I Never Dreamed

Quite a game at Wyoming Area to open up the HR girls' run into the district tournament.  After arriving a few minutes late,it looked to me as if your Royals were well on the way to coasting to victory- keeping a double digit lead through most of the play.  This seemed to be as is should- the number one seed coasting through their first game. After all, low seeds never make a long run, right?  Plus, no one ever comes back from a big deficit like that- just ask the Bruins.   I never dreamed  that this would get close, much less end in the nail biting thriller that it did.  Congrats to both teams on their efforts, and thanks for providing an enjoyable afternoon of competitive basketball!

Some thoughts- because I know you are dying to hear what I think....

Wyoming Area's gym is one of the best in the area as far as lighting goes.  If you are looking for better quality photos (as far as color and lighting at least) this is the set where they will be.

While the lighting is good, apparently the roofing is slightly below average.  Congrats to the maintenance crew for their on-the-spot solution.

Note to fans- When you vehemently protest this foul being called, your judgment comes into question.

Speaking of fans, I am not sure what they were trying to accomplish with this-  I somehow doubt that it is a show of respect for the team from the catholic school... perhaps its that start of a joke?  (Jesus, a priest and three catholic schoolgirls walk into a bar....  you fill in the rest!)

Look familiar?

Some of the best photos were of the bench as the game got closer and closer.  Here's Mary doing her Curt Schilling imitation.

Sara resorted to the "death grip" on Fallyn and Shaina.

In case you are curious, this is what it looks like when your game is forced into OT.

The second free throw could have ended it in regulation.  Do you think this girl will forget this very quickly?

Shannon, with her dodgeball face....

Look Jesus- I don't care if you are the saviour, you are going to have to stay in your seat during the game.

The paper talked about the one she missed, but I seem to recall Olivia sinking a few late free throws to put this one away.

It never felt over for me though until this moment- Sydney's decisive rejection of Nanticoke's last shot.

There is a long story about why these shots are not what you expect.  It has to do with a full memory card, and a lens that was long enough to take pictures at the far end of the court.  For now, enjoy what we got, and hopefully we'll have the chance for more!

Off we go-

Game shots

FotoFink

Enjoy!

Skating Away

If you are a member of the FotoFink facebook page, you may have seen some samples of this latest "pet project"- night skiing photos.  Over the last two weeks, hardy members of the Holy Redeemer ski club have gathered on the cold slopes of Sno Mountain, skating away over the icy conditions to help make some cool action shots for all of us to share.  Before getting into the details of our fun, there are a few thank yous that need to be relayed....

This was not a simple project.  Every shot took 4-5 people "working" in some capacity to produce the results.  Lots of ski clubbers pitched in, and in case I missed thanking you in person, please accept this blanket "Thank You" as a small token of my appreciation.  If you made it into some photos, then hopefully that will be an additional reward... on the other hand, if none of your photos came out.... Then my lame thank you will be all you get.

Onto the business at hand then.   Occasionally, I am asked about the photos here on FotoFink-  Things like "How do you take those?" or "How come mine don't look like that?" or even "How come I look gross in this one?"  Blame the lighting for that, and the rub-on tan that never made it to your face. This shoot was actually a little interesting, so here's a few words on how this was done....

Usually, taking photos at night, on the ski slopes, is dicey at best.  Photos need light, and there is very little of that on the slopes.  Add in to the mix that cameras don't handle scenes very well that are almost all white, or all black- and the results can be .. average.  So how did these work?  At the most basic level, we brought our own light in.  There were two highly trained assistants carrying flashes on poles for each of these shots, which, in theory were fired with a radio transmitter attached to everything.  The effect is like a strobe in a disco that makes everything look stop-motion-  without the flash, the camera is set to "see" nothing- the burst of flash reveals the subject for a split second (about 1/800 actually) and freezes the motion on the frame.  Another quality of light is that it "falls off" very quickly (google "inverse square law" if you are as much of a geek as I am and want to know more about that).  The result is a well lit subject, and then a completely dark background.  Cool stuff, if that's the look you are going for.

