love wins.

6/50 states isn't pretty, but it's progress. new york made history last week by becoming the sixth (and most populous) state to legalize same-sex marriages. i realize that there are "bigger" issues in the world, like war, poverty, and heinous human rights violations, among many others, but this is something worth celebrating. it feels amazing to know that we can reach across the aisles of partisanship and stand together for something as powerful, important, and universal as love.

honestly, i'm shocked that prejudice still exists in this country, in this day and age. if there's anything i've learned from the stories my parents have told me about growing up in an era of racial prejudice and segregation in america, from the routine beatdowns i got just for playing at my neighborhood playground sporting the wrong skin color, from the hateful names and words i've had to hear people hurl at my friends and family -- it's that people are people are people. we may dress differently or speak different languages or enjoy different types of literature, but we all hurt, and we all love. there are things that make us unique and special -- and to be sure, those things are beautiful -- but at our cores, we were made to understand, to help, to love each other. no matter what you were born, you're not a freak. you're not unforgivably different, and you're certainly not alone. it's our job to make sure of that, right? to make sure no one feels alone or unloved?

at the end of the day, i guess i feel so strongly about the legalization of same-sex marriage because love and marriage aren't rights afforded only to those who are white, or straight, or religious, or what have you. the point we're trying to drive home isn't that marriage is "also a 'gay' right", but that love and marriage are human rights, belonging to all human beings. when values like equality, love, and fairness aren't applied to everyone, then don't they kind of lose their value? it's like winning because the person who beat you broke some obscure little rule -- who likes having that asterisk there? it just doesn't mean as much. denying people who are in love and committed to each other the right to marry -- for me, that is an endangerment to the institution of marriage. that is a real slap in the face.

i've said it before, that i believe our destiny in this world is to leave it a better place than we found it. we were put on this earth to effect change, to society and in each other, and our lives are ripe with amazing opportunities to do so. you have the choice to sit back and let those opportunities pass you by, but to do so would be to waste our amazing faculty for sympathy, compassion, humanity, and love. i find it astonishing that we as a species can erect metropolises and continually top one another at the "tallest building in the world" game, build machines that will take us into outer space, create weapons that can hit a target from hundreds of miles away, and invent devices that allow us to talk to each other in real time, face-to-face when we're oceans apart -- but we can't understand something as universal as love, and what's worse, we aren't willing to fight for it.

i refuse to believe that the world will be like this forever. that my friend, an army veteran, will continue to be refused service at a restaurant in the south because of the color of his skin. that my dear friend won't be able to marry the woman she's in love with because someone else says it's not okay for girls to be in love with other girls. that people will continue to look at my sister, someone who's never hated or hurt anyone in her whole entire life, like she's a monster. call me a cheeseball, but i believe in change, i believe in hope, and most of all, i believe that human beings are capable of so much goodness and so much love. we're better than this institutionalized hatred and inequality we've been blindly supporting for so long. and if our legacies are defined by the causes we fought for and the things we were passionate about, then i hope we leave the right kind of legacy, on the right side of history.







love always shines everytime. remember 2 smile.

epiphany

thank you, for this inspiration and this encouragement to keep going and keep fighting for what i love.

"i love writing but hate starting. the page is awfully white and it says, 'you may have fooled some of the people some of the time but those days are over, giftless. i'm not your agent and i'm not your mommy, i'm a white piece of paper, you wanna dance with me?' and i really, really don't."
-aaron sorkin

"nobody tells this to people who are beginners. i wish someone had told me. all of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. but there is this gap. for the first couple years you make stuff, it's just not that good. it's trying to be good, it has potential, but it's not. but your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. and your taste is why your work disappoints you. a lot of people never get past this phase; they quit. most people i know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. we know our work doesn't have this special thing that we want it to have. we all go through this. and if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know that it's normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. put yourself on a deadline so that every week you finish one piece. it's only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. and i took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone i've ever met. it's gonna take a while. it's normal to take awhile. you just gotta fight your way through."
-ira glass

while the expanse is still vast, i'm feeling a little less small, even if it's only on the inside.

let the rain: the lowercase version

whoa, been a while. the only thing harder than the upkeep of one blog is the upkeep of two blogs. i don't know why i thought i could do it and stay interesting (*foghorn*)/motivated.

