Photographing People, or, People Watching

I have a love of watching people. It was probably fostered from my childhood looking at Life and Look magazines that were always in our house. I was exposed to great photo essays by great photographers such as Gene Smith, Grey Villet, Gordon Parks (whom I met when I received a third place in the Eisie Awards) David Douglas Duncan and Larry Burrows. I was so fascinated and enthralled by the work of these photographers. When I am on assignment at events, or at family events I am always watching people. The photos presented here are from my niece L's wedding that took place in Orlando, Florida earlier this month.

Prior to this wedding I had never met any of these folks so I assume they are friends & family of the groom, or aquaintances of my niece. Anyhow, family or not, these photos I made with a selective "Eye". I am interested in the relationship of forground to background subjects. The man & woman for example. She is obviously talking to someone off camera. She is unaware of the man in the background. I snap a few different images switching the focus between him and her. My goal is to take photos of people that ALL PEOPLE can relate to, or some how become interested in regardless if they actually know that person.

Birdhouse In Skaneateles, N.Y.

I arrived at a freelance job early at a park on Skaneateles lake in central Ny. As often happens when I am early I start looking around. Things catch my eye. Then I start snapping just to see what the eye catching subject looks like photographed. Many times I like it. That was the case with the photo presented here. It also says Summer to me.

Nikon D7000 Back Focusing Problem

It is a beautiful day here in Chaumont, N.Y. The sun is shining, there's a nice breeze blowing through the trees. Just ideal for working on the wood pile. I had this wood delivered from a man in Rodman NY. This is the third time I have bought wood from him. It is mostly cherry. I wish I could spend the rest of the day here. However, I must go photograph a couple of jobs for the Post-Standard. I also have to edit photos I took yesterday for a freelance job.

This is a self portrait of me and the wood pile I have been stacking this morning.

So here is what I
ve been up to. This past Wednesday I played a 2 hour guitar gig at the Carthage Savings and Loan. It was a wine tasting and art show fund rainsing event for the Carthage Library. A most enjoyable event. Saturday evening I attended the Syracuse Press Club awards dinner. I was recipient of a first place award in the spot news category. I got home and into bed around midnight. Sunday morning (yesterday) I drove to Cicero for the freelance job. The photos were for Discover Card. They sponsored a contest involving the Stanley Cup. The winners were from Fulton. THe event took place at an ice arena in Cicero. Anyhow, I spent the day documenting the event and taking photos of of all the Discover Card signs that were placed in the arena, the locker room, the lounge, etc. I also went to the winning family's home and photographed them with the Stanley Cup. I left the house yesterday morning at 8:15 and got home at 8:00PM. A long day. It was made more stressful than it should it have been due to the cameras I was using. They were a Nikon D700, and a Nikon D300. The biggest problem was with the D7000. It has a terrible habit of back focusing. Sometimes the simplest of images were not in focus. Most frustrating. I had to continually check & double check every photo for correct focus. Then there is the constant tweaking of exposures. I spent as much time studying the pictures on the camera's screen as I* did looking through the viewfinder to make the pictures. I'm re;living the stress as I write this! I simply cannot go into all of the details right now because my time is SHOT! Suffice it to say that the D7000 is not rerliable unless you are very diligent and constantly monitor what you are doing. Otherwise you will have more soft pictures than sharp ones. So, I had to overshoot everything yesterday which means I have a much bigger editing job than I should have as I wade through, scrutinize and delete a million unsharp photos, praying that I pull enough acceptable ones out to satisfy the client. That is no way to work.

First Place Win For Military Drone Protestors Photos

Just found out I took First Place in Still Photos - Carl Single Award for Spot News Photos in the Syracuse Press Club Awards for photos of protestors at Hancock Air Field, Mattydale, NY, demonstrating against the military's use of unmanned drones.

Photographing Basketball With Nikon D7000

Last Friday I photographed high school basketball. Last night I photographed high school basketball. Tonight I am photographing high school basketball. It is probably the single most thing that I dislike to photograph. But what is one to do? One must pay the bills, so you photograph what The Man wants photographed and you takes your pay.
I've been using a Nikon D7000 camera for these ganes. I'm not so sure it's the best choice. I will use it again tonight to see how it goes.

