Rant Mode : ON

Many of you who know me, know that my atitude about my website is pretty laissez-faire. I am not shooting on spec, I have a guaranteed sale on all the assignments I shoot.

So maybe I shouldn't be so pissed off at this, but this really got my dander up earlier today at the soccer games.

The were two games this morning, Girls at 10, and boys at 12. The early game was for the Middlesex League Championship, and it was Woburn -vs- Winchester (archrivals for years!). So as I am standing photographing the girls game, a photographer I have never seen before shows up, sporting a PRESS pass around his neck, and starts talking to me.

What are you shootin' at?? He asks, and I casually answer him with "200 ISO at whatever the camera says is OK".

He moves off and we shoot the rest of the first half.

So here is the incredulous part: I asked him who he represented, as he was sporting a press pass, and he told me this: "Oh I am a FULL TIME STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER for _______________ ( a large daily paper in an area of Massachusetts that is a 40 or so minute drive away) and I don't work on the weekends, so I just find out the top games in the area and I go shoot them, and then I pass out lots of business cards to the crowd. I do really well with the parents from _________________ and _______________ and _________________ etc.

Is it just me?? I just cannot beleive that this guy has the unmitigated gall to come to my house and try to sell photos to my customers. Ya ya I know, it is a free country etc...

So now I am competing against the parents, the big corporate website shooters, and some GWCAWS.

It is enough to make me just want to fold my tents and go back to refusing the reprint business.

No, not really! The website for me is a time saver and an income generator, though not a ton - I will never get rich on the web income, but it is enough to take the family out to dinner or buy some small camera gear.

I suppose I should be happy though... many of those on the sidelines threw away the small sheet of paper he passed out, and his website is so long, I doubt anyone will remember it (www.xxxxxxx.exposuremanager.com sheesh!)

So I hope you will tell all your friends about MY WEBSITE and I truly thank you for any and referrals!

Digital Images Over the Years

Labor Day - In my world, it is the last chance to prepare for the big show. If you know me, you know what I mean - Fall, aka Autumn, aka the Most wonderful time of the year! Why do I call it that - one word, well OK three words - HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS.

So I did what I do every year about this time - I made sure that my computer and workflow are up to speed for the season ahead. Like winterizing your car, I call it fallerizing my computer. First I make sure all the summer files are backed up on DVD and transferred to the archive hard drive. I then make sure that the Hard Drives in my system can handle the gigabytes (GB) that are about to be thrown their way. Yes I shoot sports and yes I shoot heavy and yes I shoot lots of games. Usually 2 a day, and up to 5 on a weekend. So, yes, I churn out the GB.

So today, realizing I was running out of drive space, I was swopping over files to the new 500GB drive, and I thought I would make a chart as to what I have shot for the newspapers, since 1999 when I acquired my first digital camera. (A Nikon Cool Pix 990!)

A side note here: my workflow involves a very basic filing system: Ingest the card to a "todays date" folder on a small drive, then separate each assignment into individual folders, then under each assignment a folder labelled by destination of photos (I work for several newspapers with different deadlines and mechanical requirements.) If the photo is going to be posted on my website, then the folder is copied to the web drive for posting.

OK, so here it is for your humour, is my chart of newspaper shooting for the past 8 years or so:

• 1999 15.7 mb 4 files 1 folder
• 2000 548.0 mb 633 files 50 folders
• 2001 11.1 GB 10098 files 239 folders
• 2002 20.7 GB 18519 files 410 folders
• 2003 44.2 GB 39823 files 1489 folders
• 2004 55.6 GB 49957 files 1738 folders
• 2005 100.0 GB 56430 files 1290 folders
• 2006 177.0 GB 80647 files 1747 folders
• 2007 86.5 GB 42907 files 809 folders

Wow, maybe Rick Friedman's assistant Marlene was right - we digital photographers DO have diarrhea of the shutter finger! LOL LOL LOL

As always, I'd love to hear your comments!

Chimping ??? At This Altitude ????

My Nextel went crazy this afternoon, as the helicopter passed over, low enough to shake the windows in most homes.

What was this crazy copter doing? Well apparently taking photos - not just regular photos - DIGITAL PHOTOS.

How do I know that ??? Well, check out the photo - the photographer was strapped to the outside of the helo AND HE WAS CHIMPING !!!

Who'da thunk we'd get to this point!

Actually I think the bigger question is - What was he shooting - NIKON or CANON???

Time to Play - Guess the White Balance !!!!

It had to be about 10:00am yesterday morning. The mayor's assistant called - "How soon can you be at the (Woburn) High School construction project?" I told him I had the morning free and would meet him and the mayor there.

Why were they calling me up here? I wasn't sure, but it became crystal clear the moment I arrived - LIGHTS. Indeed, the track has not yet been laid, the field turf has been ordered, but not installed, but there some 90 feet in the sky, the first light pole had been installed. The mayor thought it would be a nice photo feature. And you know what? He was right.

But then it happened again. For maybe the third or fourth time in my 20 year career. I got to meet the guys who install stadium lighting.

And it inevitably is a disaster - It goes some thing like this:

JB: "So, we got some nice new lights here huh?"

Lighting Guy "Yup - so bright you'll be able to see this place from Burlington"

JB: " Really? That bright? Are you sure??"

LG: - "Of course they are! I do the lighting for _________ (insert professional stadium name here)."

IT IS A FAIRY TALE FOLKS!!! Take it from me. I have shot at many fields. The best local field is Burlington, and we can squeek by at 800 iso for that - but the lights are uneven, so it is FLASHED football. The worst is, well, there is a tie for that - so again - flashed football - YUCK!