i'm coming up on close to a year post-graduation, and all i've really done with my life is rewatch entire television series (and then i proceed to identify outrageously hard with mad storylines, womp womp), work out occasionally, grow out my hair and then cut it, and spend more money than i have -- hardly what i imagined i'd be doing with my life back when i was a wide-eyed 21 year old, standing at the edge of the rest of my life. it's been rough, for sure. with all the terribleness that's going on in the world, i'm very thankful and happy with what i've got in life, and i know that i'm lucky for all the great people and great things going on in my life. but the past couple months have still been trying, unhappy, and very lonely. after a while you've got to take a long, hard look in the mirror and ask what's wrong with you that you still can't find a job or some sort of direction in your life.

i don't know when it happened, but some time over the course of the last year, i lost myself. i lost the person i had grown into, the person i had grown to love; i lost the skin i felt comfortable in. i lost everything i felt good about and i lost all the devices i used to use to make me feel good again. i lost the sense of self-confidence, of self-assuredness. i felt like i lost my insides and guts (not the gut though, *foghorn*) and my heart, and i just felt really dang lost, period.

without going into the long-winded, "woe is me" details about how i went deeper into the crevasse to go through this wonderful journey of self-discovery and self-acceptance, i'll sum it up with this: i became consumed by my anger and cynicism without knowing exactly where it came from. it wasn't until we received the verdict of a criminal case against the man who killed my cousin in a car accident last winter that i realized what all those bad feelings were stemming from.

i don't want to get into discussing the verdict or the specifics of it, really, because i think it's all bull. well, never mind, i'll get into it a little bit. i understand that i'm bitter, and i understand that i'm being vindictive. i understand that no punishment, no matter how severe or how harsh will bring my cousin back. i also know that it wasn't only our lives that were changed -- ed stapinski's life and his family's lives were also changed forever. i sympathize with that, and i feel for his family. i know guilt is a terribly powerful thing to live with, and i'm sure he feels sorry for what he did. i know all these things, and i also sometimes believe in forgiving and moving on, but i don't think i'm there yet. maybe that part of my maturity isn't fully formed yet. so a part of me is dying inside because he might not have to serve the full six years. the paltry six years he got for getting drunk to three times the legal limit and speeding over thirty miles an hour over the speed limit, resulting in the death of an innocent man. how do you get so drunk that you're three times the legal limit and escape being labeled as "reckless"? "aggravated driving under the influence"? cuss that, you killed a man. was it intentional? no. was it reckless? hell the cuss yeah!

so back to my original point -- that anger, that hostility, and that cynicism that came to dominate my spirit came from the knowledge that bad things happen to good people. and good things happen to bad people. you can do good your whole life and get nothing for it, while you can do bad and not suffer the consequences.

so why be good if it pays to be bad? why work hard if there are people who can skate by and still win? why do things the right way every time if it's so much easier to do what's, well, easy? why put yourself through that?

again, i'll spare you the sappy, self-congratulatory details of how i came to this point, but i realized that no matter what the world and what life has to throw at me, i've got to stay true to the core of me.

my life philosophy is to do good because it's the right thing to do, not because there's some sort of reward for doing good or some sort of punishment for doing bad. work hard because there is no other way to work. give everything you have because there's no other way to give. (unless it's food, in which case a big girl's gotta eat, you dig?) love with everything in you because there's no other way to love. most of all, be good to the world and the people around you. i think that sometimes that good and that positive karmic energy you put out into the world might return to you in some way. finding money on the ground. getting an e-mail about your class being canceled before you leave your apartment. having your favorite song come up on shuffle when you need a smile. y'know.

i learned a lot about me, and i learned a lot about my "friends", too. because -- and did y'all know? -- some people don't come around so often when it's raining. some people don't wanna talk to you as much when they know you've got nothing but bad news. some people don't want to talk so much anymore once you start asking for help. some people don't miss you when you're hurting. some people don't want to reach out if they think they have to reach into a hole. "i get by with a little help from my friends?" that whole song and dance? it's nice when it's there. but a lot of times you'll find yourself rolling one deep.