Once again the Better Half and I are at odds with one another. 'Tis the season to be merry.

The transmission bit the dust on my 2002 Dodge Caravan. Repair bill will be around the $1,500.00 mark. That's a nice thing to buy myself for Christmas.

When will I ever get to buy a new guitar?

I do not have time to post a photograph at this moment in time.

Day 342: Color or Black & White?

Black & white has always been my favorite photographic style. I loved it as a kid, I love it now. Some subjects work better than others. In the digital world we can have our cake and eat it too, so to speak. shoot everything in color and convert it to B7W later. However, that doesn't always come off well. It requires practice which I must confess, I have not done a lot of. Anyhow, lets look at the photo presented here. I shot it a couple of weeks ago. It is a paper mill in Brownville, NY. It was 10 below zero. The extreme cold really makes the water vapor visible. What this translates to in the photograph is texture.  And texture is one of the elements that can make a photo interesting. Especially in a black & white photo.

Day 299: Sony WSC-350 Test Shots

The panarama mode. Easy to use feature. Pan the camera slowly from left to right & the camera creates the image.

It is 12 degrees, grey, with a light snow falling in Chaumont, NY on this day after Christmas. Santa Clause came and went and we all had a nice day. The photos here were some quick snaps to test the Better Half's new Sony WSC-350 digital camera.

Our Christmas tree made with out the flash.

Here is a detail cropped from the previous photo. There is some motion blur caused by the slow shutter needed for the non-flash exposure.

Otherwise, it is slow to motivate today. Off to visit my son later, and then: Grilling some jerk chicken wings out in the snow! Gotta love living in the North Country. More later.

Day 255: Multiple Exposure

The temperature was around 23 or so degrees in Chaumont NY this morning at 5:30AM. I looked at the thermometer but have forgotten exactly what the temperature was. I can sat there was a fairly heavy frost on the ground na dthe cars in my driveway. We have had clear, Sunny skies the last few days.


I made this photo on Route 81 early this morning. It is another in camera multiple exposure. I say in camera to differentiate from a similar effect one could do with PhotoShop by layering several images and adjusting the opacity of the layers. This was made with a Nikon D300. I set the camera to make 6 exposures. I shot from a moving car with the frame rate set to high speed. So the 6 exposures happen rapidly, each one a fraction of a second after the next. This was something I tried on a whim recently and have continued to experiment with it. Most of the results are disappointing. But some are interesting, as I feel this one is.


The second photo I snapped by accident immediately following the multiple exposure.

Day 232: Night Shot At SU

There is a reason why I took this picture and later today, or more likely, this evening, I'll try to find time to tell it.
An old Chinese proverb says it is better to be three hours early thn one minute late. Well I try to follow that principle when it comes to photography jobs. Often times when I am to cover a specific event I find that I can make interesting pictures before the event begins. A good example is parades. I always show up early for parades and begin making photographs before the parade and continue shooting through the parade. So last night I was to photograph a candle light vigil at Syracuse University for the Post-Standard . It was to take place at 8:00PM. Fine. I get there at 7:00. I meet and chat with a couple of the organizers. Well, as I hung around a bit it soon became apparent that there were no photos to be made prior to the event. So I just walked around the campus trying to kill some time until I saw some activity. In situations like this I just start looking through the camera and taking some snaps, just out of boredom. It was dark. So that made it interesting to try some night exposures. I love night photography. The world is different then. I made numerous shots of the scene presented here and settled on this one to post. My whole reason for shooting it was to kill time, to experiment and practice some night time exposures. Is the photo worth anything? I don't know. In the old days it would be tough to find a place to publish such photos. Thanks to the inernet I can at least share it here. Potentially with the World.

So this is one of photos I made at the event. The vigil was sponsored by the Remembrance Scholars for the 35 SU students that were killed in Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, December 21, 1988. The event is part of Remembrance Week at the school. There's more at
Flight 103 Victims official home page.

