Two girls

Two girls talking and texting around 1:30 p.m. March 31 outside Moody.

© Rennie Murrell 2010

Phone

as i was leaving campus today, this guy came marching out of Loftin, looked like he was in a hurry to get somewhere.

Moble Phone

Joseph Garza, freshman, Broadcasting major, is having a serious personal conversation. Hope all turns out well for him. He is excited in getting into broadcasting.

just took this a couple days ago and thought ya'll might want to see it.

Someone on the phone with some kind of emotion

She's on the phone with a smile.

Just to remind you that it might not be easy to get a perfect shot in a week's time, but it is not impossible to get an acceptable shot. I spend 10 mins. sitting in front of Moody and I did encounter several opportunities. I don't have my SLR with me but the message is there.

This blog assignment is to train you be always aware of your environment and have your camera ready when something happen. Of course, a planning of where and when to get the kind of photos is part of the game.

Dr. Lo

Lisa Krantz's recent awards

Our coming speaker Lisa Krantz had just won the Star Photographer of the Year at the Texas Associated Press Managing Editors convention.

Check it out.








http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local_news/E-N_staffer_wins_star_photography_award.html

Slideshows of her photos

She also won the 2009 NPPA Region 8 Photographer of the Year award.

Region 8 incluldes States of Mexico, Louisiana, New Mexico, Texas. She is the best photographer amongst these 5 States.

Dr. Lo

The fire in my life.

My journal entry~

If you don't know by now there was a apartment fire next door to me. The guy that it was okay to stick his cigarettes between the siding. And the inter walls lit up like a Roman candle. Most of the damage was to the kitchen in between the ceiling broads, dining room, some water damage but the worst of all smoke damage. I was lucky that I forgot my camera in the car.....so I start taking photos and there I am standing there needing somebody to document this event. But why me? All I wanted was to hit, push and kick the living cramp out of the neighbor that caused this mess. After sitting in a empty apartment with my boys plus my parents I realized I was thankful because we were safe. I sat on the floor looking at my photos and cried because I was not in one of those photos nobody froze the image of sadness on my face that night. This morning I got the chance to walk through apart of the apartment, throw stuff away and get the basics....shampoo, towels, pillow, books and toys to keep busy while the apartments get their act together. The complex did lots of work to fix and repair the damage today which it great. However there's no electricity so we have to stay in the empty apartment maybe one more night and most if not all the food is bad. So los of take out : ( We did throw some stuff away but we won't know how much until we can walk through the whole apartment after all repairs are done.I hope to move back in the next few days after the inspectors gives us the okay. But here are my photos of today......

Finishing up repairs on the exter walls by the door.The vinyl floors have a layer of smoke debry that my shoe prints.

Our new door after the fireman broke down the old one.

Repairing the ceiling and the window that the fireman broke. Still no power but we got most of the damaged stuff out now we are waiting to clean up the smoke damage and air out the apartment. And waiting for the "okay" from inspector to say it's "live able."

The lesson is if you smoke please be considerate of others and put your butts in the trash can and make sure they are out.

outside reading

ATVB sophomore Steven Santana studies for a morning test in the mall.

Nursing sophomore Chris Rubalcava writes down some lyrics around 8 a.m. March 29.

© Rennie Murrell 2010

Reading

I took this picture East of Loftin while these two girls were studying for an Art test. Things got a bit interesting when the girl on the left pulled out a pen and started copying things off of the paper onto the bottom of her shoe.

Some more practice panning shots!

© Rennie Murrell 2010

Who is this photographer?

News photo 1 folks,

Please find time to find out who is this.















We are lucky to have her in town.

Dr. Lo

Reading

Theme for next week's blog posting

I thought you guys are getting better and better with your technique, therefore, I am going to make this a bit more challenging for the next week's photo.

The theme is: "Someone talking on the phone with emotional expression." Of course, the more emotional the better. Smile, surprise, angry, freak out are some examples. Expressions like ordering a pizza is not going to work. And please make it documentary, we don't set up photos except posed portrait. The same as before, photo ought to be taken on ACCD campuses.

See who is going to be the first one to come up with the shot.

The deadline is: April 5 (Mon.) at 10 a.m.

Dr. Lo

This week's Ranger

Hi news photo folks,

Have you check out the Ranger yet? If not, you should go to Ranger online (theranger.org) or get the print version at SAC.

I would like to comment on two photos this week.

The first one is the cover photo taken by Alison.

Alison Wadley/The Ranger






















This is a photo truly deserves the name "photo" in our professional photography world.
The timing was just right which frozen the beauty of a split moment that only a still photography can reveal. The perspective was just right with the subject high above the ground and showing a delightful dancing gesture. The girls watching and mimicking at the background clearly illustrated how a contributing background can help a photo to tell a story. It is a close to perfect photo except that I would hope that the original photo was not so loosely taken that require quite a substantial crop to achieve this composition, which caused a lost of image quality.

The second photo I would like to praise is Tyler's photo.

Tyler K. Cleveland/The Ranger






















I remembered in various moments in class, if you were not sleeping, I did mentioned about "creativity" in photojournalism. This is exactly what I am talking about. Creativity does exist in photojournalism, not once in a while, on the contrary, should be in every assignment we took. I remembered when I was a beginning newspaper photographer in Little Rock, I reminded myself everyday that I would try at least one creative way of shooting in each of my assignment (of course, after I secure my publishable "cliche" photos). This is even more important when one is shooting for a photo group or picture story.