(side note: i would DIE if someone dedicated "roll up" to me. DIE. i'm just saying. i've thought about dedicating this to at least seven different people. mad thirsty, but i'm not sorry about it.)

while i felt grateful for the self-discoveries i made, i still felt angry that my friends couldn't have been there with me, that they couldn't have supported me or even given a hoot about what was going on. but that anger was so wrong; that emotion was entirely unnecessary, and the energy i spent being mad at all the trifling people who "weren't there" should have gone towards working on my relationship with the person who was there all along -- respect starts with you. love starts with you. you know what i mean? you can't expect others to love or respect you if you don't love and respect yourself.

i had to sit back and recognize that i wasn't lost in some deep, dark, desolate hole of sadness and cries and gloom. i didn't need someone to save me, i didn't need someone to tell me what i was missing. i wasn't lost and the person i've always been didn't die away, either. that person, although she's been kind of sad and lonely and down for a while, well... she's always been there. she's always kept fighting and standing up and brushing off her shoulders like she's the baddest thing walking. she's been there from the beginning, and she'll continue to be there through everything.

i guess what i'm trying to say is that i've always known who i am (awkward phrasing, eep). i love my friends who've been there too (don't think i spend all my time fretting about the people who weren't there), but i'm glad i found me through all of this. i've always known that i'm not lacking in the strength, heart, determination (read: bullheadedness), guts, or courage to persevere, and it's nice to know that when things get hard again i'll *still* have all those qualities to carry me through it. it can get rough sometimes, but if you stay you through it all, you'll make it out okay. god, this post has been full of nonsensical mess, but i hope you know what i'm talking about. i've always known what lies in my heart and what drives me. sometimes i just need the rain to remind me.


i always felt it before
that the world was filled with much more
than the drowning soul i've learned to be
i just need the rain to remind me

full-blown addiction

hi, my name is joann, and i'm a shoot-a-holic. i'm addicted to photographing sports.

no, but in all seriousness, what a GREAT feeling. i'm so glad i don't have to wait long to do it again (shooting volleyball -- TWO games -- over halloween weekend, holler!), and hopefully i won't have to wait much longer to see my shots, eek!

i shot the illinois soccer game vs. iowa this past saturday evening. i've shot soccer before, but that was in high school and it was during the daytime, not to mention my camera was terrible back then ... but anyway, this was definitely going to be a challenge. my original plan was to make it back to chicago early to late afternoon on friday, immediately drive down to champaign and shoot volleyball and watch midnight madness, and then shoot soccer on saturday night. unforch, i was still in the state of michigan when the doors for the volleyball game opened sooooooooooo i knew i wasn't gonna make it. i then revised my gameplan and planned on renting equipment early saturday morning before heading down to shoot the soccer game at night.

i went to dodd camera on armitage, and the guy working that day, john, was super helpful. they didn't have anything i was looking for (no olympus lenses, the only nikon body they had available to rent required a $5000 deposit, etc.), but he really worked to help me find other alternatives, and was very informative in answering my questions. there were two other guys in there that morning looking around for stuff (one guy said he had gone to school to study photography, the other guy seemed like he might have worked in photography -- he was talking about how he had just gotten a camera "yesterday, but it's not coming out until tomorrow" and whatnot) and i have to admit that i was a little intimidated and out of my element, but john was very kind and explained things/answered my questions without being elitist or condescending. i asked a question (what kind of camera should an amateur sports photographer like me get?) that kind of sparked a store debate about what camera i should buy, the pros and cons of each camera, etc. etc. after the whole big discussion died down, john came back to me and gave me a few suggestions and extended the offer to help me try out different lenses and stuff once i picked and purchased my body. so i walked out of the place without anything, but i still had a great experience there, so kudos to john and dodd.

anyway, dilemma. i knew my oly wouldn't hold up very well shooting soccer at night, so i let cary know about my situation, and he was super awesome and told me he could hook me up with some of his older equipment for the evening. i ended up shooting with his nikon d300 and a 70-200mm f/2.8 lens. he took the camera out of his bag and it looked like a behemoth compared to my oly. i put the camera around my neck and thought i was gonna fall over. definitely a very hefty camera. i was a little nervous at first, didn't know how to touch it or how to do anything. but it was pretty easy to figure out. snapped a few practice shots, fiddled around with the buttons for a bit, and by the start of the game, i had a vague idea what i was doing and my shots were turning out decent. when the anthem started playing or whenever play stopped, i didn't let that camera hang around my neck the way i usually do with my oly -- i probably would have tipped over -- i hung onto that thing for my dear life. good lord was i nervous the whole time.

