I'm packing as much baseball in to my Spring Training assignment as I can, so I left early this morning in order to catch an 12p start for the A's. 101 was as empty as I can remember coming in to the city. I hit every green light on 19th [...]
It's no secret that people have tightened their budgets and thus a ripple has coursed through every corner of our economy. I had to mention, as the PD sends me to Spring Training this week, the rental car company I signed up with is using creative ways in lessening their [...]
Venturing out today to photograph Millenials wine tasting as part of the Wine Road Barrel Tasting Event in Dry Creek and Alexander Valley here in SoCo. This event is always an adventure. What do you get when you put 8,000 cars on narrow country roads and mix in a few [...]
Ah. Spring is around the corner. Daylight savings time jumps forward on the 14th of March. The blooms are turning to leaves, grape buds are swelling. It's getting soooo close. So what's with all this rain if blooms are on the trees? We're almost 97 percent of average rainfall in [...]
Every once in awhile, a photojournalist will capture an image that they really like. Images that will make the reader cry, fret, hate or laugh out loud. Pictures that wield an emotional comment have done their job. They have communicated. A myriad of daily assignments confront a newspaper photographer day [...]
Hands. They're everywhere. Pointing and waving. Pix from the last week.
For the first time in a few years, I was sent to Pebble Beach on Thursday Feb. 12, to gather photos for a Sunday story. The last time I shot the event, everything with the economy was peachy. Three years of a bummer economy have taken a toll, even at [...]
Count em. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. Eight is great. Eight is enough. I eight the whole thing. On Friday Feb. 5, fellow photographer Crista Jeremiason and I were assigned to document Cloverdale's Robby Rowland and his quest to surpass the Redwood Empire boys basketball all-time scoring [...]
While cruising the web this morning, I came across several articles proclaiming Friday Feb. 5, 2010 as National Weatherperson's Day, which commemorates the 1744 birth of Dr. John Jeffries (1744-1819). Jeffries began taking weather measurements in 1774 in Boston where he was born. Basically, you might say he was the [...]
Certainly, journalists will cover the same event numerous times in a career. Here at the Press Democrat we've all covered the Sonoma County Fair dozens of times, The Russian River Jazz Festival, city council meetings etc. I had a good run at the Pebble Beach Pro-Am for many years [...]
How many frames in a photojournalists life? Millions. Literally.
I’ve lost count since I started shooting photos at eight years-old with a Polaroid Land Camera (which I still own). It’s a way of life this photojournalism thing which is endlessly fascinating. The trip along the way, now in my 31st year professionally and the last 25 with the Press Democrat, has been an adventure in life. What it has to offer, ranging from implausible beauty to the utterly cruel things life randomly pitches out have shaped and molded who I am. That means I get to witness history. Pretty cool, eh? This journey has included photographing lots of inanimate objects which can be terribly boring. I’ve also borne the brunt of people unhappy to see a photographer show up to document less than pleasant circumstances. Then there’s the weather, which wreaks havoc on the human race daily. So I document the clouds. My advice for anyone having a bad day is to go outside and take a picture of those clouds once in awhile. It will do wonders for the interior beast. Unless you are using a metal tripod in an electrical storm.
-Kent Porter