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Better to Receive

We know football season is around the corner when we get Media Day assignments. I’ve written about these phenomena before, but yesterday, pictures that our staff photographers took during media days several weeks ago, were finally used in the newspaper.

Staff photographers Bryan Terry and Chris Landsberger hauled lights, backgrounds and cameras out to Oklahoma State and University of Oklahoma campuses earlier this month to get portraits of some of the star players. Here’s a couple of images from the events, but for more sports coverage related to the recently released college football sections, click here.

We photographed the media days on different days, in different towns and under different conditions. Chris and Bryan tried to get the light as consistent as possible, even though Bryan was indoors at Gallagher-Iba Arena and Chris  was outdoors at Memorial Stadium in Norman. They used the same grey backdrop and put one light on each side of the backdrop, slightly behind the players and then one directly behind and slightly above the photographer. The covers of the special sections looked fantastic. Seeing those sections in the paper means that football season is no longer around the corner. It’s here.

-John Clanton

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Miscellaneous Debris

Eight hundred pounds of bacon in Enid, Oklahoma, kayaks on The Oklahoma River, small college football, and a nice moment in a home for disabled adults all made for an interesting weekend in photographs. If either of you haven’t looked at our galleries lately, then click here and take a look.

-John Clanton

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Published Never

Last night I photographed a Stand for the Silent rally on the south side of the Oklahoma State Capitol here in Oklahoma City. After that, I drove a few blocks north to cover James Lankford’s watch party. These are a couple of my favorite images from last night’s news events that we just didn’t have enough room for in the newspaper. To read articles about Ty Smalley and the Stand for the Silent campaign, click here. To take a look at more pictures from The Oklahoman Photography Department, click here.

-John Clanton

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Pictures I Like-A little bit of everything

Football season is upon us. Work schedules have been rearranged and between college football, high school football and, eventually, Thunder basketball, we’re going to have a busy sports schedule.

Here’s a few more nice images we’ve taken over the last couple of weeks, including images from a barbershop and a school in Oklahoma City. Just this morning, I finished putting in the last of 325 mug shots of high school athletes and coaches from The Oklahoman’s fall photo day. Last year, I did a blog post called ‘Prep Photo Day.’ This one was very much the same, so if you missed it, then take a look by clicking here.

-John Clanton

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The water is fine

I was cold when I woke up on Sunday morning. The night before, I’d convinced myself to wear swim trunks to work so I could stand in Lake Hefner and get pictures of the IronKids Triathlon in Oklahoma City. When the alarm went of at 6:15 AM, I started trying to talk myself out of it, ‘I could just use a 300mm and stand on the shore.’ Once I got in the lake though, I was glad I wore shorts and crocs. After so many days of triple-degree heat and no rain, the water was fairly warm, even before 7 AM. If you haven’t lately, take a look at the gallery for more images from the event.

-John Clanton

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Pictures I Like-Weenie Dog version

I always keep an eye out for dachshunds when I’m on dog-related assignments. A tribute I guess, to Yossarian, my parent’s dachshund who shared birthday cake with me in my high-chair when I was a kid. After that we had Bogey, who was mean. Really mean. For almost 14 years, my wife and I had Bazz around the house. He went by Jackie Treehorn for short. A weenie dog named Moose caught my eye during an assignment out in Yukon, Oklahoma on Sunday. Here’s a few more pictures that you may have missed in the newspaper or in our online galleries.

-John Clanton

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Of light and shade

If it was possible, we’d only take pictures at dawn or at dusk when the light and the sky are perfect. Every building would have windows on all sides so that the perfect amount of sunlight could pour in and light up our subjects. But we work for a newspaper, so all too often we’re standing under ugly, noon light trying to figure out how to get a nice portrait of a high school athlete, or we’re sent out in total darkness to photograph a train derailment or, more likely, when the sun is setting, we’re inside a steel building with no windows photographing an event. Often, the challenge for news photographers is to either bring our own lights or try to find that perfect light where you wouldn’t expect to see it.

Every once and awhile, though, an assignment or a self-generated project happens at just the right time or in just the right room (above) and we’re taking pictures in perfect light. I was thinking about this while I photographed high school band practice at Edmond North last week. The photo-geek in me got very excited about finding pretty pictures in those fleeting moments before the sunset.

Speaking of pretty light, staff photographer Jim Beckel photographed a scene at the fair last year that won an award at the Great Plains Journalism Awards a few weeks ago. Here’s what the judges said about Jim’s picture:

“A very unique depiction of an ‘ordinary’
carnival ride. The black-and-white silhouette treatment makes this a stunning and very interesting image. Good eye!”

-John Clanton

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Getting back to work

Last week I photographed a shop in north Oklahoma City that carries, among other things, gift baskets for baby showers. When I saw this doll I had to photograph it and show it to my wife, since we’ll have our second kid before October of this year. The last week has been busy at The Oklahoman. We’ll have a ton of nice pictures to talk about including an abudence of ‘Hey, Take my Picture’ shots from an assignment at a barber shop.

-John Clanton

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Media Days

There’s plenty of behind-the-scenes work that’s done on Media Day at our local Division 1 colleges, and, of course, there’s plenty of waiting.

On Sunday local media outlets converged at Gallagher-Iba Arena on Oklahoma State University to photograph fans getting autographs, press conferences, practices and portraits of players.  At some point in the hour and a half wait for the players to arrive for the player availability part of the day, the media relations team brought in helmets that we could use for portraits (above). Staff Photographer Bryan Terry got portraits at OSU, while a few days before, Chris Landsberger photographed players at the University of Oklahoma. Meanwhile, I photographed practices and fan appreciation events at OSU and Steve Sisney photographed Fan Appreciation day in Norman. You can see photo galleries from both events by clicking here. The portraits will run in the August 29 newspaper, and we’ll talk about them on Alternate Crop as well.

-John Clanton

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Pictures I Like-Bryan Terry version

Since we started Alternate Crop a few years ago, some of our best blog posts start with the words ‘Staff Photographer Bryan Terry…’ Earlier this week, DOP Doug Hoke asked if I would look through the last month of pictures turned in by The Oklahoman staff and look for candidates for July’s Best of the month inner-office contest. Bryan’s name kept coming up on my list. Here’s a few of the pictures that caught my eye. What really surprised me is that only one of these pictures was ever used in the newspaper. We’ll get back to talking about the Great Plains Journalism later this week.

-John Clanton

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