So what can go wrong?  Having been out there twice now, I can answer that with some authority.  First off, batteries don't do well in the cold, and spares are completely useless if you leave them at home.  This was the harsh lesson of week one.  The cold has some other negative impacts as well- the radio flash triggers, which are supposed to work from a distance of 3 football fields away, struggled to work at anything more than 10 yards or so (I will blame the cold for this, as they have been very reliable indoors).  Auto focus in low light is another struggle, and focusing manually is no walk in the park either.  (Hats off to the old-timers who did this before the days of auto-focus.  And electricity)  As a result of the short range on the flashes, the camera needed to be closer to the skier than I would have liked, resulting in some "over-zooming"  Throw in some operator error on my part- bad timing, bad aim, etc. and this was really a minefield of possible disasters.  Thankfully- there were a few instances where the stars lined up just right, and we got some very good shots as a result.

Enough technical stuff- let's see the photos, Fink!

Ted's photo came out well- but for some reason, his skis look tiny.....

Another good one.  Maria was one of several who spent a lot of time holding the lights.

Casey was a bit help too, which makes it especially disappointing that her shot came out all blurry.  See the autofocus explanation above.

David's photo is one where only one flash triggered.  While its not the effect I wanted, its still pretty cool...

Nice finish...

Artie with some nice air...

This shot of part of Bernie is an example of the "operator error" I was noting earlier.  I missed, and I was too close.  Still....  This is kind of cool....

Melissa was another huge help.  Pretty gutsy too.

Something has to be said about David's jacket.  The last time I saw these colors, I was at the Flock of Seagulls/Go-Go's concert.  Which was a great show, btw.  The muffler falling off my car on the way home kind of spoiled that evening though.  No lie- I tied it back on with my sock.

I have no idea who this is.  I hope they have a better side.  My bad on this one.

I know for a fact that Courtney has a better side.  She was another major help to the project.

See?

There were a couple of guys who saw what we were up to and asked to get their photos taken too.  "C'mon" one said to the other, "we'll be on the internet!"  Wow.  First off, aren't we all anymore?  Secondly- Its a big internet.  Facebook has more users than most countries have people.  Maybe you should have asked for the website.  This may be one of them.  The photo didn't turn out too well anyway.

Photos from these excursions are all on the FotoFink site.

Week 1

Week 2

Enjoy!

Surrender

Sometimes, you just know there is something wrong.  This was the case in the house of FotoFink around the holidays.  There had been multiple shoots, on top of the ordinary holiday stress, and there was this undeniable feeling that the world was not spinning quite right.  Sure enough, it turned out that a set of pictures was mysteriously deleted- memory cards were re-read, hard drives were scanned, satellites were linking up... but still, there was a set of photos missing.  After lots of searching, it seemed the only thing to do was surrender- the first boy's basketball photos of the season looked to be gone for good.

Then....  While clearing some room on the hard drive, (it fills up pretty quickly here) a random folder on the desktop was one click away from deletion, when common sense took over and it was decided to check the contents first.....  and as they say in West Pittston....  Voila'!  The missing photos.  Some days it's good to be lucky.

As a result of that luck- we all get to relive the excitement of that pre-Christmas tilt, fan photos and all.....

As always, the games were exciting, but you know the party will start once Po arrives.

Some things just defy explanation.

When cheerleaders do their handspring thing, it is surprising hard to get the camera ready to catch the peak of that action.  Usually, the result is a late shot, that looks like this.  Or this.  Luckily,when the fans participated, the shot was a bit more timely.

Two questions-  Why would 4 opposing cheerleaders decide to sit in front of the entire Red Sea?  and what did AJ do there to make him flash that innocent, empty-hand look?

Soon guys...  Soon.

At Disney, a character would get fired for removing their head.  Here in the Red Sea, sharing your Po-head is actually considered a gesture of affection.

Laa-Laa seems more focused on the game than girls.  Wasn't Tinky-Winky the one there were questions about?

Speaking of questions...  Don't even get started here....

Game- oh yeah there was a game....

Nice face Pete.

Steve's no slouch-  check out the air.

John too.

Everyone is in on it.

