i'm not usually a sportrait person but for a lack of better photos this week, i'll throw these up here.
our soccer mvp steven mcgrath was fun to work with, which makes these shoots a lot easier. it's so nice if I can dial in the lights at the speed of -uhm- what seems like an eternity, and not having to worry about the subject wondering whether that newspaper lady really knows her trade and when they can go home, thank you very much.

the blue dress

my citizenship party. not americana. rather USA! USA!

berkeley

i didn't see much of the outside world during a multimedia & convergence workshop at uc berkeley last week. apart from learning a lot of technical and software-related stuff, it was inspiring to work in a group of people who cared about journalism first. journalism as in the craft and profession of journalism. not individual success but rather getting news out to people who might not want to open a newspaper. how do we tell a story in a way that people want to read it online? which medium works best for each aspect of the story? what do people read, what turns them off? how in the world can we make good, in-depth, investigative storytelling survive?
The Knight Digital Media Center has several workshops every year and it's definitely worth applying for. It's kind of competitive but if you get in they cover tuition, food and hotel and all you have to pay for is the flight. Their website also has tons of tutorials and other resources. Check it out.

his mom

Stephanie Sloop makes her first appearance at the Second District Court in Farmington, Utah, on May 14, 2010. She is a suspect in the death of her 4-year-old son Ethan Stacy whose body was found buried in a wooded area near Powder Mountain.

Court assignments are nothing out of the ordinary. This one was different. After covering the candle light vigil for Ethan Stacy, I was glad I could shoot the first appearance of his mother and step dad in court as the pool photographer.
I was curious to see them -- as if their presence would reveal a clue about the motivations behind the crime they are suspected of having comitted.

The look on their face told me that these two broken people have been tormented by their own minds in the days they had spent in prison since the arrest. The weight of their actions and the possibility that their lives might have changed to an existence in prison forever seemed unimaginable.

ethan stacy

this is from a candle light vigil a day after ethan's body was found somewhere in the woods near powder mountain. and also just a day after he went missing. i think the speed at which this event was unfolding made it especially tough to deal with -- for the public and at least for the people in our newsroom who covered the entire story. One minute you look for a missing child, the next minute he's found dead and right after you hear the mom and step dad are most likely going to be charged with murdering him. how do we understand this weird beast, the human psyche? is it possible to figure out how parents could do this without sounding like you're making up an excuse for their actions? how do we tell the story in a way that's complex yet compassionate?

state gop convention

political momentum often seems to be growing out of mistrust and complaints rather than positive motivation and concrete ideas of how to change things for the better. the current discourse makes my ears ring. not more.

extra special day

high school kids walked out of class to protest budget cuts. i think they had a pretty good time too.

back on stage

the last month has been busy. parents visiting, that thing about citizenship, went to a multimedia workshop in california and some other things...now i'm back with a few photos from the past couple of weeks. here's the first one: