Weekend Warrior

This weekend was the 22nd incarnation of the Eddie Adams Workshop in Jeffersonville, NY, and I drove up to spend a little time re-connecting with some old friends and meeting some new ones. Pulitzer-Prize Winner, Eddie Adams, started the photography workshop for 100 top, up-and-coming photographers to come together for a weekend of inspiration. I had the opportunity to hear two fantastic speakers, Al Bello and Platon. Al is a Getty photographer whose work I’m very familiar with, but I hadn’t had the opportunity to hear him speak before. He is a very funny, extremely talented sports photographer who has shot everything from cock fighting in Puerto Rico (his first multimedia project) to eight Olympics. He said that he always works the angles at a sporting event because he was never good at getting the “peak moment” shot that other photographers can get (I don’t believe you, Al). In his words, peak action is “hard….friggin’ hard.”

And of course, Platon is one of the contemporary kings of the portrait, who I got to hear at last year’s workshop, and is still fantastically entertaining.

The “usual suspects” of amazing photographers were there — Douglas Kirkland, Carolyn Cole, Deanne Fitzmaurice, Howard Schatz, Clay Patrick McBride, Yunghi Kim, Bill Eppridge, Bill Frakes, and more. It always feels like “how many Pulitzer Prize winners can you fit into a barn.”

I bumped into Gina LeVay, who told me that her Sand Hogs project (the guys who build the tunnels under New York) was being produced into a book this Fall. Can’t wait for that. Suzy Allman who attended as a student with me in 2003 was now a producer for one of the teams. Ah, the student becomes the master….

The friendly folks from Nikon Professional Service cleaned my camera, and replaced a rubber focusing ring on one of my lenses. I even got to play around with a 200-400mm f/4 lens. *drool*

This year the farm was invaded by bunnies. No one know where they came from, but I guess they’ve been breeding like, er, bunnies. I don’t know much about bunnies — I think they can be a pest, but they sure are cute.

As the students came back from their shoots, they started to ingest their cards and sit down with their team leaders and editors to discuss their imagery. As I walked around in the cramped quarters, I noticed all the hand gestures that people made as they critiqued the photographs. I even learned about Photo Mechanic‘s great slideshow feature (which I knew existed, but never tried — fullscreen, here I come).

Eddie Adams Workshop Hands – Images by Allen Murabayashi

I also picked up an X-Rite ColorChecker Passport from the guys at the Mac Group, which is a passport-sized white balance and color card. Been needing something like it for a while to neutralize some of the color cast in my studio work. I was talking to photographer Nelson Chan, who helps them out each year, and said “I don’t think I’ve ever come here without buying something from you guys.” He grinned and said, “I think you’re right.” I keep hoping gadgets will make my photography better (it doesn’t, but it sure is fun).

And two weekends ago, I ventured back to New Haven, CT to attend the centennial celebration of the Yale Whiffenpoofs, the countries oldest collegiate a cappella singing group, of which I was a member. I figured now that “Glee” is a big hit on FOX, I can brag about having been in the a cappella scene for the brief moment that it is cool.

600 of 800 living Whiffs from the class of 1939 – 2010 attended the reunion, and I have to say, it was quite moving to be a part of a legacy. There was a lot of singing, drinking, and memorializing. And even though the repertiore of songs has changed over the past 100 years, we still have a few songs that every alumni know, including the eponymous, Whiffenpoof Song.

We are poor little lambs,
Who have lost our way,
baa baa baa

We are little black sheep,
Who have gone astray,
baa baa baa

Gentlemen Songsters off on a spree,
Damned from here to eternity,
God have mercy on such as we,
baa baa baa