"To me...music exists to elevate us as far as possible above everyday life." ~Gabriel Faure, (12 May 1845 – 4 November 1924) was a French composer, organist, pianist and teacher.

Day 202: Multiple Exposures

Sunny and 50 degrees here in Chaumont, NY.
I have always been intrigued by multiple exposures. When I was a kid nobody had professional cameras and it was easy for people to accidentally make a multiple exposure. And of course they would be upset because a picture of their kid sitting on Santa's lap would be accidentally exposed over a picture of the kid with the Easter Bunny. Two precious moments taken months apart, ruined. Well, after seeing an accidental multiple exposure for the first time I was captivated. The strange, dreamy, fading in and out of two images on one piece of film. I loved it. So, I remember on some very few occasions when I could take some photos with my Dad's camera, I deliberately made double exposures. Of course he would see the results when the pictures came back and that would make him less likely to let me use the camera. I was wasting film.


Finally a day came when I got a good 35mm camera, an slr. It was a Minolta SRT-101. Great camera, but no way to make multiple exposures. Well, turns out there was a way, but not sanctioned by the camera makers. If you pushed in the clutch button on the bottom of the camera and held the film rewind lever stationary you could cock the shutter without advancing the film. This method was less than ideal. It required some dexterity and care to pull it off. Usually the two exposures would be off register by varying degrees. Eventually camera makers realized that some people wanted to make multiple exposures deliberately. So they incorporated that ability into their products. I only just recently realized that the camera I am using for most of my work, a digital Nikon D300 has the ability to make multiple exposures. Great! Now I can experiment and see the results immediately. The two photo presented here each consist of six exposures. I don't know that they are terrific pictures, but I am happy with these preliminary results.

Need a wedding photographer in the 13601 zip code area? Call me, Gary Walts 315-649-4174. Check out my wedding photography album on FaceBook at

Day 196: A Brick Wall

There's a story behind every photo. Isn't there? I mean, some are better stories than others, but however small, or mundane, there is a reason (& thereby a story)for them all. This photo came about today. I was stopped at a red light, just as it turned green I noticed this scene. There is a car behind me. I grab my camera QUICKLY!! point it out the window and fire off two frames. Now, I really was in no particular hurry, so I could have parked nearby and walked back to the scene and really work it for a few minutes. But I look at what I snapped and figured I could live with it. There is a lot I like about the photo: the texture of the wall and the pole. The shapes, how the frame divided up by the telephone pole, the shadow cast by the vent protruding through the wall. Shapes and textures. That is what this photo is all about. The texture comes from the light, the arrangement of the shapes comes from the photographers composition.

Day 195: Red Pepper

This photo came about as most of them do. I was in the process of doing something and suddenly I stop and see I must make a photograph. In this case I was preparing some breakfast, cutting up some tomatoes, oninos and red pepper to fry with some eggs. I cut a section of the pepper out, set the remainder on the counter. When I looked back at it I was compelled to photograph it.

Day 191: Big Sky Over lake Ontario

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Who can doubt God when you see the sky painted like this? This photo was made while driving home from a visit to my friend, Tom Bintz, as known as Captain Honk. He's an interesting man, difficult to get to know and understand. Maybe that's the artist in him. He lives in a small waterfront cottage on Pillar Point, Lake Ontario, Jefferson County, NY. There's not much to say about this photo, just that I spotted it and took the time to photograph it. It's more than a snap shot, though. I snapped it with a couple of different lenses, some views showing a wide sky and the earth below it. In this, and really all photo opportunities, one has to figure out what it is that catches one eye and then capture it in the photo. The sky was one thing, and a wide panoramic view would indeed be a photo of the sky. But it wasn't tryuly the sky that I was attracted to it was the clouds in the forfront, tinged with color from the setting Sun. So this is really a photo of clouds in the sky as opposed to a photo of the sky. Do I make any sense? Well, that's what I mean about identifying just what it is you are attracted to and wish to photograph.

Day 170: Birds on Wires

It was a cool, low humidity morning in Chaumont, NY today. The photo presented here was taken yesterday. I love how these black birds gather together in late Summer, flying about in large flocks. I grabbed this photo while enroute to somewhere lese. The birds fly off quickly. Unfortunately I had no time to adjust the camera & shot this with a slow shutter speed which introduced some blur. But that's OK. I still like it.


I put in some good guitar practicee this morning. I have been working to polish up a short etude by Agustin Barrios Mangore. (Most people refer to him as Barrios) It is titled Estudio Inconcluso Not a terribly difficult piece, but a fun one to play. I usually have a number of pieces "in the works" so to say. That is I play through numerous pieces frequently and over time some of them come together. Eventually some come to the surface and get more attention than others, and then I add them to my repertoire. Other pieces I I have a strong desire to learn and play. Those get a lot of attention. One of them I am currently working on is also by Barrios. It is the third section of La Catedral: Allegro solemne .

Allegro Solemne from Barrios La Catedral, performed by Denis Azabagic

I put Denis video of his performance here because I have not yet mastered it to where I am ready to record it. Also, I stumbled on this video quite by accident. It was the first time I had heard the piece. I think Denis does a great job with it.

Day 167: Shirt in Window

Every morning when I get up I pretty much follow a routine. I come down stairs a bit fuzzy headed, start the coffee brewing and head from there into the bathroom to brush my teeth and wash my face. From there I pour some coffee, go to the guitar and hopefully put in a couple of productive hours. But some mornings something will catch my eye and I make a photograph before pouring the coffee. Such was the case with the shirt in the window. Evidently my Better Half had taken it out of the washing machine the night before and jut hung it off the window frame to dry over night. So, I get up, start the coffee, enter the bathroom and whoa... The shirt is hanging there, back lit, interesting looking. So, I stop everything and photograph it. I snapped a dozen frames maybe and settled on this one. I also converted it to black & white. In the old days I would have shot it on tri-x film and that would be that. I am still not real comfortable changing a color digital file to b&w, but it is something I am beginning to dabble with. So I present this one in B&W.

Now this brings me once again to something I harp on all of the time: there are good photos all around you, right in your own home, school, workplace. You do not need to go on a trip or vacation to find photographs. Just get into the habit of seeing what is around you.

Day 141: I Make A Photograph

So I am sitting at a red light, waiting for it to change and for reasons I can never explain, the arrow painted on the road along with the shadow of my car catches my eye. I think there is a photo to be taken. I look through the viewfinder and the first thing I notice is myself reflected in the rear view mirror. Oh cool. I take that photo. Then I shoot several more of the pavement, changing my camera angle as best I can given the restraints placed upon me. You know, I'm behind the wheel in traffic. I can't exactly get out and move around. Anyhow, I like the result. But as always, I wonder what does it all mean? What is the relevance of taking such a photo? What's the point? What? What? What? In the end it's just pixels on a screen or ink on paper. The World keeps spinning reckelessly round and round and in the end it will all just end up in a black hole somewhere in God's Universe.

Here is the final photo:

Day Ninetyseven: Wedding Photo

It was only around 55 degrees in Chaumont this morning at 7:45 when I got up. Yes, almost 8:00am. I hate that. I like to get up and at 'em early. However, things have changed with my schedule at the Post-Standard. I now am working the night shift on Mondays. That means I get home and to bed late. I dislike it. But what is one to do? Certainly isn't something to quit over! There are some other changes too, but I won't go into them now. That is also why I never got to a blog post yesterday.

The photo presented here today is from a wedding I photographed this past Saturday. I was posing the couple for a typical portrait, shooting away, when something transpired between them causing them to fall out of the pose. I was quick enough to grab this moment between moments. It was a spontaneous, unposed moment that one cannot create. When I photograph weddings, or anything for that matter, I am always on the alert for those unexpected moments.

Looking for a wedding photographer in the 13601 zip code area? Call me for your wedding photography anywhere in central and northern NY.

See more of my wedding photos by clicking on my FaceBook wedding album.

