A Little News

Dedicated readers of this blog will recognize Corey Wilson right away. Corey did a post for us about shooting in the deep freeze at Lambeau Field for the NFC Championship game between Green Bay and New York. Corey is a graduate of Eastern Kentucky University and has been my friend for about seven or eight years now. We worked together in Decatur for two or three of those years and he has worked in Green Bay for five years. Corey is one of many photojournalists whose work inspires me. He is a wonderful shooter and a good man to top it all off. I hope you enjoy his musings on covering one of the NFL’s true legends.

History. When does it become such? As soon as Father Time ticks to the next second? Months later? Years later? As far as I know photography is the only way to stop time. Every photograph represents a slice of history. Is it your child’s first steps? A birthday? A war? A sports feat?

Most photojournalists like myself are in this business because we can’t get enough of capturing time…in fleeting moments. I’ve been fortunate enough to cover the NFL, namely the Green Bay Packers, for the last five years. This has always been a dream of mine and it’s one I’m proud I’ve accomplished. Unless you’ve been living in Northeastern Siberia for the past two or three weeks you know one thing. Brett’s done. Brett Favre that is. He donned the uniform like no other quarterback has from 1991-2007. He NEVER missed a start during his entire Packers playing career! (That’s 253 for those of you who are counting). He’s a legend and everyone has heard of his magic feats on the field.

I did a lot of reflecting as I pulled file photographs for special sections, books and audio slideshow productions that my paper, the Green Bay Press-Gazette, would be publishing in the days after his retirement on March 4, 2008. Covering Brett Favre has been a once in a lifetime opportunity. You could go an entire career as a photojournalist and not photograph a legend like that. It’s an opportunity I’m extremely thankful for. Thumbing through all these hundreds of images over the past couple of weeks made me sentimental. Do we realize that we are literally photographing history at the time we’re actually shooting it? Or does that come much later? Does it ever come at all?

Have you ever been on an assignment when you suddenly realize that what you’re doing, in that very instant, is going to be documented as history for years to come? Does it take a monumental event to seem important? A career like Brett Favre? Or do other events like murder trials feel like live-history? I fall victim to feeling like lesser-scale events like plays, church services, portraits or city council meetings matter less. Aren’t they just as important? You bet they are.

I guess all the reflecting did one thing for me. It served as a wake-up call. It hit me that our smaller communities are not made up of Brett Favre grandeur. As photojournalists we have a tremendous responsibility to document everything around us as if it were just as famous. Don’t we? How do we not?

With that said I’ll never forget the moments I had covering Brett Favre. I’ll have the newspaper covers to remember it. I’ll forever have my spot in the new Sports Illustrated Commemorative Edition of Brett Favre. I’ll have the black & white picture I shot with my Holga 120 plastic film camera (retail $20) as he ran onto Lambeau Field for a game in 2005.

***If you would like a glimpse of my 2007 reflections of Brett Favre please copy and paste the following link to a first-person audio slideshow:

http://www.packersnews.com/includes/newspaper/assets/soundslides/2008/030408remembering4/

Be aware that everything you shoot as a photojournalist is important. In 10, 20 or 30 years, when memories begin to fade, it will be YOUR photographs that remind people of days-gone-by.

Photos copyright Corey Wilson. The opinions expressed in this blog do not necessarily reflect those of the writer’s employer.

Note: This is the second of two posts from Green Bay Press-Gazette photojournalist Corey Wilson, a friend and former co-worker. Corey and I worked together for a couple of enjoyable years in Decatur before he moved to the frozen north to become a snowman.

After I got all bundled up for that Jan. 20th NFC Championship game between the Green Bay Packers and New York Giants I headed down to the field about 30-minutes prior to kickoff. Wow. Nothing like minus-25 degree wind chills smacking you in the face as you walk down the same tunnel as Vince Lombardi, Bart Starr, Reggie White and Brett Favre.

My photo staff at the Green Bay Press-Gazette was given all brand new Nikon to test out at the game (and possibly the Super Bowl) by Nikon Professional Services. Unfortunately, all the beautiful D3 cameras failed the cold test. Upon kickoff I realized that NEITHER of my D3 camera bodies were working. I had one driving a 400mm lens and the other on my 80-200mm lens. Both cameras starting flashing “err” messages and when they would fire they would fire black images. Some of the images were half-black…similar to when you sync your flash at too high of a shutter speed and part of the shutter curtain casts a shadow on your image.

Uh oh. Not a good sign at the start of a huge game. What the heck am I going to do?

My boss came down to the field and gave me one of his D3’s that was operational. I quickly mounted that to my 400mm lens. Our ‘runner’ for the game also brought me one he’d had slung over his shoulder. Okay, I’m reloaded and ready to go. Well, one of those quit and I got frustrated. So now it’s the second quarter, I have basically no images, and I’m headed for our media workroom upstairs for reinforcements. I darted upstairs, as the Packers had the ball on offense, and grabbed my older Nikon D200 body. I only brought this for a spare! The batteries that were in it were all I had for that camera too! I’m actually sweating in a bit of panic at this point.

That camera lasted into the second half until the shutter literally froze in mid-burst during a key drive. Another one bites the dust (or ice). Our ‘runner’ brings me yet another D3 to replace my D200. He believes this D3 is operational…for now. It actually held up pretty decent, except for replacing a battery in the fourth-quarter. It held up long enough for me to get legendary quarterback Brett Favre slinging a cape over his head as he ran off the field after a 23-20 overtime defeat. Is it the last image of Brett Favre ever at Lambeau Field? We’ll see. Personally, I don’t think so.

