expenses to this trip, and my friend Keith Kale who invited me to do this project keeps saying, "Steve, you'll do great. Whatever you do will be a big improvement over what we have," I keep trying to explain to him that I have little experience with this kind of thing, and am in fact just picking up the skills behind videotaping and audio interviewing. My class this semester at Minneapolis Community and Technical College has been a heaven sent, at least making me aware of the tools I need to perform some of the video and audio recording side of things. 

But, my advertising and branding background keeps creeping in. As much as I have been fortunate enough have  my camera take me to a new place I've never been, I can't help but keep wanting to give myself some direction on what to seek and look for going into this so foreign land. 

What is the insight behind all the sights? What goes beyond the cliche of poor children who are victims in need? Is the story about making a difference? Is it about hope? What can be said that compels those of us so fortunate to be able to help to do something about this situation? 

And then I am constantly pressed with my own challenge. Is it simply romantic feel good for us who can, to "save the world" while at the same time we have incredible misfortunes and inequities and human rights issues right in our own cities, perhaps as close as two to five miles from our own homes? It doesn't need to be one or the other, but there sometimes seems to be a capacity or a saturation point for caring. It just seems worth questioning. 

But the important first step now is to first take my meds, pack my gear and take the first step of the journey. The journey will take me to four schools in Nairobi. It will take me into the streets of Nairobi to see everyday life. It will take me inside the homes of a number of families where the students of Ngong Road live, to visit, to talk, to listen, to hear and to see, with my cameras, audio equipment, ears, eyes and heart. Even with the several books I've been reading to become acclimated, I don't imagine I'm at all prepared for this trip of a lifetime. I try not to read too much into today's headline, Photographer Grieves-Cook dies a story about a Nairobi photographer who jumped to his death to escape from armed thugs." Okaaay.

I will do my best to post the progress of this trip on f/go Rambler as it occurs. So you are invited to check back. 

Visually recording a record event

April 16th was national Record Store Day http://www.recordstoreday.com/Home, a perfect match for a photo assignment for my composition and design class.  We needed to shoot at least 150 images and narrow them down to just five that were somehow linked to a series. What would be more natural than taking a photojournalistic approach and covering an event that overlaps with a interest for local music. 

On the eve of this day that celebrates the local charm and cool factor that surrounds the experience of actually stepping into a record store to flip through the stacks, expose yourself to new sounds and learn about music from those more passionate about music that we can only imagine. I still thank Rob (John Cusack) in "High Fidelity" for selling me The Beta Band record! The project took me straight to my favorite Minneapolis record store, Electric Fetus.

This was a cold wet night, just what I was hoping for to get some "edgy" urbanscape reflections. Add whipping winds and rain that quickly filled the lens and the plan worked out just part way. But thanks to one of the managers Paul, I felt very welcome to shoot the event. He encouraged me to come back early in time to capture the line that wrapped around the building before they opened the next morning. I knew that this was going to be fun if these record store fanatics were going to brave these 30 degrees temps for the chance to get their vinyl rewards. I took the opportunity to pick up a half dozen CDs before the next day's crowds swarmed. 

"Move on buddy. We're not interested"

My adventure took me to a second record store too, but the experience was wholly different. While I got to the second store Treehouse just after their 9pm closing, and I admit I didn't get the same chance to warm up to the management in the same way, what I did encounter was not cool. Approaching Treehouse, I saw the lights on and guys huddled around the front counter, seemingly readying for the next day. I tugged on the handle of the glass door only to find it locked. I pointed to my camera, letting them know what I was up to and then backed away to take a series of shots. Admittedly, this took some time. I was shooting HDR (high dynamic range) shots, so the series of shots in the dark ranged from 30-seconds on down, and five shots per try. At one point, the inside lights went dark. Finally, after perhaps 3 to 4 minutes, one guy cracked open the door and yelled out, "Okay buddy. Move on. Get going." I have to admit I was taken aback. I felt like he was treating me like some drunk pissing on his building." I replied in my optimistic South Park character Butters' tone, "It's for tomorrow," only to be curtly replied, "We're not interested." I walked back to my car down the street a bit wounded, but also resolved that I wasn't going to give that store my photo coverage the next day, much less my business in the future. 

These guys got here at 4:30!