Day Eightynine: Nature All Around Us

Six AM it was 68 degrees in Chaumont, NY. Plenty of Sun this morning, low humidity, turning into a beautiful day. Both photos presented here today were taken at my home. There is an abundance of nature and wildlife photos all around us, wherever we are. One need only be armed with a camera 24/7 to be prepared for those unexpected encounters with God's creatures.
Well, yesterday I failed to post anything. I could have, (and was going to) post the photo below of the spider. I came upon the spider yesterday as I was digging up a garden bed in my back yard. But, for a number of reasons, I never got to putting it on this blog. So, I decided to save it for today. So, I am sitting at my computer editing the spider photos when I hear a sharp chirping. I look toward the front door and see the young Robin on the floor of my front porch. I quickly took his picture through the screen of the door. I would prefer to have shot him with the door open. Shooting through the screen has a degrading effect on the overall picture quality. After I took a couple of initial photos, I decided to try and get one of him with the door open. I slowly opened it and, as I thought would happen, he got spooked and flew off into the yard. So, this is what I have.
The spider photo is more of a documentary photo. I took it to show family & friends. I wanted to photograph it more, trying to "work" it into a more graphic, artsier photo. But, the creature ducked away on me and I lost him.
The Robin photo is also a documentary photo for the same reason as the spider, However, you can see that it has a graphic quality coupled with nice light that elevates to higher level than the spider photo.

Day Fortynine: Portrait Of A Banana Peel

It's best for me to create a blog entry in the morning as opposed to now, almost 9:00 in the evening. But somedays one has no choice. The day began at about 40 degrees in Chaumont, NY this morning. Then we had a great, Sunny day, ending with a nice sunset.
What does the world's smartest man eat for breakfast? Well, this morning I had some yogurt, a small sandwich of pastrami on rye, a piece of carrot cake and..... A BANANA! That's where today's photo came from. It may seem odd to take a photo of a banana peel, but it seemed to present itself to me so I took it. Now let me tell you something about being a professional photographer. It's one thing to take pictures for yourself or for family and friends. Some things, like weddings, tend to be straight forward. But when it comes to shooting for newspapers, magazines, the Associated Press, advertisers, and other, you just never know what you will be asked to photograph. You just might get asked to photograph a banana peel. How would you do it? Well, buy some bananas and start peeling them and arranging the peels in a visually pleasing fashion, add some kind of light, and shoot away. Easier said than done. It can turn into real work. Shooting, reshooting, and trying to come upon the "just right" combination of elements. If I had been hired to make a banana peel photo I probably would never have come up with the likes of today's photo. This morning I simply ate a banana and placed the peel on the dish. I just laid it there. Then I noticed it's shape. I was struck by how perfect a banana peel it appeared to me. If I were hired to make this photo I would have eaten the banana with a preconcieved notion of how the peel should look afterwards. Then I would have had to move the thing into a million positions just to get it to look "right". One more thing. I really did eat all that stuff for breakfast but it wasn't as much as it sounds like. The pastrami on rye was SMALLand so was the carrot cake. Basically It was handy food hanging around the house, so I got rid of it.
Regards, Gary.

The Art Of War...

"...is governed by five constant factors... These are: (1) The Moral Law; (2) Heaven; (3) Earth; (4) The Commander; (5) Method and discipline." Sun Tzu, born 544 BC.
Isn't all ART governed by these five factors?

Day Fortyfour: Seeing Pictures

This is a photo of me taken last Summer by a friend while I was visiting them at their cottage on Pillar Point, Lake Ontario. It was sunset and you can see how the color of the light played upon my complexion, shirt, and hair color. Notice the glass of wine in front of me? Well, the photo below shows what that glass of wine looked like from where I was sitting. As I snapped the photo my friends didn't think much of it, in fact, looked at me sort of oddly. Then I showed them the photo. They were impressed. I just sit around wherever I am and view the world around me as if I am looking through a camera. I am mentally framing the scene and the various elements of the scene in front me, imaginging how it will look photographed. The bottom photo is a view of the porch after the Sun had set.