Tyler's photo showed the relationship of the play director and the actor. The hand gesture was great and informational. It might be a bit going toward abstract but when the photo presented together with other photos of the same event on the same page, it would work and not just that, it gave a collective impression of what happened there. It was not told in a straight forward way, but it is another way of telling. The only thing I would hope to see was the actor's gesture to be more like acting instead of just standing there. But I guess the subject of this photo is the director, the actor is just an contributing element.

As a beginning photojournalist, I suggest you all to work toward this kind of photo. Your goal is to get it by purpose, not by luck. When you are sure that you can come back with this kind of photos in most of the assignments you took, you are ready to be called "professional."

Good job. Alison and Tyler. And of course, there are other pretty good photos in our Ranger taken by you all. I just don't have time to mention everyone of them. I am seeing maturity in photojournalism in some of you.

Keep up the good work.

Dr. Lo

These images were captured around 6:25 p.m. I used 1/200 sec. with f/5.6 ISO at 100 with various focal length settings.

© Rennie Murrell 2010

A CHILDS IMAGINATION

My niece, Elizabeth, is lost in deep thought while viewing fish at the Texas State Aquarium. What are you thinking about? The pretty fish? I'd like to swim like them. Only she knows. She enjoyed it and talked about it for weeks to her parents.

.

Early evening bluebonnets

© Rennie Murrell 2010

Reading.

Student reading right outside of Gonzalez Hall. The sun provided warmth in the early morning chill.

Reading

SAC Student prefers to endure the chill of the morning in a secluded table to study.

Risky business

Brandy discovered a huge machinery waving its huge crane in front of the chemistry & geology building Thursday noon. It was a machine that pumped concrete to the base of the building. She was trying to get a good shot of the machine and eventually she went up to the top of Loftin (the journalism building side). In order to get a better shot, she stepped closer and closer to the edge of the roof. Dr. Lo was worried about her safety. It is better wait until you become a war photographer to risk your life, not on an assignment like this.

To see how the huge crane look like, go check out the "people" slideshow on the Ranger online.

Dr. Lo

Outdoor reading

Have camera in hand, a desire in mind, your expected photo opportunity will appear in your eyes pretty soon. Of course, if you wait until the last hour to find your photo, a lot of excuses will find you.

Dr. Lo

"The Tree of Life"

© Rennie Murrell 2010

About connection

Not until I am sick I can feel this Web Log (Blog) connection is so helpful in connecting people mentally. I can't come to school on Monday but I was still able to connect to some of you by going to the blog to view your photos and leave comments.

Photography is a life style. You don't want to live a day without photography. If you know what I mean.

Dr. Lo

Dr. Lo's suggestion

My suggestion:

If you want your photo to be better, two things can help:

1. Start looking for photo opportunities earlier, not to wait until the morning the assignment is due.
2. Go try something new, new environment, new event, new people. Go out of your comfort zone.

It is very easy to distinguish what is a well planned photo; and what is a picked-up-on-the-way photo.

Dr. Lo

reading

reading in loftin

one with the tree.

i am one with the tree.

I was waiting for a car to pass by for another panning shot. Car never showed up for the assignment!

Holding hands shadows......

I was looking for something that would be interesting to see so I asked my husband hold out his hand for this photo. I was super happy because this was one of the days it was sunny !!

Bird on the fence

I took this photo of the bird on the fence, I was trying to get closer but as I crept up the bird flew away.

Next weeks blog theme

"Outdoor Reading"

Must be taken at ACCD campuses. If photos are good and outstanding, don't forget to turn in for the Ranger.

Shadow

Walking in the the park with my brother.

My scene my shadow

Port Aransas

Spring.

I felt adventurous and decided to climb a tree to shoot scattered flowers lit by the sun.

PEACE!

Finally, the sun came out! :) peace guys!

Robert Stofa © 2010

Texas Aquarium Photos

Okay yall here's my question.....we visited the aquarium this week and was wondering what could I have done better to make these photos work?? The jellyfish was challenging and the fish tank was okay I think....but whatever you offer will be great.

Thanks class : )

I decided to have some fun with my camera at 5:30 a.m. I used normal program at 4.0 secs. with f/5.6 and ISO set at 400. The focal length 55mm. I was really surprised when I saw this image in preview. Who let this dog out? © Rennie Murrell 2010

Shadowed In

Early morning shadow at the Texas State Aquarium in Corpus Christi. A great family experience. A must see, at least once.

Girls Playing

This picture is of Brooklyn, 2, and Dustyn, 2, running in circles at Luminaria downtown. They were enjoying the music and dancing and then began to chase eachother around.

Dr. Lo acts like a wild life photographer

Just last Sunday, I went to New Braunfels' Landa Park to enjoy the sunny weather. I noticed that quite a lot of birds were flying around in the area. I happened to have a long lens with me. Therefore, I tried to pretend I am the National Geographic photographer Joel Sartore and fired some nearly 500 frames on those birds.

Below are some better ones I got. I hope you like it.

Just so you know, photojournalism has no boundary. Any thing that is truthful and honest is photojournalism. By the way, no serious Photoshoping here, just some brightness/contrast/sharpening adjustment.

BTW, anyone knows these birds' name? Please enlighten me.

Dr. Lo

interraction

The bride, Lori, was so happy to see her old friend from middle school, Tiff, at her wedding. Tiff traveled all the way from D.C. to witness the important day. The suprise of her friend made Lori cry more than when she read her vows.

This shot was taken right after the wedding.

Photo by Marisa N. Montano