Sam Bradford’s Bedlam Flip
Some of you may have seen the flip in the air by OU quarterback Sam Bradford in the third quarter of the Bedlam football game between Oklahoma and Oklahoma State. It ws awesome to see in person and made some cool pictures. Chris Landsberger captured this series as OSU’s Orie Lemon forces Bradford out at the one-yard line. Check it out:
BY CHRIS LANDSBERGER, THE OKLAHOMAN
I was positioned across the field in the other end zone and got a different angle on the flip. Here’s two from my series:
BY NATE BILLINGS, THE OKLAHOMAN
We had five photographers covering the game, including our director of photography, Doug Hoke, who edited and did some shooting.
Click here to see a photo gallery from OU’s 61-41 win.
-Nate Billings
Take my picture, again.
I’ve gotten way behind on my updates from the “Hey, Take my picture” series. Here’s a couple from the month or so. 
For anyone just joining our blog site, newspaper photographers are often asked by people to take their pictures while we’re on assignment. For the most part, we are looking for pictures of people going about their lives or activities. But, now that we have a blog site, I’ve started collecting “Hey, take my picture” snapshots.
-John Clanton
Early Voting
In January of this year I got an assignment to photograph a little restaurant on the city’s northeast side. I enjoyed talking with the owner, Florence, so much that I went back several times, got lots of pictures and turned the assignment into a slideshow. During the course of our conversations, Florence told me about her father who was at that time, 102 years old. She said that if Barack Obama got the Democratic Party’s nomination to run for President that her dad wanted to be first in line to vote for him.
I knew right then what I’d be doing on election day.
By November, Robert Jones, a black man born in Oklahoma, was 103 years old. He was still excited to get to the polls and vote. The week before he voted, he fell in his home and was taken to the hospital, but that didn’t stop him from going into the Oklahoma County Election Board to vote early on Nov. 1, 2008.
Here’s a link to the page on NewsOK.com about Robert. The video is embedded on this page.
http://newsok.com/richmedia/robertjones?custom_click=lead_story_photo
To me this story has little to do with the politics of the man getting the vote. If our job is to document history, then I witnessed something special last Saturday. Our country is just over 200 years old. Robert Jones has been alive for almost half of that. He has never had a chance to see a man of his race run for president. In our history, I doubt a black man will ever have to wait 100 years to vote for a black candidate again. As a 33 year old white man, that really made me think. I was born into the majority, until last week I’d seen nothing but people of my race and gender running the country. Robert enthusiasm to vote was contagious. The best part of the morning though was how Robert was treated by everyone in line. Robert’s granddaughter saved him a place in line. One woman, who had been there since 3 a.m. and was first in line, stood up, and applauded when Robert approached. “Praise God,” she said, “Praise God.”
Robert Jones, 103, is surrounded by friends and aquintances outside the Oklahoma County Election Board in Oklahoma City after he voted on Saturday, Nov. 1, 2008. By John Clanton, The Oklahoman
And if your interested, here’s the slideshow from Florence’s restaurant.
http://downloads.newsok.com/flash_video/theoklahoman/slideshows/Florences/
-John Clanton
OU fans stick around for Texas Tech
OU looked pretty good against Nebraska on Sunday. And there were lots of great action photos. This picture, however, is the one I find most interesting. As the football game against the Huskers ended, the battle between Texas and Texas Tech in Lubbock was coming down to the wire. Hundreds of Sooner fans stuck around to watch the Red Raiders defeat the Longhorns on the televisions that hang throughout Gaylord Family-Oklahoma Memorial Stadium. The race for the Big 12 South just got very interesting.
OU fans stay to watch the Texas vs Texas Tech game after the college football game between the University of Oklahoma Sooners and the University of Nebraska Huskers at the Gaylord Family-Oklahoma Memorial Stadium, on Saturday, Nov. 1, 2008, in Norman, Okla. BY NATE BILLINGS, THE OKLAHOMAN-Nate Billings
