Hi everyone-

Hope everyone had a great week. Mine was ok, and pretty long. Just got back from Las Vegas last night and you would think that after spending a week there at the WPPI photography conference I would be all amped up.

While I did learn a lot and am thankful for the experience I was really sick the whole time and didn't have any of the fun you might expect out of a Vegas trip. I never even got to play a single hand of black jack. Most days were spent in class trying stay awake, learn something and not hack up a lung. Evenings were spent trying to eat something and then heading to bed.

So today I went to the doctors again and then for x-rays to rule out pneumonia. Super. Waiting to hear back on that. And I'm starting another round of medications.

But one good thing has happened this week. One of my images shot at a fire in West Manchester Township was selected for this months cover for FireRescue Magazine.

The issue covers rural fire tactics. So the image is a good fit. FireRescue tries to create covers that give the reader a glimpse of what's inside. This image fits well because of the barns and windmill in it.

When I shoot fires I try to shoot a variety of scenes and angles. I want to tell the story of the incident. But one thing I always try to shoot are images that will fit well on the cover of the magazine. Obviously they need to be vertical bet I also like to arrange areas for the mast head (magazine title) as well as areas of dead space where text can be laid over.

This image worked pretty good in that way.

Have a great day!

Hi everyone-

Back in March of '09 I got a notice that there was going to be a structural burn training held at the York County Fire Training School. I thought it would be fun to go up and catch some shots of the departments involved in the training.

Until recently I forgot that I even went up and shot these images. However I have recently started to organize and relocate some images and while I was doing so I came across the fire from that day.

Since it's been a while since I have shot anything fire department related I thought it would be a good change of pace.

Here are a few of the images that I shot that day. Hope you enjoy.

Have a Great Day!

Hi everyone-

So If you have been checking in I am sure your pretty surprised that there is a new post today. Well, I have actually had a bit of time along with a reliable internet connection so I thought I better get some new images up.

I have arrived in Choteau, Montana and am spending a few days here visiting with my mom and family. It's been a bit nicer here weather wise than it was in Yellowstone but I think thats about to change. Sounds like very cold temps and snow will be arriving shortly.

So onto the images....

The first two are f the Arnica Fire in Yellowstone National Park. During my first week in the park this fore was the dominate park feature. It was putting off a huge amount of smoke, closing roads and generally screwing up travel and sleeping arrangements. As well the wild life viewing wasn't that great because it was warm and most of the animals hadn't gotten the memo that it was fall.

So I shot a lot of images of the fire. The first one was shot at night from the West Thumb area. This was the last time I was able to travel the road before it was closed for the rest of the week. This image shows the width of the fire in this area.



The next image was shot at the Fishing Bridge junction. I thought it was interesting/funny because of the message on the sign.



I have a ton of images of the fire, some of which I will post here late and also in a gallery that I will post a link to here.

So I also shot some other subjects in the park between figuring out how to get around detours and smoke. Because the road was closed between Norris and Madison I stayed on the east side of the park for the most part. One of the places I spent a lot of time was on Mount Washburn. There was a lot of Elk activity in the high mountain meadows. The bull in the image below was on the move and lookin' for love on the this morning.



Another area that I spent a lot of time was Canyon. Many hours were spent walking and waiting in the meadows in this area looking for the Great Gray Owls. Well it paid off as I was able to photograph one of three that I saw. I also recorded some of the calls the owl was making. I will post that audio later once I get home and figure out the best way to do that. The other two owls I saw within second of each other. One flew away and the other gave us every opportunity to shoot it but a comedy of errors commenced once the ranger asked us to move our vehicles 3 more inches off the road. Till the logs were run over, the tripods hit, the vehicles moved and cameras found the bird said these guys are idiots I'm out of here and off he flew into the night.

This owl was shot within minutes of the first and only time I saw him at this particular location. He was very skittish and kept his distance. I think it had a lot to do with the large amount of photographers looking through the woods over the previous few days.



Have a great day!

Hi everyone-

Greetings from Jackson, WY and Grad Teton National Park! I would like to apologize for the lack of content lately, I have had little or no access to the internet over the last few days.

