Sharkey’s blog

So it looks like the stars might align and I will find myself in Seattle for the weekend of July 18th.  (North Bend to watch sight hounds compete on an open field).

If things go well I am going to be doing a photog shoot with the Rat City Roller Girls.

They kick ass.
Their photogs are extremely talented.

Here's to hoping the stars align.

This last weekend I had a terrific opportunity. My photography saga continues along solving some problems, throwing money at others (bought a flash).  But this last Sunday I had one of a good day. 

For a while now I have been following a flickr group, "Marking Portland". This is an effort to capture pictures of people
in PDX with tattoos.  I looked through the shots with some fascination as I always have been interested in tats.

But then I was hit with an idea, another of my recent passions, roller derby, has NUMEROUS participants with a wide array of ink.  I've been taking pictures for them since January, why not, instead of action shots, stretch my reach a bit and do portraits?  (I am sure any experienced photogs are laughing at me right now). 

So I bounced this idea of the president of the league and she LOVED it.  So this past Sunday we made 2 general callouts.. one to the photographers related to derby, the other to the roller girls.  We ended up with 3 distinct "studios": 1 was soft light boxes and a black back drop, the next was a hardcode strobist approach with flashes, focused flashes, etc. The last was an outside studio capitalizing on the natural sunlight.  Add 5 photographers and it was an awesome learning experience.

So this week we are going to assemble the shots, put them in   a restricted access area for the roller girls to all view, select the best and submit.  Even though I am doubtful any of mine compare to the others, the experience and what I learned was well worth being the newb on the block for the event.

So this last past weekend we took our boys (aka whippets) to a lure coursing event. Oberon, the older, is qualified to run so he was entered.

So where some beaming parents attend soccer matches and such, I was along for the ride with a rented 600mm f/4 camera lens for my SLR.  1000+ pictures of the event still remain to be loaded to flickr but this is my little man in full stride (above) and happy as can be after his run (below).

It's as close to smile as whippets muster.

It's what they love to do and what we love to watch him do.

And in the end.. he will sleep for days.

When the significant other is going to be late it sometimes affords you the opportunity to take the mundane and experiment. My assistants for the evening (included in the set) were quite supportive...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pdxsharkey/sets/72157616573732356/

Bwblml

IMG_0127

This week's photography assignment was described as open ended - choose something of interest and then work with different apertures, shutter speeds, white balance, etc.

I decided to play with water a bit and of course share the 1 shot that I thought was pretty slick.

This was captured at a zoo where an underground observatory is hidden under a waterfall spilling into a eagle preserve's all-you-can-eat fish buffet.

The rest of the pictures focused on capturing water in motion, splashes, breaking the surface of water pools, etc.

Wonder how this would look as wallpaper for my laptop.. hmm....

Received a request to talk to a gorup of high school students about internet safety...

me?  kids? really?  wow..

So this had me thinking how to even begin to design an 'informal' conversation with high school students about this.

I had this theme pop in my head..  "Polaroid Cameras and Pandora's Box..."

I am debating going to this thing with a polaroid camera and asking someone close to me to smile

when I take a picture.. then kick off the conversation with "Now.. suppose this was a nude of you.. get your hands

on it and you can be somewhat comfortable you have contained the issue.. but on the internet..."

Other things I might consider for them..

- what to share online

- relate my own experiences from when I had an online stalker show up at my door

- chat rooms

- identity theft - drawing the distinction between theft of what exists versus stealing enough to forge new assets

- stealing copyright materials? do I even care?

So the weekend of derby photography went off without a hitch.

Admittedly I was a bit nervous. Silly I know but I have that all too common fear of demonstrating in public what I do not know can hurt me. So from my seat out of the way, unobtrusive with my 300mm lense I focused on the season opener for the Rosecity Rollers (www.rosecityrollers.com):

http://picasaweb.google.com/masonite.burn 

Part of the class experiment/lesson this week involved messing with shutter speeds so that you black out the background and focus on your subject. Given the vast difference in lighting on the track and the audience behind them this was not too difficult - nor did it require the 4 full fstops the teacher advised.

It was an interesting trade - I lost some coherency in the bouts given I was behind a camera - they all went by quite fast. But seeing them through the telephoto lense exposed me to more personal aspects of the event - seeing it up close, the huddles, the jokes between jammers on the line, etc.  I will need to find that happy balance of enjoying derby for the sake of derby and playing with my new hobby.

P.S. A "masonite burn" is the rash one gets when you go down hard on a derby rink surface. It sounded neat so I am using that for now.  Someday soon I'll join the Flickr army and need to generalize the name since it will house derby and dogs and life pictures all at once.

2009 brings a new hobbie.. previously covered in several places here are some results from the Rose City Classic

dogshow where my whippet actually took 1st place in his breed/gender 1 of the 3 days. HUGE happiness for the

significant other.

Icarus

For more cool snaps...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/whippet-madness

So just prior to the snowpocalypse of 2008 I decided to make a purchase. I did the research, talked to a friend who's a  semi-pro, and made the purchase.  I've entered the world of digital photography.  Canon Rebel XSi + lenses + gear has been delivered.  Starting Friday I am taking classes. 

I've often looked at the few folks @ the cons I attend who lurk with cameras wondering about them. It's a dual edge sword; it seems to afford you some anonymity in crowd, acting as a shield of sorts to some forms of social scrutiny. On the other hand, most of the people I engage with despire being photographed so.. we shall see.

I think the happy compromise for me will be faceless moments captured in time.

- people's shoe covered feet at conferences (actually I don't have a shoe/foot fetish but I was trying to think what could I photograph that would not offend... oh look! it's  HD and Valsmith talking with Window.. and all you see are feet in a nightclub..)

- people's tattoos (another rarely discussed obsession of mine)

Of course the perrfect harmony that awaits these combination (like resse peanut butter cups) is shoes in rollerskates and tattoo.. namely.. DERBY.  Season Opener, January 24th!