Friday, August 25, 2006

The post that almost was.

I just typed up a really great post for everyone to read that involved my daughter taking a big step, my internship and future career and Reese's Puffs but due to either a browser error or my stupidity it was erased. You would have liked it if you could have read it (trust me on this one). It may have been the best blog post ever. I think I am going to go console myself with some crunchy, peanut-buttery cereal.

Friday, August 11, 2006

My last day...

It's been awhile since I posted here, mainly because life has been pretty busy for me. Mary and the kids came to visit me this past Sunday, so I enjoyed a day and a couple evening with them but had to start on the OA's football tour early monday so they went home. I didn't go home this week because of the tour, but that's also why I had Sunday off. I have so much to say about what I learned here, and I will probably have a couple more posts about it. I think in a week or so I will be better able to express how much this summer has changed and molded me (probably even more than I realize now). I feel like I can shoot much better now, but its not just that. I feel like I have a clearer picture of who and what I need to be to succeed in this business. I may not be that person now, but I plan on getting there.

Also, newspaper photojournalism is hard on a person in ways I can't explain. I really don't think anyone who hasn't tried it could understand. Maybe Cade White can help me out here. Somehow, the more tired I am at the end of the day the more I feel like I did my job. It's the long hours, the skipping lunch (what, there's a meal in the middle of the day?!?!?!) and the hours spent in the midday sun just waiting for some event to actually start 30 minutes after you were told it would; It's all these and the hours spent hunched over a computer figuring out which photo is best or how to tell your editor you screwed it up that somehow make the job... a job I love. I failed plenty of times, I had to re-shoot a couple of assignments (you usually don't get that lucky. Spot news only happens once!) and in the end I learned alot about what makes a good newspaper photograph. In the end, I would have done the job for free, if they had asked me. Give me a camera, some vaguely worded photo assignments and a press pass and I'll go to work. (Note: I mean the photo assignment thing. They get pretty bad sometimes. Many of them just have the word "none" in the photo idea section. Gee, that really helps me out.) I wouldn't have it any other way though. I am looking forward to finding a job somewhere, and getting to do this more. Ia few years the daily grind might have changed my mind, but then again I might just like the daily grind.

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Watching the press

Tonight I watched the first few papers come off the printing press at the Odessa American. Cade White had suggested it to me over a week ago, but I am usually out of the building long before the files are sent "upstairs" so I hadn't gotten around to it until now. Tonight I happened to be at the office late due to some spot news that came up literally as I was ready to walk out the door and go home. One of the reporters and I went to check out the operation upstairs and were told to come back in half an hour. Michael, the reporter, decided to go home but I just had a feeling I should stay and check it out since I only have a couple more weeks left and I might not be up at the office that late again.
It was worth the wait just to get a look at the operation. Although the printing press at the OA is over thirty years old, it works pretty fast. I got to keep one of the first papers off the press, which isn't really that big a deal but meant alot to me tonight. Somehow, seeing how things work up in the printing room was what I needed tonight. I know it's just a newspaper being printed, but it's "my paper", the one I work at (at least for a few more days). It's kind of like how I think my camera is special and performs 'better' at 3200 ISO than all the other identical camera bodies out there. (For those non-camera folks out there, pushing the sensor to this sensitiviy level loses detail in the shadows and creates excessive noise but is necessary sometimes when in low light such as indoor stadiums or when shooting an accident scene at night. No camera out today does very well at this sensitivity.) I also think my camera and I (yes I typed that correctly) can shoot at lower shutter speeds and still get a sharp picture where everyone else would fail. It's a foolish idea (don't tell Gertrude the camera I said that), but something that I think alot of us feel when we become attached to a thing or place. It becomes that much more special.
I felt like I was watching something special tonight, although in the end it was just another edition of the paper being printed like others all around the country. It's just ink on glorified toilet paper, uh, I mean really thin paper. My photos never look right, and somehow my copy always has crinkles in it, but when everything comes together you have a newspaper. So tonight, I didn't just watch another newspaper being printed, I watched the Odessa American being printed and somehow that made all the difference to me.