More to come

I first must apologize for neglecting the blog. It is finals time and I have been trying to get my head above water for the last few weeks. I have three days of finals starting Monday, and after that I will be out of school for a whole two weeks before summer session starts up. That being said, I should have some free time for a day or two during that period to post my favorite Komet hockey photos from this season. Congratulations to the K's for making the playoffs even if it didn't turn out the way we would have liked.

By the way, I was at game four Thursday, as a paying fan, and I was extremely dissatisfied with the officiating, and the undisciplined play by some of the Komets. The penalty shot was a terrible call. It may have been within the rules to call, but it was just bad. I was more disappointed at the number of stupid penalties the K's took. The guys knew they had to win that game. They knew that to do it they needed to stay out of the box as much as possible. It should have been simple math, but this time 2+2=6 goals against. Three of those goals came from basically one series of play in the second period... the St. Pierre slash at 9:55 and penalty shot from the same play, then the Campbell double minor 30 seconds later giving Rockford nearly two minutes of 5 on 3 power play time. They only needed 6 seconds to bury the first goal and 1:02 for the next. So, in 1:38 we gave up three goals. Dissapointing to say the least. In any case, the K's deserve credit for playing tough through the season and giving the fans some great games to watch, especially at the end of the regular season.

Take care, and check back soon for the photos.

More Portraits

I am working on finishing the assignments that are left in my portrait class. Today, an IPFW theatre student needed some headshots done and we decided to shoot a few more photos. Breona was great to work with and a big help. Malina, another portrait class student, and I were able to get some nice photos. Feedback is always appreciated, so if anyone has any comments about the photos, feel free to leave a ccomment or send me an email.



Thanks again for looking.

Chad

Birthday Party Fun

My nephew (pictured) was one of ten people my son invited to his 10th birthday party last weekend. When my son told me he wanted all of his cousins to sleep over, I was less than excited. Usually mayhem ensues when all of the kids get together. But this time around, it wasn't that bad. We started off playing laser tag and arcade games then came home for birthday cake and pizza. After the festivities, my son popped the Madagascar dvd in and everyone was quiet until they fell asleep. The next morning, my wife woke up and made a huge breakfast for everyone. She even let me sleep in. She's too nice.

I decided after breakfast to shoot some photos of all of the kids. I thought it might be a good time to get some portrait assignments worked out while I had a captive set of models. Besides, they are all a bunch of characters and they love to have their pictures made. I decided to try out the "shot from below" technique I have seen a couple of shooters do, and it worked out well. I constructed the aparatus for a couple of portrait assignments for work, and I thought it might be good to practice with the kids first.

I shot this photo of my nephew, the biggest character of the group. Then I got all of the kids together in a photo. I had fun, the kids had fun, and my son had a great birthday. So, it was a good weekend.

My glass is definitely half-full

I pulled into my garage around midnight tonight after driving for the last 12-plus hours to get home from a photojournalism conference in South Carolina. It normally wouldn't have taken quite so long, but Cheryl and I decided to drive through the Smokie Mountain National Park on the way home because we love the scenery. New colors were starting to emerge and the weather was quite nice today. Unfortunately, I underestimated the amount of traffic that would be in the Gatlinburgh, Pigeon Forge, Sevierville area as I thought, surely, traffic would be light on a Monday. I won't make that mistake a third time.


The National Press Photographers Association held the Southern Short Course in news photography over the weekend in Spartanburg, SC. It was a weekend filled with guest speakers, breakout instruction sessions and meeting new people. I had a great time and saw some wonderful, inspiring work by some of the best photojournalists in the world. I also received some great feedback on my portfolio. I was lucky enough to win a Nikon Coolpix S4 digital camera after winning first place in the Nikon Shootout. The Shootout is a contest where Nikon Reps hand out 25 digital point-and-shoot cameras. The photographers are given 45 minutes to go shoot an assignment based on a theme. At the end of the 45 minutes, the cameras were to be returned with only one photograph on the memory card. The theme of the assignment was "Spring Forward." My winning picture is shown here

Events like this one and the SportsShooter.com Luau/upcoming shindig not only teach and refine techniques, but they are great for recharging the batteries in terms of creativity and devotion to the craft. I have some ideas for new work that I am excited about and look forward to get started. I also plan to start working on my new website very soon. When I get the new site registered, I will post a link to it.

As always, thanks for checking out my work and reading my rants.

Chad