Arriving bright and early the next morning was as described. The first two guys in line had been there since 4:30 am. Second in line last year, they vowed to be track one on this year's release. And they came prepared, having brought a portable gas stove to make early morning waffles. By the time I arrived, breakfast was all cleaned up and put away, so it seems I need to get there earlier next year if I want a shot of that!

The line of record store supporters snaked around the building

As promised, the line of record store enthusiasts snaked around the building. I didn't get a good count, but when shooting it, it seem the number walking through the doorway at the initial opening approached some 100. People came and went all day. 

Crowds took in the day's experience

Once inside, record store enthusiasts checked out their favorite artists, on vinyl, CD and live! 

 

Live performances featured Fort Wilson Riot, Holly Newsome of Zoo Animal, Ben Kyle of Romatica, Haley Bonar, Christine Brown and No Bird Sing. The final set (which I regrettably missed) featured Low.

Haley Bonar returned from West Coast to release her new CD

Ben Kyle of Romantica played a nice set

It was a fun time visually recording Record Store Day!

Shooting the best, with the best

This past week I had a special opportunity to photograph the best college hockey players in the nation at the 2011 Frozen Four NCAA national championships. Wow. 



I got to shoot the event because I was credentialed by Southcreek Global Media, a company where you have to be referred by a fellow photographer to get reviewed and if you get approved you have the opportunity to shoot events under their name. (Many thanks you to my referring photographer who wishes to remain anonymous.) The shots get uploaded to their distribution system. If they get purchased by national or international clients, such as media outlets and companies, I get paid. If nothing sells, I don't get anything. So it's speculative, but a pretty good risk factor for someone like me who needs to have a means of access to big time events and distribution network to get the shots into the marketplace. As a result of this relationship, I don't sell the images directly. I can show my photos but only with the Southcreek watermark (except for the some that I will not submit to SCG because they are not interested in non-standard sized images or personal shots.)

So the night before the event, I shot some photos of the exterior of the Xcel Energy Center, the venue for this pinacle of college hockey sport. It's a great venue in that it's where each year in Minnesota, "The State of Hockey" it's where the state high school hockey championships are held. Lots of hockey dreams are associated with this place.


Because of the gravitas and romantic nature of "the X" I used two newly learned techniques to shoot it: Pano and High Dynamic Range (HDR). The first shot above i used both. The panoramic technique was surprisingly simple. Just use a tripod. Line it up and shoot the series. The HDR technique was way easy too. The camera and software does all the work. All I had to do was to get my light settings right, and set the camera to shoot a bracketed range of exposures. I went +2 and -2 on both of the building shots above, so it was capturing 5 shots , +2, +1, 0, -1 and -2 and then collapsing them into a single image. I did some addition tweaks to make it pop just how I liked it. I was pretty pleased that it reached the affect I was after.


Thursday it was game time. I got the X parking lot about three hours before the first of two games. As strapped my gear onto my back, I saw a fellow photographer loading up too. We took the walk into the X together and he told me his name was Eric Miller and had been shooting for Reuters for 27+ years. What a great guy. He made a point of waiting for me as we got our credentials. He was familiar with the place and wanted to be sure I knew where to go. Only later did I figure out that this was my first of many encounters with "the best." Fast forward to after the championship game on Saturday: I was doing some quick research to caption a photo and landed on the New York Times page, with an image by Eric, as he sat right behind me! 


Another great guy I met was Pat Green. Pat noticed my credentials after I sat down in the workspace next to him, plugging in my laptop and unloading some of my equipment with hardly the faintest idea of what I needed to do next. He told me that he too shot for Southcreek, and that he'd come up from Dallas to shoot this event. Pat was a heaven sent, showing me the ropes, giving some great advice on how to do my best for Southcreek. Pat's been doing this work for several years too and loves it. Can you tell? 

This start and this space helped me realize that I was surrounded by men and women photographers, maybe two dozen or more, who were here because they loved shooting sports. They were the best at what they do from all around the country as well as locals who really know their sport in this State of Hockey. Not to mention I was amongst the ESPN team, bumped sholders (almost literally as I entered an elevator, with ESPN analyst Barry Melrose. 


Geez, did I feel pretty okay about all of that.  