Thanks go out to Austin for encouraging this shoot.  Thankfully, the photos are back from the dead.

Speaking of photos-

Game shots are here-

FotoFink is here-

Enjoy!

Green Christmas

Green Christmas (First time?  Install the plug-in, then right click and press play after you follow that link) took on a new meaning on Saturday, as not only was there no snow to speak of, but more importantly, the Rams celebrated the holiday with an end-of-season banquet.  The West Pittson Rams have quickly become a staple here at FotoFink, so we were thrilled to be invited to the affair. Although an attempt was made to provide Santa photos "on the spot", that didn't go as smoothly as originally planned....  As an alternative, the shots in this gallery are all right-clickable... so you can download, save, share and print as much as you'd like.

A few quick housekeeping items-  If you added the appropriate plug-in to see the Santa show, you can also clich here for a showing of the 40th anniversary DVD.  Copies will be available to all who order, contact Sherrie or myself for details.  Note that the DVD includes folders of original, Hi-res files for every photo in the show- but you'll have to open it up on a computer to see that.  Those alone are worth the cost of the show.

Speaking of which.... Many of you have asked me about buying a CD of the photos of your own player.  For the most part, I've never really sold the files like that- weddings have been the exception.  Since I had so many requests though, I've decided to offer them.  Here's the arrangement- pick any 40 pictures (of YOUR child or children only) and I will make up a disc for a $60 charge- that's $1.50 per photo.  They are then yours to have forever.  Note that this is not any 40 photos-  to discourage sharing,  the photos should be of players from the same family.

A few observations....

Kids are supposed to be in Santa's lap.  Its how things have been since the dawn of time. The best photos, of course, come when someone else gets in the act.

Tugging on Santa's beard probably won't result in better gifts.

Babies.....  they are like little photo machines....  I could have snapped all night.

Something about the lap-sitter outsizing Santa seems wrong.  It's probably a football thing.

Here's Chrismtas card material.

Why do you think that snowman is smiling?  Where is his hand anyway?

Enough of this- Here's why you are here-

Santa Photos

All of FotoFink

Enjoy!

Finish What Ya Started

Its no secret that this has been the busiest season in FotoFink history (FotoFink history?  C'mon....  its not like this has gone on for 40 years....).  Regardless, the backlog of photos has resulted in a lot of late nights, and a severe lack of blog posts.  Perhaps the worst part of all this though, is the constant question that comes up at every game....

"Hey FotoFink- When are you gonna finish what ya started?"

Thanks for asking.  Wednesday night/Thursday morning, 11/17-18....  The super bowl pictures are edited and uploading....  which means.... nothing really.  There are other sports to finish up still, a DVD to make, and winter seasons are right around the corner.  Still, this feels like a milestone, which is always worth celebrating a little.

Ram's football worked it way deeply into the FotoFink stable this fall, thanks to a few connections that blossomed, and some real enthusiasm for the photos. In spite of that, this will be the first blog post about any of the games- thankfully, the Super Bowl lived up to its hype and had a little bit of everything that a football game should have- so this will make a perfect summary for all of the games that were shot.

With a shot at an undefeated season, anticipation ran high for this game.  A crowd of record proportion gathered for the game, vuvuzelas in hand.  (LOVE those...)  Your Rams did not disappoint- Spurred on by the award-winning B-Team cheer squad, the boys in green managed to run, block, and score enough to seal victory in the biggest game of the season.

Speaking of boys in green and winning......  How about this?  For a life-long (read long-suffering) Eagles fan, that was fun!  Of course, it only helps a little to be playing well in November. but surely the rest of the NFC east is looking for whatever help they can find....

This is going to stay brief, as in addition to the workload noted, there was some extra drama in the cozy mountain retreat tonight.  While playing the part of Tituba (google it yourself), Mrs FotoFink fell to her knees, incurred some pain, and earned a trip to the ER and a few days in an immobilizer.....  In the words of Tommy Boy- "I've seen it a hundred times..."

Onto the show-

Super Bowl Photos

FotoFink, including lots of football and cheer photos from the whole season

Enjoy!