shooting at night is crazy. kudos to those who do it on a regular basis. it was waaaaay different from shooting ultimate in natural light. even though the soccer field was illuminated, there were definitely some dark spots that the camera was picking up. i think once i get a little more familiar with what adjustments to make to adjust to lighting situations and once i figure out how to do it while simultaneously shooting, i'll start getting the shots i want. just takes experience and lots of playing around and learning your camera, i guess. the shooting situation was definitely a little different than volleyball. lots of the play was happening around the goals, so you just have to choose where you want to stand. obviously, you don't/can't stand behind the net, so mostly we just staked out the different corners, always standing at the net illinois was attacking. i pretty much picked two or three spots and stuck to those spots. the daily illini photographer was running around trying to get his shot, i was content with standing where i was and letting it come to me. lazy, what up.

shooting soccer was super fun. much like volleyball, it's constant action, the ball's moving fast, the girls are running all over the place. even though i was standing just out of bounds, the camera can only do so much -- when the play isn't happening right in front of you, on the sideline you're standing you, it's hard to get a good shot of something cool happening across the field or in the middle of the field. that was a bummer, when the ball would spend a lot of time in a place where i couldn't get a good shot. the atmosphere was a little different -- you're not right up next to the players like you are with volleyball at huff -- but there were times when the players would be battling for the ball right in front of us, that was pretty cool. i think on one occasion, marissa mykines passed to shayla mutz, who was on the sideline literally right in front of us. sometimes when you're so focused on getting a shot and you're just staring at the action through the viewfinder, you don't notice at all what's happening outside your line of view, so if shayla hadn't of stopped that ball, that ball definitely would have come flying at all the photographers on the sideline because none of us saw that ball coming. that was about as close to the action as i got all night, although i did get to see TWO megan pawloski flip throw-ins on my sideline. i think i got a pretty nice sequence of it too, although i didn't get the shot of the release i wanted. i'm not quite sure what i prefer shooting, volleyball or soccer. i think volleyball gets the slight edge here, leaving aside the huff vs. track and soccer field argument (because huff obviously wins, you can't beat being on the floor, literally inches away from a player as she serves and a mere foot away from the screaming spike squad). i guess with volleyball there were just more opportunities to capture emotion and reactions, which i like.

the game in itself was pretty sick. the illini came from behind to win it. i feel like all the scoring happened in something ridiculous like a seven minute span. so nasty. an iowa girl got called for a handball right in front of the ref, and then krystin miller made the pk even though the keeper knew exactly where she wanted it. the game went into overtime and shayla mutz had a nice breakaway from her defender and got it past the iowa keeper. speaking of that iowa keeper, i should have asked her after the game if she used to or still does play ultimate. i think she would make a GREAT monster. that girl was LOUD as hell. every time she yelled stuff like "TURN!" or "to your left/right", "shade in", "drop back", and other random shit that monsters yell out to you, i jumped out of my skin, she was so loud.

the illinois team was super cool. they have this mix they jam out to before their games (courtney's favorite "hello good morning" song is on it, needless to say i breathlessly texted her this information). they looked really good. marissa mykines is FAST. that girl was all OVER the place, i got tired just watching her. i didn't get to see too much of juice, my fave, but i saw lots of shayla mutz, who played mostly right in front of me. like i said, i got to see the famous paz throw in, and even though she just barely missed the save, i saw a SICK kapicka layout -- cary has the photo, and it will most CERTAINLY make illinoisloyalty or the dia gallery. finally got to see vdb play, too. DEFINITELY glad i made it to this game.