More later. I've got a high school baseball game to shoot now so will get back to this story afterwards. 

Chapters of stories focuses shooting

In shooting sporting events, there are so many compostions to consider. Deciding where and what to shoot is one of my greatest challenge as a photographer. It's easy to take on a photo opportunity and approach it as I've done it in the past. But the more I shoot and the more I learn about what I'm doing, I trying harder to consider the stories I'm wishing to tell. Many stories and better yet, many different chapters. As told through my lens from some recent events, here's a mix of chapters to sports stories.

Isolated and simple. Shooting single subject with a simple background is a wonderful way to present an athlete. An image that isolates the individual and includes the pure image of the athletic performance tells a story that often suggests precision, striving for perfection and focus that is all in the context of personal dedication and sacrifice. 



Pairings. Sometimes photos show great pairings; one-on-one, mano-mano, or girlo-girlo! As self composed the athletes may be, these shots often represent two forces coming together. One's going to get and one's going to give. Best shots are not when one athlete is dominating another, but when there's that ultimate back and forth struggle, when one wins one battle and the other the next. 

Opposing forces. While it's often preferable to capture the faces of the clashing titans, that's not necessarily required. The sheer physicality of athletes forcing their wills upon one another can just as effectively tell a compelling story of struggle and striving for dominance in a pairing. 

Instants. There are times when a sporting event has a single instant that without a photograph passes as a flashing moment in time. The start of a race, the pivot of balance in a wrestling match, the tip of a ball, the stretching reach of a first baseman. These instants are can be game changers, but may just be routine plays. It's hard to always tell the difference until what elapses just following that instant. 

Boosters. It's wonderful to help include the story about the place and context and what got us all here. Regardless of what level of sport, most athletes could not be where they are without the support of families, teachers and friends. Interestingly, last year while at a dinner for some US Ski Team atletes, one of the Olympians said just this when she and thanked all those who supported her for allowing her to be so selfish, for without them letting her be so self absorbed she would not be there. Fans, organizers and volunteers often make it possible for these contests between athletes take place. They are definitely an important chapter in the story of sports. 


There are so many more chapters and stories. But I find it helpful to think about these different angles to storytelling with photography. 

Writing with light beyond the photograph

 

Break down the word photograph and you get photo = light plus graph = write. So it's about writing with light. A story. Hopefully, a compelling one.

But what happens when we take a photo and go beyond the actual image that's been taken? Is it still a photograph? 

As photographers, we all do post-production; color correct, crop, touch-up and enhance a graphic file to meet our needs or liking. Even photojournalists, who are held to the most strict standards of not altering the content of their images, do post. So it's undeniable that there's a blurry line, or in our digital world, blurry pixels that purely define what constitutes a photograph. Ethics drives the photojournalist. Creativity and expression would seem to compel the rest of our shots.

When I capture the "ah ha" shot, the 5-star photograph, that's often an easy call. Leave that file alone and publish or print it as is. (Even the idea of printing "as is" not even a reality when I consider the countless choices in color settings, not to mention optional printing substrates.)

But what about those photo files that didn't turn out so nearly perfect? what about the shots that I really like the composition but feel like there's still more that could be done to express an idea?  For me, I like to play in Photoshop, poking around creating layers with different affect. I know little about PS and am not a graphic artist. But I find mixing and meshing options often surprise and once in awhile delight. So every so often I'll post the played with image in the gallery with the other shots because I like what came of them. To my amazement, last week one of these altered shots sold! 

Being a person open to feedback, that sale served as a bit of an encouragement to play more. Not because I want to sell more images per se, but because it suggested that perhaps others appreciate the storytelling of photography in a different, more abstract way.  It prompted me to think more about pursuing a project that I initiated a few weeks back with a local coffee-bike shop about hanging some of my stuff. I've been thinking about giving this a try. And I've been encouraged by a friend Matt Schillerberg trailheads.imagekind.com who's hung his photos at a gallery for the world to see.

I have to admit that the idea of doing this is both easy, as in who the heck gives a darn, just do what you want to do, and at the same time terrifying, as in who the hell do you think you are? After all, I'm not a graphic artist, don't have any "style" to bridge the images.


But that brings me back to the definition of photography. Seems I need to figure out what story it is I'm trying to "write" with the "light" of these images.