One of the major reasons for that was a perfect storm of events and conditions which left me confined to a small portion of Yellowstone. I could have gotten to my other destinations but it would have involved hundreds of miles of driving.

Today's images highlight one of the major reasons I was unable to travel through the park. The Arnica fire created a bit of havoc in the park. Started by lightning back on September 13th and really coming to life on the 23rd this fire grew quite large and effected many park services and roads.

This prevented me from leaving the park on my scheduled day and heading into Jackson Hole WY. I will talk more about this fire in future posts.

These images were shot in the evening of the day when the fire really blew up. It was the start to very smokey and very dramatic conditions. More on this fire later...

Don't forget to check out the Skywatch Blog and see great skies from around the world.

Have a great day!

Hi everyone-

I just received word that one of my images (shown below) has won first place in the 2009 International Association of Firefighters Media Awards.

The image is of Lt. Doug Bair of Harrisburg Fire's Squad 8. In the image he is working on overhauling a building, checking for additional hidden fire, during a multi alarm arson fire on Derry Street on September 1st of 2008.

The image is included in the awards article in this month's International Fire Fighter, the union's member publication and will be a part of the 2010 IAFF Burn Foundation Calendar.

You can purchase a calendar and support the burn foundation by following this link:---> IAFF BURN FOUNDATION

You can learn more about the foundation by going to their website here:----> IAFF BURN FOUNDATION WEBSITE

or by watching the video's here:-----> BURN FOUNDATION VIDEOS

Hi everyone-

Hope you all had a great weekend. This was the second weekend in a row that we really didn't have a lot to do. Which is certainly a really nice change from the busy weekends we have been having.

We basically stayed close to home and on Sunday my family was down to celebrate Tonya's Birthday. So we went out to eat and then hung out at home playing her new Wii. Tooooo much fun!

On Saturday night I did run out to photograph a small fire in West York. The guys made quick work of the fire. It started to rain shortly after I got there so it was a quick shoot. I got there shot some of the action, talked to some friends and got out of dodge before getting to wet.

I was able to get a few nice portrait shots of some of the guys I know. In this shot Jimmy who was part of the Rapid Intervention Team was hanging out after throwing ladders, taking out windows and making sure the firefighters inside had good egress and the safest possible conditions to work in.



On Another Note... An image I shot a while back at a very smokey house fire not far from where I live was used in this months Fire Engineering magazine. It was used to illustrate a point in an article written by Sam Hittle a firefighter from the Wichita, KS Fire Department. Fire Engineering is the top fire service training journal in the US.

Have a great day!

Hi everyone-

I thought I'd take a little diversion today from what I have been posting to show something I have been working on for a few days.
I was asked to create a recruitment poster for The City of Harrisburg Bureau of Fire. Nothing special, 12x18 and get the info out.

So I thought about a lot of concepts, a few would require shooting new stuff, a few would compile various images from different things we do but none of the ideas really were that great. Well that's not really true, a few I liked but the logistics of creating the scenes made them impossible to pull off. At least with no budget and little time.

So I decided to look through the images I have shot with the Bureau over the last few years. I also decided to stick with something simple and visually catchy. I want the poster to catch some one's eye and pretty much draw them and get the message out all within that first glance.

I wanted an image of a firefighter that is somewhat iconic and easily recognizable. Yet it had to be simple and uncomplicated. I found the image that I liked but it lacked anything special. The moment, and the pose were OK but the over all feel of the image and the color didn't do it for me. Here is the original version of the image:



After narrowing down the overall concept for the poster I set out to transform the image to look more like I had imagined it would or should. A few hours later this is what I have come up with:



I was pretty happy with the results to this point. It was certainly one of my most involved image transformations yet. I am not sure if I am done, at least to my satisfaction, but I am running out of time to deliver the proof.

This image will basically make up the entire poster with some very catchy looking text and a cool slogan as well as all of the necessary small print that a city would add. Once it is approved I will post the finished product here.

Have a great day!