Get Ready

As busy as things are here at the FotoFink HQ, these photos had to become a priority.  A few parents had asked about purchasing shots, but until now everything taken had become the property of Wilkes.  Finally then, as the guys get ready for their last game, photos that you can buy are available!

A few of you, I know from when your players were in High School.  You may want to skip over my drivel and go right to the links at the end of the post- which won't bother me in the least.  The less time I spend between you and entering your credit card info, the better..... ;)

For the rest of you- first off- Welcome!  FotoFink is my hobby-turned-small business, and I hope you enjoy the shots from the game.  Those of you that I have met have been very positive, and your support is appreciated.  In addition to purchasing photos, there are some ways to steal and share them-  you can get details in the FAQ section of the site, or in the post I made for the Women's team here.

This was a fun game to watch- One of the things that makes soccer interesting, is that since scoring is so infrequent, results are often unpredictable.  Earlier this season (Nuemann) Wilkes almost managed to get a result in a game where they were outplayed- Against Manhattanville, it happened.  Good stuff for the home squad, and its much more satisfying than being on the other end of that exchange.

This was a scary moment, as Nicky P does his job in the wall.  Give him credit for bouncing right back up into the play, but for the next few seconds, he had to be running on instinct.  Its doubtful that he knew where he was right here.

Give Kaleb a lot of credit too- A big game on senior night really helped the cause.

I am so glad I still get to shoot this.  And this.  Well, all of it, really.

Believe it or not, this is a brief post, because as always- there are places to go, things to do, people to shoot....  There actually may be a few more shots posted to the gallery at some point- there was a full staff shooting that day, and all of the photos are not in yet.  In my haste, I neglected to add keyword tags to the photos, so the search box will not really work well.  If/when more shots go up, that will be corrected.

Photos from the match are here.

The rest of the empire is here.

Enjoy!

Friends

Busy times here at the cozy mountain retreat have delayed posting game photos beyond any reasonable time frame.  As a result, a game recap seems foolish- Let's just say that Meyers came to visit, and your Royals won convincingly to wrap up the home season on a positive note.  The light-hearted atmosphere on the sideline led to some fun photos though- which seems like a better topic to focus (pun intended) on.

It's hard not to notice that some teams are more special to the players than others.  Sometimes, that good feeling comes from success, hard work, and victory.  Truly special teams bond more deeply though- and its clear that these girls share such a bond.  Besides being teammates, they are friends- a fact that hopefully they will remember forever.  (note- buying a few photos wouldn't hurt to enhance that memory.  I'm just saying....)

It's hard to describe the momentum that builds with these girls as their photos are taken.  Despite efforts to stay out of the way, Mary spots the camera during a team huddle, and the hoopla begins.  Samantha seems a little less thrilled at that moment, but judging from the response, she was the only one.

From there it grows- "Mr. Fink! Can you take one with my sister?"  Done.  Too bad Mallory was playing at the time, or you could have had gifts for the entire extended family for Christmas.

"Mr. Fink!  I really want a picture with Danielle!"  Who wouldn't?  Done.

"How about one of the three of us?"  Sure.  Too bad for Mallory again- and Lauren for that matter.

"Thanks Mr. Fink!"  It's cool-   just so I don't miss this shot.

"Could you get one of all three goalies?"  Sure.  Stand right there.  "Wait!  I want to be in this too!"  Cool.  Mallory finally gets in one.

"Wait- me too!"  Sure- Jump right in. Literally Lauren, jump right in.  Sara- you do what you have to back there to be seen.

"A picture!  Let's get the whole team!"  Yeah, um... ok...  Shouldn't some of you be on the field though?

 "OK- Now Mr. Fink- can we get the goalies?"  Yep, we can.

"How about my sister and I?"  Good thinking.  There's Christmas card material.

"Now all the defense!"  Sure.  Why stop here?

"Wait wait!  I want a Bernardi picture!"  A Bernardi picture?  Yup.  It's like a sandwich.

There was, of course, a game going on too.  Really.  Photos are here.  It just wasn't as interesting as the sideline hijinks.


Lots more photos here.