So the biggest game of my life was filled with much frustration. I enjoyed the opportunity but trying to stay focused while cycling through SIX camera bodies was the biggest challenge I’ve ever faced while shooting an NFL game. So what’s my opinion of the D3? Beautiful. The images were drop-dead gorgeous and needed no toning at all. Just don’t plan on having much success with a D3 in the Frozen Tundra! I learned another sobering lesson? Turns out the Good Lord makes things better than we humans make things. Here he designs a human body that with proper planning (using the brain he gave us) can survive the most wicked cold temps in the United States. And we humans can’t even design a piece of ($5,000) camera equipment that can last 15-minutes in the same elements. Truly amazing.

For more images from the game, please visit The Press Gazette photo galleries from the game.

Photos copyright Corey Wilson, the Green Bay Post-Gazette. The opinions expressed in this blog do not necessarily reflect those of the Press-Gazette or The Decatur Daily.

Once in a while a small town guy gets to play with the big boys. Sunday was just such a day for me. I relish these days. I had the assignment to shoot the Tennessee Titans game with the San Diego Chargers. The reason for this luxury is the Chargers’ quarterback, Philip Rivers, grew up in Decatur and played his high school football at Athens High, about fourteen miles up the highway. So really, my job was to shoot Philip Rivers regardless of the outcome of the game.

I certainly earned a new appreciation for the job of NFL quarterback and am very thankful that Philip was the one taking the pounding and not me. The Titans spent the day in his face, wrapped around his legs or on top of him. He took a real pounding. Kyle Vanden Bosch practically lived in the Chargers’ backfield and he ended up pounding on Rivers more than any other player.

For me, the job was really different. I had never been assigned to shoot a single player. It was both challenging and liberating. I didn’t have to worry about missing the big play unless Philip was involved in it. It was challenging too because I am so accustomed to shooting the game I found myself missing pictures of him because I would be following the play. Thanks to the good folks at Nikon I had the use of an excellent 400mm f2.8S lens. You guys can’t believe how nice that thing is and how absolutely tack sharp it is.

I shot three lenses; the 400, an 80-200 f2.8 and a 17-35 f2.8 at the end of the game. I shot with the D2Hs with the 400 on it and the D2H with the 80-200 on. There is not really a lot to it technically. The main thing I wanted to be conscious of was being in a place to see Philip’s face as much as possible and being in position for the sacks which seemed to happen all the time. Even when he wasn’t being sacked, Rivers was under intense pressure was hit often after throwing. My choice was whether to stay behind the line of scrimmage or in front of it. I did a little of both just mixing it up based on what the game felt like and what my gut was telling me.

Here is an important note that relates to anticipating the play. Watch the momentum of the game and position yourself accordingly. For the first three and a half quarters, the best place for me to be was behind the Chargers offense because the Titans were really putting the pressure on the quarterback. Late in the game I got just a little ahead of the offense after the momentum shifted in the Chargers favor. That way I could see Philip’s face as he was throwing. It’s one of those small things that adds up to nice pictures.

You can check out my Sportsshooter member page to see a ten shot show. Later on I will post a lot more pictures on the Decatur Daily website and I will post a link to it when it is up.

Photos copyright The Decatur Daily. The opinions expressed in this blog are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of my employer.

Okay, one more Iron Bowl post. I know you are probably tired of hearing about it by now. I know I am and would not post anything else were it not terribly instructive. Every game has its key plays. When the key play in a big game is made by a young man from your newspaper’s town, you really want to have the shot. It’s not always possible but if you have the shot then it is double bonus time. Local kid makes big play and local photographer is right there nailing it.

That is exactly what happened in this year’s Iron Bowl. Jerraud Powers is a cornerback for Auburn and he made the play of the game on a potential touchdown pass to D.J. Hall late in the first half. Bama quarterback John Parker Wilson threw a fade to Hall in the corner of the end zone and Powers was defending. He just got his finger tips under the ball and was able to flick it up into the air. That was a huge play in itself but then he intercepted the pass to end the scoring opportunity. And I nailed the whole sequence with the key play being the exact moment when the ball landed in Powers’ hands. I rushed back to the workroom to do my first half pictures and saw I had the photo and cropped, toned, captioned and saved the image. Unbeknown to me, I saved it in the wrong folder. A complete accident. My complete accident meant that I thought I had transmitted the image to the newspaper when, in fact, I had not. Even after the game reviewing the take with my co-worker Jonathan Palmer, I didn’t notice the picture was not in the folder.

Sunday morning I get up to see an AP photo credit under “MY” photo. I was blustering but I had to go to church and teach my class. (That is a bad way to go to church. Three hours sleep and upset over a photo.) After church I had one of those revelation moments and realized what I had done. Sure enough, upon checking my laptop I found the photo in another folder. I was banging my head. I am still banging my head. I showed the stuff to our sports editor and he said to give him a sequence and we may be able to use it for a bowl game preview or something else later on. I am still banging my head! Take a lesson from a knuckle head and check, double check and triple check to make sure you did everything right. It is great to have the photo but it is better to have the photo and actually transmit it so your paper can use it!

Photos copyright The Decatur Daily. The opinions expressed in this blog are my own (except the part about me being a knuckle head. I am pretty sure everyone here agrees with me on that one!) and do not necessarily reflect those of my employer.