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Veterans Day assignments

Here are a few photographs from Veterans Day assignments around Oklahoma City on Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2009.

If you’d like to see a gallery of more photos, click here.

For more Veterans Day photos, click here.

-John Clanton

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James Nachtwey visits Oklahoma

James Plumlee and I were worried that we hadn’t left Oklahoma City early enough to get good seats. As we opened the doors of Te Ata Memorial Auditorium on the USAO campus, we relaxed a bit. We were an hour early and were the first ones there. James Nachtwey, one of the greatest war and conflict photographers of all time, was speaking at USAO in Chickasha, Okla. Nate Billings had heard about the free event on NPR and we threw together a group of photographers including Sarah Phipps, Chris Landsberger, Nate, myself and former staff photographer James Plumlee to drive to Chickasha. We sat on the front row and talked while the entire auditorium filled up behind us. Nachtwey opened his speech by saying that this was his first time to visit Oklahoma.

If you’re reading Alternate Crop, you’re either related to a staff photographer at The Oklahoman or you have at least a passing interest in photography. Either way, you should be familiar with James Nachtwey’s work. There was a documentary about him called War Photographer. And he’s one of the founding members of VII Photo Agency. I’ve seen the movie, poured over his books and I keep the VII website bookmarked on my computers, but hearing the stories first hand and seeing the pictures on a big screen gave me plenty to think about. We hung around afterward, met Nachtwey and asked a couple of questions. I asked him if we could buy him dinner or coffee.

Every description I type and re-type about his presentation seems inadequate. Nachtwey’s photographs are heart-wrenching and inspiring. His stories from seeing war and famine around the world are chilling, but I think I liked his thoughts on journalism the best. He talked about journalists being involved in the community, locally or overseas, and about contributing to society by highlighting problems in our communities. I’m glad the five of us made the trip to USAO in Chickasha. He said, no, by the way, to dinner. I told him we’d do it the next time he came to Oklahoma.

-John Clanton

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A busy night in Edmond

When news of the apartment fire in Edmond got to the Photo department at The Oklahoman,  Staff Photographer Chris Landsberger was sent toward the smoke. From the ninth floor windows at The OPUBCO tower, DOP Doug Hoke and I could see the flames from the fire that was about 8 miles away. Landsberger ended up spending about 4 hours photographing the fire, taking breaks to send pictures back from the car, in order to meet deadlines back at the paper. Meanwhile, just two miles away, I photographed a candlelight vigil for Bicycle Bob, a homeless man in Edmond, who was killed this week. A young man named Bryce Camp organized the event that drew hundreds of people to the Market Place in Edmond.

-John Clanton

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Pictures I Like

The Oklahoman Photo Department has been busy in the last seven days. Henry Bellmon’s funeral, OU vs. Miami football, a feature story about T. Boone Pickens and, of course, high school football are a few of the assignments we’ve photographed. Here are a few images that stand out over the last week.

-John Clanton

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Thunder media day

If either of you have looked in the paper and seen a nicely lit portrait of Sam Bradford, Dez Bryant or Russell Westbrook, chances are we didn’t take the picture the night before. We probably took the picture during the team’s media day. Professional and collegiate-level teams hold media days to try and meet a portion of media’s requests for access to players and coaches all at one time in one place. Basically, it’s a chance for still photographers, reporters, and video photographers to take pictures, ask questions and tape interviews so that later in the season we can concentrate on coverage of the teams. We usually archive the pictures so that when the sports department needs a nice portrait to augment a feature story, we can use a picture from media day instead of sports action photo from a game.

Chris Landsberger and I set up our station between the Associated Press and the official NBA photographers. We brought a backdrop, three lights, stands for the lights and background, pocket wizards, a pile of cords, battery packs for the lights and a partially filled basketball. The photographs that Chris took will be used throughout the season on NewsOK.com and in The Oklahoman.

-John Clanton

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A New Way Of Looking At Something Old

For this year’s State Fair I wanted to do a photo project that captured the sights and sounds of all the activities that take place during the ten day event. The thing that I wanted to do was display the package in a little different way than other projects are done.

The next thing was ‘how can I do this’. I thought about how digital cameras have made picture taking an instantaneous process these days. So this started me thinking about how in the ‘old days’ that instant photography was only available if you shot on a polaroid camera. The two of these processes quickly brought my idea together.