first, HUGE shout out to cary, who not only let me borrow his equipment but also hooked me up with a SEASON media pass for all the "olympic" sports at the university of illinois. understandably, it doesn't get me in to shoot for football or basketball, but he says that getting the women's basketball pass isn't too difficult. this basically means that for the rest of this entire year, i'll be able to get into games free and before doors open, and i'll be allowed to shoot on the floor of events without getting hassled by the dia, which is gonna be great. there's no date or year on my pass either, so cary said i could very well just keep on using it beyond this year, too (another photographer in the vicinity at the time admitted that his pass was from 2008, lawl). it's pretty sweet to have someone who is well-known and respected within the u of i sports photography community vouch for you and go out on a limb for you and do something big like this, so i definitely appreciate it. it's definitely like a "foot in the door" for me, so hopefully i learn a lot, get a nicer camera, take some sick shots, and hopefully get picked up by the dia or someone like that for some freelance work. seriously, none of this would have happened with cary, so huge props to the guy.

second, big shout out to patagonia. that cap 2 half-zip pullover is amazing. legitimately, in the past week, i've worn it about 5/7 days. it's pretty gross, but i just pulled that puppy out of the washing machine, so looks like i'll be wearing it some more soon hollerrrrr. anyway, the soccer game was a night game, and it was a little chilly and a little windy down on the pitch. i didn't want to shoot in a bulky jacket or hoodie, so i wore a long sleeve shirt, my ultimate long sleeve, and brought my pata half-zip along as well. it started getting a little windy just as the game started so i pulled on the half-zip and i was TOASTY for the rest of the night. the other people shooting and recording were wearing jackets and hoodies.

finally, thanks to the soccer team for such a SICK game. i had been saying all season that i needed to get down there and watch this team play, and when i finally get the chance to go down, it's an exciting game that goes right down to the wire (i think it was the first game this season that was a come-from-behind win). no record-setting performance from vdb (ALMOST WENT TO THAT GAME, UGH), but great game by the team nonetheless.

i'm pretty sure i'm going down to campus halloween weekend to shoot two volleyball games. hopefully i'll either find a d90 to borrow and try out, or my uncle will lend me one of his old nikons for the weekend. i'm reeeeeeeally looking forward to it, and i'm even more so looking forward to seeing my SHOTS from soccer!

awkward/embarrassing story #1: when i got to the field, i realized that i really, really had to pee. i was pretty sure they weren't gonna let me into the ticket office to pee, so i decided i'd go for the first port-a-potty i saw. once i walked down to the field, i saw a port-a-potty off to the side, next to a tent about twenty yards off the field, so i headed straight for that one. i went in, j'd my p's a little over having a season media pass around my neck, took care of business, and came out totally thinking to myself that that was the cleanest port-a-potty i had ever been in in my entire life. a few minutes later, after the girls were done warming up, i saw a couple players start walking to that port-a-potty. i then noticed that the tent it was next to was their halftime tent. and then i realized i had used the team port-a-potty instead of the public ones. *phew* good thing no player was waiting in line to use it while i was in there...

awkward/embarrassing story #2: cary had some business to take care of before we met up to set up the camera, so i hung out behind the goal and watched the illinois goalies warm up. i noticed that none of them put their hands in their pockets (like i did when i was beasting in between the pipes for thundercatz), but probably because their shorts didn't have any pockets. but anyway, all the little ball boys and girls were hanging out behind the net too, waiting to pounce on any stray ball that the keepers knocked out or the coach kicked out. i wasn't paying full attention and was half-watching and half-texting, so i was taken a little by surprise when a couple balls would come my way (that's a TWSS situation). for the most part i just awkwardly moved out of the way, but one time a ball actually rolled right up to me. i kicked it back to the keeper (margaret would have been PROUD, it was a good ass kick!) before the ball kid could get to it. he was maybe five or six, SUPER tiny compared to his friends, and he stood there and watched me kicked it. he watched the trajectory of the ball. he watched it roll back to the keeper's feet. then he turned and looked at me and gave me the most dejected, most hurt face i had ever seen on a child. i felt like such a monster.

awkward/embarrassing story #3: the guy shooting for the di was someone i apparently had class with. he went on to describe how we had discussion together and everything. apparently i was so far checked out of college by second semester that not only could i not remember the kid, i couldn't even remember the class he was referring to. WELP.

