2010 Big West Conference Tournament

This year marked my fourth and final year of covering the Big West tournament at the Anaheim Arena. Next year the tournament will move to the Honda Center. The Anaheim arena is a great venue for basketball, in addition to the hospitality and latitude we had to install our strobes. A lot of you have heard us talk about the infamous ceiling at the arena. Many a photographer have gotten lost up there over the years. Since this was our last hurrah, I shot shot some video so everyone can see what we've been talking about. The initial climb up the scaffolding is approximately 25 feet in the darkness. Most who know me, know I hate heights, so this used to really freak me out. However, after four years I kind of got used to it. Sorry about the "Blair Witch" POV, but hopefully you'll enjoy the footage.

A few setup photos:

Highlighted in red is one of four pods where we mount the strobes

This is a view of the climb down into the pod

Strobes mounted on the rail of the pod. Notice the other pod across the way. Each set of lights are hoisted up to the pods in a bag.

Anaheim Arena (aka, Anaheim Convention Center) from Michael Foo on Vimeo.

Here's the story that ran in a local newspaper.

 

The crew from the final Big West Tournament at the Anaheim Arena. From left to right, Reed Saxon (Associated Press), Grant Brown, Matt Brown, Bryan Crowe, and Michael Foo.

Shoot the Moon right between the eyes

Had the first clear and warm night of the year. Came home from dinner at around 21:00 and it was about 70 degrees and crystal clear. The moon was a couple days from full, but it looked awesome none the less. Since my friend Danny was recently bending my ear about the moon, I set up the rig to see what it's all about. Shot with a Nikon D3 at 560mm.

Bodie State Historic Park

These are some shots from October, 2009. The day was clear (too clear), warm, but very windy. Unfortunately, the timing worked out so we arrived at mid-day. Shot with my Hasselblad CFi 50mm on Kodak Plus-X, developed in Xtol and scanned.

"And now my comrades all are gone;
Naught remains to toast.
They have left me here in my misery,
Like some poor wandering ghost."

 

Will work for Food

I had a gig shooting women's college basketball last weekend. The venue is a true dungeon, so I needed to set up strobes. I took Jessica and Cheri with me to help set up and tear down. It was well worth the cost of a Subway sandwich and desert (shown below).

Vivian Maier (1926-2009)

Photographer John Maloof hit the jackpot at an antique furniture auction in Chicago. He acquired 40,000 medium format negatives from photographer Vivian Maier, an obscure French street photographer. Just over a third of the film was exposed undeveloped rolls. John is busy developing and scanning the remaining film. I spoke to him and his long term plan is to possibly publish a book of her work. There is some fantastic content. Check out the link below.

http://vivianmaier.blogspot.com

BTW, Vivian shot a Rolleiflex!

Digital Outing

Headed out early this morning with my friend Danny to capture some images. We had no set plan, so we just started driving. Ended up stopping by Long Beach for a short time and then ended up in San Pedro. I had some film with me, but opted to shoot a digital body with the Zeiss 21mm f/2.8. I love this lens!

More film scans

I had a couple of unfinished rolls of film in my cameras leftover from the Eastern Sierras trip. Again, I found myself heading to San Diego for some Division II Soccer Regionals. Since the game started at 19:00, I headed down to the beach for the sunset.

The first one was shot with the Pentax 67 II, 55-100mm on Fuji Velvia 100.

The next two are also shot with the Pentax 67 II, 55-100mm on Fuji Velvia 100.

 This shot was with the Hasselblad, CFi 50mm on Fuji Velvia 50.

And a couple from the front side of the roll. This was from our last cold and windy day at North Lake. Shot with the Pentax 67 II, 55-100mm on Fuji Velvia 100.

La Jolla Tidepools

In early May, 2009, I was down in the San Diego area covering a track and field event. After the event I hooked up with my friend Jimmy and he took me to this small stretch of beach in a residential area of La Jolla. There were only approximately 10 other people on the beach for this magnificent sunset. Captured with a Hasselblad 500 series, CFi 50mm on Fuji Velvia 100.

Also, a few digital images taken in mid November during low tide. Shot with a Nikon D700 at 24mm.

Volleyball

In my opinion, volleyball is one of the most difficult sports to photograph. Typically, games are played in gyms where the ambient light is terrible. Add to that a fast paced game with a fast moving ball and I rest my case. When I was tasked to cover a game, I took the opportunity to travel to UCSD and took my lighting gear. Rimac Arena has a catwalk that allows you to mount strobes and cameras about 30+ feet above the court. I used this opportunity to capture all the images I needed for the entire season in one night. I also mounted a remote camera on the rail to get a different angle from above.

Kodak Tmax 400

This is one of my favorite films. The grain is so very fine and it scans like a dream. Below are a few samples.

The first one is Jessica in front of her favorite chicken restaurant shot with the Rolleiflex 2.8F.

The second one was shot with the Yashica Mat 124-G.

A family portrait at El Matador State Beach with the Hasselblad CFi 50mm.

 

A portrait with the Hasselblad CFi 50mm using ambient light from the window and a Sunpak handle mount for fill flash.

A shot from the San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary in Irvine, CA. Shot with the Hasselbald CFi 50mm.

The Boardwalk

This is one of my favorite images of the year because of its simplicity. It was captured at the Bolsa Chica Wetlands on a cool and frosty late March morning. It was captured with a Canon EOS-1v HS with an adapted Zeiss Distagon 28mm f/2.8. Shot on Kodak Plus-X, developed with Kodak X-Tol and scanned.

Street Performer

In late August, 2009, I took the Rolleiflex to downtown Seattle outside Pike's Street Market. My goal was to capture some stealth street photos. I was trying to be invisible, but the camera drew a huge amount of attention. Most people were amazed that film was still available! I walked to the center of the crowd and sat on the ground to capture this shot of a street performer. Shot on Fuji Acros 100 (pushed to 400) and developed at home with Kodak Xtol.

South Bay Yellow Pages

In early October, 2009, I was contacted to publish some of my images for an ad in the AT&T Yellow Pages. Much to my surprise, the current issue not only included the internal ad, but also the cover!

Mono Lake

In early October, my friend Bryan and I took a road trip to the Eastern Sierras. My goal for this trip was to capture images on film. I took two film cameras, the Hasselblad 500 series with a CFi 50mm FLE and the Pentax 67II with a 55-100mm. The weather was clear, cold (~19 degrees in the morning) and windy. Definitely not ideal, but we managed to capture some great images. All transparencies were scanned on a Nikon Super Coolscan 9000 ED.

The first one is an early morning shot with the Hasselbad, CFi 50mm on Fuji Velvia 100.

The second one is a shot in the afternoon with the Pentax 67II on Fuji Velvia 100.

The last one is a shot at dusk with the Pentax 67 II on Fuji Velvia 50.

Summer surf

The weekend of the Hurley US Open of Surfing finals, a west swell brought double over head sets. This almost never happens. Because of the swell, the projected attendance at the US Open was 500,000! HB is a parking nightmare, so we decided to head south to the Wedge in Newport Beach to avoid the crowd. Because the Wedge is essentially a shore break, I decided to leave the still cameras at home and shot video. The early weather was pretty socked in, but the waves did not disappoint.

fyi, if you look closely, some of the surf footage features surf legend Tom Curran. Turn it up!


The Wedge from Michael Foo on Vimeo.