I would combine today’s digital photography with the ‘retro’ polaroid. Next, find a way to accomplish this. Since my digital SLR cameras can only do 35 mm format, I had to set them aside for this project and find me a digital polaroid camera? My search only had to go as far as my IPhone to get this done. I found an app that turned the built in digital camera into a digital polaroid. So now I was on my way. I grabbed my IPhone and my audio recorder , and was on my way to the 2009 State Fair.

As I walked through the fair I shot some of the little things I saw along the way, and recorded natural sound along with a few personal accounts of the thousands of people I saw enjoying themselves. In the end, I cam up with a slideshow that gives you a one minute and 30 second look at some of the things I saw at this year’s fair. Hope you enjoy. – Chris Landsberger

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Military Funeral

On Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2009, I covered the funeral for U.S. Army 1st Lt. David Timothy Wright II who was killed Sept. 14th by an improvised explosive device in Afghanistan. He was only 26 years old.

Unfortunately, I have had to cover many of these military funerals over the last few years, and over time I have developed a love/hate relationship with covering them. I hate to see another young military person passing away before their time, and the pain their family goes through. On the other hand I want to be there to cover these funerals, and capture these emotional moments to document, pay tribute to these fallen heros, and show our readers who this person was and what sacrifice this person and family paid for our country and each and every citizen of the United States.

Sometimes there is a big misconception that I, being part of the media, am there to exploit the situation. I can say for sure that the photographers I know and for myself, this is the furthest thing from the truth. When I am photographing a funeral, I have had many reactions to my presence. I am met with some that are very upset, and can not believe that I am there doing ‘this’ to the family. Others are of complete gratitude that I am there to remember the one that has fallen. The latter is always the reason that I am there. I never attend a funeral without the family’s permission, and in doing so I comply to the fullest extent to the family’s wishes. Each family is different, some have given almost full access, and others very limited to none at all. These request are absolutely fine with me, because these difficult situations are about the families not about me, it is a privilege for me to be there.

In doing my job I want to be able to do the best I can to pay tribute, and not let them be forgotten for what they have done for all of us. I admit it is not easy for me though. I am a husband and a father, and it is hard for me to see the pain these families go through. I see these difficult situations, and I put myself in their shoes at every funeral I attend.  I can not begin to comprehend the pain they are going through. It is an emotional roller coaster for me, because I do get emotionally involved, I have a job to do and it never gets easier. I am not afraid to say that I have had to take pictures through many tears that roll down my cheeks. All in all, I am always honored to be there, and always very sorry for the family’s loss.

I do want to say thanks to all the families for allowing me and my coworkers to be in attendance, and to say thank you to those that have fallen and to those that continue to serve on their missions. I wish you all God Speed.

-Chris Landsberger

Please take the time to view the slideshow from the funeral of U.S. Army 1st Lt. David Timothy Wright

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The best rodeo in Oklahoma

We cover a lot of rodeos at The Oklahoman. The one that our photo staff looks forward to the most every year is the International Finals Youth Rodeo in Shawnee. The great thing about the IFYR is that most of the competition happens during the day.  Rodeo can make great pictures, however, most of the rodeos we photograph happen at night or in dark, dingy arenas.

The beautiful atmosphere of this rodeo really comes through in the sun. The daylight allows us to use higher shutter speeds to stop the action better as well. So, the IFYR is the best rodeo, for pictures at least, in Oklahoma.

Here are some photos and galleries of pictures from the competition.

July 13, 2009.

July 14, 2009.

July 15, 2009 in the evening.

July 16, 2009.

July 17, 2009.

July 18, 2009.

-Nate Billings

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A new award

The Great Plains Journalism Competition, which is sponsored by the Tulsa Press Club, had their first awards ceremony on Saturday night in Tulsa. This competition was different than most of the ones we enter. Instead of awarding a first, second, third and honor mentions in each category, the Great Plains Journalism Competition awards only Finalists and Winners. Here’s how we did and some of the winning photos.

Winner in Sports Photo — Chris Landsberger

Winner in Web/Slideshow Photos –John Clanton

Winner in Spot News–Steve Gooch

Winner in Feature Photo, single — Jim Beckel

Winner in Photography Portfolio — Bryan Terry

Winner in News Photo –Paul Hellstern

Finalist in Feature Photography Multiple –Jim Beckel
Finalist in General Photography–Sarah Phipps

-John Clanton

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Your AP monthly contest results

I have gotten behind on posting our department’s winning images from the monthly AP photo contest. Here are our winners from recent months. Congratulations to all.

-Nate Billings

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