awkward/embarrassing story #4: i got caught staring at janet rayfield. NOT MY FAULT SHE'S A TOTAL BADASS.

baby's first shoot

so in case i haven't gushed to you about the story, i recently had the privilege of shooting the illinois/penn state volleyball game at huff hall. it was the pitting of two big ten/national volleyball powers against each other early in the season, with #2 penn state, the current three-time defending national champions riding a 65-game big ten win streak into champaign to meet #9 illinois, a team that has already knocked off then-#2 texas in straight sets earlier this season. i've been a fan of illinois volleyball for a while now, but it never occurred to me that i could actually shoot their games.

i came upon this opportunity earlier this year, after a little bit of soul searching (to come in "just a dream part 2", if i ever get that finished). long story short, i decided that i wanted to see how far i could take this sports photography avenue, something i've been pretty interested in since my amateur days of shooting with my little ol' point and shoot. i'm a loyal lurker on illinoisloyalty, which is where cary frye posts a lot of his photos. that's where i got his name and twitter account, and i contacted him that way. i e-mailed him, asked him about how he got to where he is today (basically getting paid to go to illini events), and about the equipment he uses. he answered all my questions and more, and extended an invitation for me to shoot with him at events. it just so happened that the first opportunity i got to go down to a game was the penn state volleyball game. it was one i knew i was going to attend anyway, whether i was in the stands or shooting, so the possibility that i might be on the floor for it was just kind of the icing on the cake.

i talk a little bit about the game and some of my photos are on my other blog, so if you want to read about that head over there. here i'm gonna talk a little bit more about the actual experience of shooting.

i know it's only been a few months since i last made that drive on i57 but DANG that felt like a longass drive down to champaign. i was on campus mostly for business, so i kept the personal visits to a minimum. i hung out with an old friend i haven't seen in months for a little bit, and then i chatted with fozz and clurious george for about an hour or so before we realized we had to start getting ready for the game. i got to huff a little after 5pm and there was already a big line forming outside. the parking lot had already filled up and i was on the grass. when i finally got in the gym, i had a little bit of difficulty finding cary. one of the women working the floor wouldn't let me on the court (understandably), and i walked around for a while until i saw a guy holding a huge camera, wearing a nikon photo vest. the most i know about cary is that he has red hair, and the only photo i've ever seen of him is his illinoisloyalty avatar, which is him behind a camera. it was a shot in the dark but i introduced myself to this guy and it turned out to be cary, luckily for me. we got the introductions squared away, and we started talking about shooting right away. he helped me find all the settings i'd need to take photos indoors and we went over stuff like where he'd be shooting from, the use of flash, etc. etc. it was all pretty exciting.

we started shooting from the southeast balcony first. i watch volleyball quite a bit, but shooting it is a little bit different. i wasn't totally familiar with the timing for shooting, and i wasn't sure what the lag time would be for my camera. luckily the girls were warming up, so i used their warmup time to get my timing down. taking those photos was definitely frustrating, just because my zoom isn't that powerful and my flash isn't great. because i have a shorter, wider angle lens, that meant i wasn't zooming past all the heads in the crowd, so those showed up in a lot of my pictures. this was definitely the part that was whetting my appetite for shooting because i'd have good pictures timing-wise, but poor quality-wise. once i saw how those shots were turning out, i knew i needed to get better equipment, STAT. after the first set we moved downstairs and set up on the north end of the court. the view was definitely a lot better here, but again i was getting that zoom/height problem, catching a lot of heads in my shots. i was getting some decent shots of the players at the net and a lot of reaction shots. after that set we moved over to the south end of the court, right in front of the band and the student section. we stayed there the rest of the night. cary was a little disappointed, i think, because he wanted more shots from the balconies and whatnot, but the stands were PACKED and there would have been nowhere to set up. it worked out for me because my positioning made up for my equipment's shortcomings -- i got to stand right up next to the little fence they had to stop people from spilling onto the court, so there was no one in front of me except the stupid line judge, who made an appearance in waaaaaay too many of my photos. it was great, and i got a lot of cool shots.