With any luck, the lights at the new Woburn High School will be OK. Now comes the fun part! Guess the WHITE BALANCE!

When the first light stanchion was hooked up and turned on here is what the lights looked like:

Seventeen individual light fixtures - half cool and half war.

Hmm,now multiply this by 4 stanchions, and it looks like I will need the one thing my friend Bud swears by:

A CUSTOM WB GREY CARD.

Hmmmm, guess I will have to order one.

What A Spoiled Bunch We Are....

There I said it OK?



It seems to me that we, specifically we photographers, have become quite the spoiled bunch. Even worse, in some cases, are the people we deliver our photos to. In my case, my editors.

The switch to digital, though fantastic on many, many fronts, can SOMETIMES be a real PIA.

We all have our crosses to bear....

Julain Olansky - My Memoriam

Truthfully, I cannot remember when it happened, I just remember bumping into Damian Drella and BAM!, MRS Car 52 was on board. It certainly wasn't long after that, that I met Julie.


I remember thinking about who this guy was, and after talking to people I found out who he was.

So, that began many days of on air banter between the units, remember the drawl??? (said in that raspy voice of his) "arrrrrrhhhhhhhh car 52 are you telling me that you have a working fire in Woburn????" or "Arrrrrhhhh 52 we cant read you, try moving to a different area and try it again...." Man, those were the days. Back when we had fires! LOL.

As MRS changed and evolved in those years, Julie introduced me to many of the other old MRS names - Gad, Ansin, Mullowney, Brigham, and Jay Bourgious (Newton Jake founder of MRS - what a character he was! lol) just to name a few. And dare I say we all hit off pretty well. We should have, we were all seeking that goal - to catch the big one, and in some cases, either put it out, or at least put it on film.

Every now and again, Julie would call (wow we didn't have email back then!) and ask for a photo or if I would do a story for the newsletter - MetroRadioWaves - remember that? I actually looked forward to getting my copy of that in the mail. I still have many of those here in a box in my garage. I may break them out one of these days.


I also attended some of the MRS Board Meetings held in the "bunker" in Brookline. What an intense place that was! Those were interesting meetings, and much was done to further MRS in those days.

Fast forward a few years, and Julie and I lost touch... not really, it's just that I had retired from MRS and was extremely busy trying to get my photography off the ground. I would always see him at all the required buff events - Lynnfield, the MRS Flea Market, the Holiday Dinner to name but a few. I would see him at fires and I remember one night at 174. Not a wheel turned, but the coffee and the stories flowed like water, and he had several of us enraptured with his fire buffing story's.

The last time I saw Julie, was about 18 months ago - Al Fay from Burlington called and told me that Julie was going to put on his film show for the Middlesex County Fire Wardens, and would I come by to take some photos for the newspaper.

I am so glad I went to the station that night, for what I saw was just amazing - Julie's films were sharp, and full of action, and when it came to Our Lady of Angels, I do not think there was a dry eye in the house. Honestly, you all know what a noisy place a firehouse can be - any firehouse in the world, but not that night - you could have heard a pin drop as Julie told about filming that, and the tragedy that it was.

Well, the rumours swirled that night about his health, and someone even went so far as to say that he might not be able to give another show - ever again. And I left there that night glad to have seen him, glad to have known him, an happy to be able to say I was at least his acquaintance, if not a friend.

Goodbye my friend and may God Bless you, and your family, keep them safe, and keep you at his right hand.

These photos are from the night in Burlington - Julie doing his presentation, and accepting a model rescue from retired Burlington firefighter Al Fay.

Memorial Day 2007

The kids are in the pool, and the bbq will be fired up soon. Another Memorial Day and the start of the summer right? Not for me, nope, this year seemd different somehow. And I think I know how.

Having covered two different town's ceremonies and then having covered other ceremonies earlier in the weekend, I am tired. Not so much physically tired, but mentally.

This Memorial Day here in Woburn is different. I have covered these services for the past 19 years, but this year it is different. You see, we (the collective City of Woburn) had a native son killed in Iraq just a few short months ago. And when George Poole read the role of honour, and got to SFC Keith Callahan's name, it got me. Indeed it did. I put the camera down for a minute and just looked around. Looking at all the faces of the free and the innocent and the young and the old. I just looked around. I looked at my foster Grandfather - Woody Ford, who, now in his late 70's, came to Woburn Center to see and be part of a ceremony that means so much to him. It was so great to see him.

That's Woody right there offering a hand salute as the flag was going by.

But as great as it was to see him, it is hard not tho think about the family of Sgt Callahan, who lost a dad, a father, a son, and a friend, who was doing what he knew best - defending the freedom of the United States of America - yup - of you and me, and him and her and us an d them. All of us. Thank you Sgt Callahan, for giving your life, so that I may still enjoy mine.

I truly think my friend Bud said it most appropriately on his blog:

Seriously folks, you should take a brief moment away from your weekly trip to
Home Despot or Wally World, and reflect on what the day should be about -
remembering our fallen Soldiers.
And that is Soldiers with a capital "S".
I won't grandstand anymore than to say I honor our Veterans, and I hope
you do too.

I must agree with him, in every way possible.

So here are a few other photos from Woburn and Burlington's ceremonies. I hope you enjoy them, and I would, as always, enjoy hearing your thoughts and comments.

One of many of the flag bearers on the Woburn Common this morning.

This man was a POW in Korea for nearly two years.

The Burlington American Legion Rifle Squad fires a volley after Taps.

Woburn Police officer John Lally - ever the proud grandfather - showing off his new (3 weeks) grandson.