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Thunder Quiz

Who are these members of the Thunder captured at practice today?

-Doug Hoke

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More than a coach

Former football players stood in the press box, wiping away tears.
Their voices echoed across a football field lined with family, friends, students and co-workers who gathered to remembered the impact that Head Coach Mike Cartmill had on their lives.
Cartmill, who died on Sunday, was the head football coach at Santa Fe South High School — a charter school on the city’s southwest side that prides itself on feeling more like a large family than a small school.
He was remembered during a candlelight vigil on Tuesday night, not for wins on the football field or for trophies in a display case, but for being a father figure to kids who needed love more than they needed wins.
“He was a great man, especially for those who didn’t have a father, because he was one,” said Emilio Torres.
Current players and coaches joined former players to share their memories of Coach Cartmill, while the crowd lined up around the field.
As candles were lit and light spread around the field, another player remembered that his coach would introduce him to people as his son. “… and I’d say, ‘That’s my Pops right there.’”

-John Clanton

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Marathon Day

I enjoy photographing the finish line at a marathon. There’s so much emotion, exhaustion, relief all at once. So many stories. Some runners celebrate when they get to the end, others cry or get a hug from a family member, some just turn off their stopwatch and keep moving.  I want to chase down every person that reacts as they cross the finish line. Ask them where they’re from, what makes them run, why they’re so excited. But right then, another couple crosses the line, holding hands and smiling. I forget the last runners and wonder about them instead.

Take a look at some of the images from today’s marathon by clicking here.

-John Clanton

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Thunder and fans bring the noise

When people ask me what is the loudest and most intense atmosphere for games I have covered, I usually say OSU basketball games at Gallagher-Iba Arena during the height of success in the Eddie Sutton era. I think my answer is about to change.

The Thunder beat the Lakers on Thursday, 101-96, in the team’s OKC playoff debut and the crowd was spectacular. I have never heard such a large arena be so loud. When the Thunder took control in the second half, the fans never let up. It was awesome. I will remember to bring my earplugs to the game on Saturday.

Here are some of the photos Sarah Phipps, Bryan Terry and I took at the game.

Click here to see a gallery with even more pictures from the win.

To see more photos from the game, click here.

(Seriously, there’s lots more good stuff. You should follow this link).

-Nate Billings

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I went for a bike ride and a time lapse broke out.

The Photo Department was recently approached about photographing the route of this weekend’s Memorial Marathon. The idea was an interactive map featuring a time-lapse video of the route that runners will take through the city. If you think this sounds easy, then you’re doing it wrong.

Photographers Nate Billings and Sarah Phipps did the bulk of the work. All I did was ride my bicycle at Lake Hefner. They spent most of a Sunday morning with designer Matt Clayton rigging a camera to the dash of a car, programming a pocket wizard to fire a frame from the camera every second, and then driving the route. Nate says that figuring out how to attach the camera to his CRV and testing to determine the best frame rate and shutter speed took longer than the hour-and-a-half it took to drive the route. Sarah put all of the thousands of frames together to make a video that showed the entire route in about three-and-a-half minutes. Brian Mays then took the video and matched the frames with a map of the course to show where the shots take place.

If you watch the finished product, you’ll see that near the Capitol, the route goes the wrong way down a one-way street. Sarah and Nate managed to out-think that obstacle without breaking any laws. They drove that portion of the marathon with the camera attached to the back of the car shooting backwards and then later spliced that section into the time lapse with the order of those frames being reversed. So, when you play it back, it just looks like you’re going the wrong way down the street.

Also, there is a point where the route goes along Lake Hefner trails. A week after the drivable portion of the route was photographed, I went with Sarah to capture the portion on the trails from my bike. Sarah then added that section to make the finished time-lapse video.

Click here to see the time-lapse video. And check back next week for an update from the Memorial Marathon.

-John Clanton

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Respect and Resolve

Fifteen years have passed since the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah building in Oklahoma City. A ceremony held today at the Oklahoma City National Memorial and Museum commemorated the anniversary. Hundreds of people attended the ceremony, which ended with family members placing items on the chairs of their lost family members in the Field of Chairs. Three photographers covered the event for The Oklahoman. Here’s a slideshow of some of our best images, or you can take a look at the gallery by clicking here.

-John Clanton

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Archiving Memories

Tomorrow morning is the 15th anniversary of the Oklahoma City Bombing. In advance of the ceremony that is scheduled for Monday morning, I’ve been working on a couple of stories related to the bombing. The fence outside the museum used to be cleaned every week when it first started gathering keepsakes and memories immediately after the bombing. Now, fifteen years later, archivists clean off the fence about 4 times a year. Here’s a slideshow about one of those cleanings that happened last week.

When I started talking with Helen Stiefmiller, the Collections Manager at the museum, she took me into the archive room and showed me a part of the museum that few visitors ever see. I was taken aback by this room full of cardboard boxes that held so many artifacts and stories. We walked up and down the aisles, talking, when she pointed to a shelf near the floor. “There’s what’s left of the Ryder truck,” she said. That’s when I felt like I could make a slideshow about the archive room where all the museum’s memories are stored.

-John Clanton

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Take my Picture-with an E.

I’m working on a couple of slideshows and hoping to have them ready for the 15th Anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing next Monday. Yesterday, when I pulled up outside the museum and got into the trunk for my cameras and gear, a man named Ben Edwards stopped on the sidewalk and posed for a couple of pictures. When I ask him what his name was he said “I’m Ben. With an n.”

There’s a few loose ends I forgot to blog about last week, so I’m going to get that corrected. Last week, I posted a picture from Sarah Phipp’s trip to Taft, Oklahoma, to photograph a prison chapel. What I didn’t do was include a link to the video that she put together from the service.

I photographed a funeral for Aja Johnson last week. It was the first time the father of a murder victim made a point to come to the back of the chapel and greet all the members of the media and thank us for attending. We’ve been granted access before and families have been grateful for the pictures before, but rarely do people make a point to greet photographers and reporters. Here’s a short gallery of images and here’s Ron Jackson’s story.

Now you’re both caught up. Check back again, I’ll have pictures of a remote camera strapped to my bicycle and some images from the bombing anniversary to preview.

-John Clanton

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AP/ONE Awards

The Oklahoman Photography Department did well at the Associated Press Oklahoma News Executives annual awards. The awards were announced during a banquet in Tulsa last Saturday night.

As a group, we collected 17 of the possible 25 awards, including 5 first place awards out of the 6 categories. Sarah Phipps won three of those five first place awards. We also won the sweepstakes award for photography. Here’s a few of the first place pictures, to see more click on this link to the gallery of all the winners.

-John Clanton

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Searching Merlin

In the last 30 days, we’ve turned in 3,325 pictures to Merlin.

As both of you know by now, Merlin is the name of the archive system that we use to store pictures. Not just the ones turned in by The Oklahoman staff photographers, but also from the Associated Press, reporters sometimes take pictures, families will submit archive snapshots of themselves or loved ones if they’re needed for a story, and we get pictures from local authorities. Police mug shots, framegrabs pulled from surveillance cameras, that kind of stuff. Mostly though, the pictures come from the 13 staff photographers at The Oklahoman. Here are five nice pictures that you may have missed over the last 30 days.

-John Clanton

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