i definitely learned a lot about the different camera settings and angles and things like that. shooting with ultimate is different because you get natural lighting, and usually there's no need to use flash. but shooting inside is totally different. also, because generally (unless you're shooting at a huge tournament like nationals), the sidelines are pretty clear and you can usually get a pretty good shot just sitting down. for all the nationals games, i was pretty much just parked on the sidelines with a camera in my hand. but for this game, i was standing for the entirety of the three hours, camera in hand, ready to go. i had no idea how sore my arm would be after the game! my right arm is actually still SUPER SORE today, three days after the match. pretty crazy. my back was killing me by about the third set. i mean, just a deep ache. i guess i don't really stand too much when i'm shooting ultimate. luckily my feet and legs were feeling okay. i knew huff would be hot as hell so i wore shorts and a t-shirt, but i'm so glad i also decided to wear gym shoes instead of flip flops -- my feet would not have been able to take standing there for three hours in flip flops or even slides. but seriously, i still can't get over the whole arm soreness thing! and my camera is pretty small, too! i can't imagine what it's gonna feel like when i start shooting with a bigger camera. guess i'm gonna have to do a lot more bicep curls ...

results-wise, i took 904 shots on the night, and found 135 of them "acceptable". of course, none of them would be posted on any website or anything like that, but those 135 shots are shots i think could be improved once i get a little more experience shooting and once i start using better equipment. i really don't know how to explain how shooting felt except to say that it was completely addicting. i love that feeling of chasing the "perfect shot" -- capturing the exact moment or emotion you want to capture, and getting it at just the right time. god i loved it. and the players are just so much fun to shoot. they all get so hype and just look like they're having so much fun playing. it was such a surreal experience. not just shooting but actually just being at the match. "history at huff" definitely lived up to its billing. the players were into it, the fans were into it ... it just made for an incredible atmosphere. it was definitely hard to stay impartial while i was down on the floor shooting. there were times when i'd want to put the camera aside and just watch the game, and when the team was down i just wanted to cheer and rally for them. when they got a big block or put away a kill, i wanted to do something, fist pump, anything, but i had to be content with just smiling or laughing. the big ten network rebroadcast actually has a shot of me laughing before i go back to take another picture. it's great.

i really couldn't have asked for a better teacher or a better first shoot. cary was great all night, and super patient and super kind. he let me follow him around and he was giving me great pointers all night. he said that he started out kind of like me, as just someone interested in shooting until someone gave him a shot and helped him learn the ropes. cary's a self-taught photographer, and he does this stuff as a side job, so it's pretty cool to learn from someone who's doing what i want to eventually do one day. i really can't get over how awesome it was of him to let me follow him around on that particular night, what with it being such a huge match. MAJOR thanks to cary.

it is definitely an experience i'll cherish for a long time. i still can't get over that i was on the FLOOR of huff for one of the biggest volleyball games in illinois program history. i was actually so close to the action that i almost got hit by the ball multiple times. i think it was in the fourth or fifth set, a penn state ace literally almost knocked the camera out of my hand and took my head off. i felt the wind as the ball whizzed by. it was pretty sweet. the girls all ran by me on their way back to the court after the intermission, and they all lined up in front of me for the alma mater. probably the coolest thing was that sometimes when the girls would serve, they would literally be DIRECTLY in front of me. like so close that i could just reach out and touch them. i didn't, of course, but it was pretty cool to think that i was actually that close to everything. i'm still in awe.

i'm not good enough at shooting that this could be a profession or anything like that for me, but this is definitely shaping up into a pretty expensive hobby. like i said, i'm addicted to wanting to get that perfect shot. it's really, really fun, and i don't know, i just felt right out there shooting. i would have loved to have been in the stands too, of course, but being on the floor behind the camera just felt right. i'm definitely gonna be back multiple times to shoot more games, and i'll definitely be going back with better equipment. now that i know how shooting goes with my own camera, i'm gonna go out and rent equipment for the next time i go down to champaign. eventually i'd like to own a better camera for myself, but for right now i'm only learning, and i'm still trying to figure out what's out there and what's best for me. but oooh i'm still riding an adrenaline high from friday night, and i can't WAIT go get back down to huff and shoot some more.

i don't know which way i'm going

i don't know what i've become.


feeling pretty lost.

welp.

who knew chasing your dreams could be so terrifying?