We're Going Home!

Well Alpha Company has graduated and I have once again realized that I have not been keeping the three of you, actually I think there's less than that, loyal followers up to date with my photos. So here are some from the final days of Alpha Co. here at Ft. Knox. It was really nice to see all the families getting back together and to see how proud the families were of their cadets. Looking back on it, you could tell that these people came in a certain way and left as much more mature people. There was much hugging and kissing of boyfriends and girlfriends at the reunion. It even made me smile. Also, I've never had so many people telling me how much they appreciated my work. It made me pretty happy to know that I did a good job and I helped make it enjoyable for the parents.

It was difficult to see the cadets go since I finally started making some friends with them as they were winding down. Some of the other photographers got really close to their cadets from the start but I didn't feel like that was professional. I like to keep a professional distance from my subjects that way I know that I will cover them fairly and that I won't focus on person or group to much. Thank you ethics class.

Anyway, hope you like the photos. Let me know what you think and hey, since you're here why don't you mark yourself down as a follower over there to the side ->. Also, it would help me out if people started following the RSS feed. That way I don't have to worry about posting this up on 10 different sites to make sure people know about it. Also, and this is the last thing, let your friends know about this site! Pretty please! So yeah, start following, sign up for the RSS, and spread the word. Oh, and leave comments as always.

It's Been Awhile

So once again I find myself looking at the calendar and realizing that it's been forever since I put a post up here. There has been so much going on with LTC and my company is getting ready to graduate in less than two weeks. It's been a really interesting experience and it was cool to see these guys develop basically in front of my eyes. In about a week they're going to have an event called "Family Day" which is exactly what it sounds like. For that they're going to blow a couple of my photos up to literally gigantic size. I don't know the exact numbers but I think it's around 5'x7'. Anyway, that's being done for two of my photos. One of which is the water photo up above here. Hope everyone enjoys the shots. Leave a comment and let me know what you think.

Water, Water, So Much Water.

So I've been feeling a little down on my photo skills the last couple of days but I think I may have finally gotten some of my swagger back. The internship is going pretty well even though I'm so busy I hardly have anytime to do anything besides shoot, eat and sleep. For the last two days I've been waist high in a creek having artillery simulators go off around me while I try desperately not to let my camera equipment fall to a watery grave. Quite fun really. Seeing the other interns photos has really put a fire under me to get some better shots. I don't care if they say we shouldn't be competing, I always am. I think they're liars if they so they're not. Anyway, hope everyone enjoys the photos. Questions, comments or suggestions? Please let me know.

P.s. Here's the link for the whole photo gallery: http://bit.ly/j2PHnp

Head in the Dirt

Ok, so I'm back. It's been a couple of days but I apologize to no one. My work schedule has been insane. Shooting Alpha Company has been a lot of fun so far. Today was the first day that they went into the field and got down and dirty. I've got a couple of pictures from that and I've also got a portrait from the day that the cadets were issued their ACUs (Army Combat Uniforms). I'm actually pretty nervous about my photos since it's close to impossible to get "bad" photos in these situations. So I feel like I need to do extra good to stand out over the other photographers. As I was telling a Master Sergeant today.
"I want others to succeed. I just want to succeed more than they do."
Hopefully you like the photos. Comment and let me know what you think. Oh yeah, here's a link to the complete photo gallery http://armyrotc.smugmug.com/LeadersTrainingCourse2011/Alpha-Co/Squad-Tactics/17599254_BCBtsm

In-Processing. A boring day at ROTC

Well today was actually kind of a boring day at Ft. Knox for the LTC. Basically all that happened was the cadets did paper work and watched sketches about sexual harassment. The photo on top is of cadets getting their photos taken for their IDs while the bottom one is a little self portrait I decided to throw in since I didn't really have anything else to do. Anyway, I'm having issues with getting the page with the gallery to work right now so be on the lookout for the link to that.

Yes, Drill Sergeant!

Well I shot my first day at my internship as a Public Affairs Officer (Photo Intern) working for the Leaders Training Course at Ft. Knox. Today was the easy stuff for the cadets. Basically just getting here and getting settled. It's really quite amazing, the Drill Sergeant (not Sir, Drill Sergeant!) are told to operate at half of the meanness since the cadets are not recruits. They're simply here to see if they want to join the military. Even so, I found myself frightened of them even though I knew they didn't really give a damn about me. In fact, the Drill Sergeants are quite nice to me. As an intern I get to experience all of the fun stuff like rappelling and M-16 targeting without having to go through all of the yelling and other things. I've got a month more of shooting to do with activities that will be much more visually exciting than this so I hope you enjoy the teaser.

Churchill Downs

So I've recently becoming very interested in horse racing, and by default, losing money on those horse races. I've owned horses for 11 years but I've never really paid attention to horse racing. In the last month I've been to two races, one at Indiana Downs and the other at the legendary Churchill Downs, where all of these photos come from. I'm slightly disappointed with the actual race photos here but I wasn't allowed to get as close to the rail as I wanted and I could only zoom in so far. I am however really happy with the jockey photo up at the top. I have another photo that I want to add to this but I'd reached my limit on size for the post, maybe I'll put it up later if I get the chance. Anyway, I had so much fun at the races. I met the jockey who had won the Preakness on Shackleford, Jesus Castanon, and broke even on my betting. If you ever get a chance to go I definitely recommend it. Hope everyone enjoys the photos and please leave some comments to let me know what you think. I start my internship down at Ft. Knox next week so you'll be seeing some photos of Army Cadets in training coming soon.