Soccer Swan Song Sunset at Segra

The Loudoun United Soccer team took on the Pittsburgh Riverhounds at Segra Field near Leesburg a couple Saturdays ago. Both teams had several supporters scattered around the stands keeping social distance for safety from the coronavirus. Fans were treated to spectacular early autumn weather as the early evening sun warmed the east side of the stadium and shade began to envelop the western side. Seemingly without warning, the sunset snuck up on Segra Field. The clouds in the sky captured the warm colors of the setting sun and showered the stadium with golden colors. Unfortunately the beautiful sight turned out to be the swan song for soccer at Segra this season as the team soon found several coronavirus cases in the organization and cancelled their remaining games. (As the Count on Sesame Street would say – This post is brought to you by the letter ‘S’.)

DON’T BE A JACKASS!!

South central Pennsylvania is known for its great soils in the Cumberland Valley. Farming has dominated the landscape since the early European settlers move in in the 1700s. Drive anywhere in this region and you will see barns and silos surrounded by green fields of the different crops grown there. At one time, every farm had cattle or dairy cows, which required hay to feed them and barns to house them. A popular style was “bank barns” built into the sides of a hill that enabled entry from two levels – Livestock on the lower level and hay and supplies on the upper level.

There is one big problem with storing hay in barns in that area if the farmer doesn’t let it dry thoroughly before putting it in the barn. Damp hay generates heat and is prone to spontaneous combustion! The solution is to provide ventilation to keep temperatures low. A large number of barns in the region were built with brick ends that provided ventilation by leaving openings in the bricks. The bricklayers got creative and started leaving the openings in a variety of patterns. These patterns were made to look like sheaths of wheat, chalices, geometric shapes, or other shapes.

One such brick end barn has local notoriety along Route 16 west of Greencastle, which gets to the point of the title. Around about 1850, a farmer wanted his barn to have a man riding a horse at the top of the brick end. Versions of the story are that he didn’t have the money to pay the mason and that he was hard to work with. The mason got angry and finished the barn by replacing the horse with a mule to express his feelings toward the farmer. The moral of the story – Treat your hired help with respect, pay your bills, and don’t be a jackass!!

Here are some pictures of the barn and a few others in Franklin County, Pennsylvania.

Man Riding a Mule on Brick End Barn, Greencastle, PA

Man Riding a Mule Brick End Barn, Greencastle, PA

Brick End Barn, Fort Loudon, PA

Brick End Barn, Lemar Rd. South of Lemasters, PA 

Brick End Barn, Lemar Rd. South of Lemasters, PA 

Brick End Barn off Stitzlers Road, Mercersburg, PA

TIGER LILIES IN THE SUN

My Mother had several tiger lilies next to her deck that provided a colorful accent in her flower bed. She gave me some seed from them a dozen years or more ago. I dropped them in a flower pot along with some lavender plants my son had from school. Every year the lavender and the lilies would spring up and give some some nice colors. They were in an out of the way part of the yard that we didn't see very often and we rarely watered them or took care of them. They were ignored. After a strong storm this summer, I noticed that the pot had blown over and the lilies, now about six feet high, were on their side. The pot was disintegrating and ready to be thrown out. Rather than throw it out, I decided to replant them (not something I do regularly since I'm not much of a gardener). How the lilies had survived amazes me. After re-potting them, the lilies found a new home on our deck where the bright sun lights them up every morning. The shadows our the nearby trees provides a nice backdrop to highlight their beauty. 

THIS IS FOR THE BIRDS!

Spring sports are cancelled this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic began surging in the US just as the high schools were doing their scrimmages for the season. I was three days away from getting to photograph the XFL professional football game at Audi field. Then everything went crazy as the number of cases surged. The high schools postponed the start of their season. The XFL and Major League Soccer postponed their games. All were hopeful that the pandemic would wane. But that never happened. Eventually all sports went on hiatus and we were all put on lockdown and told to stay home to reduce the spread of the virus. Here we are months later and places are starting to reopen and teams are about to start playing again but to empty stands. More than 100,000 of our people have died so far and more will pass before it is all over. In the grand scheme of things, not having sports to photograph is nothing. Still, the itch to take photos is strong. Fortunately, there are plenty of birds to shoot. Well, with a camera that is! My Mother's feeders and our gazebo attract a lot of different birds. The disruption of the pandemic is for the birds, and so is this post!

Catching the Catch!

Why is it so hard to get a good shot of a football player making a catch? The average National Football League game includes an average of about 37 passes per team. Completion rates average around 70% or lower. That means there should be about 50 catches that you could photograph. College football has some teams that pass much more, some much less. High school football is similarly variable depending on the team and their quarterback. Still, there are a good number of chances if you are in the right place at the right time on the sidelines. But catching a player making a catch has not been easy. At least not where it is clear that he just caught it or is in the act of catching. They drop the ball. The ball is not quite in his hands. It looks like he already caught it and is making a move.

Over the past 3-4 years I have been shooting a lot of high school football. This season, my shooting included a college game (Penn State at Maryland – Go Lions!!), an NFL game (Jets at Redskins), and the Virginia State Championship high school game. These games have produced a few shots of catches along the way, but the State Championship game was my big score as shown below. The Lake Taylor Titans beat the Tuscarora Huskies thanks to some great catches and an interception. I was fortunate to get these shots. 

Lake Taylor's Malik Newton intercepts a pass to prevent a touchdown in the Virginia Class 4 State Championship Game.

Lake Taylor's Malik Newton makes a diving catch for a touchdown in the Virginia Class 4 State Championship Game.

Darious Spreight of Lake Taylor catches a TD pass over the arms of Tuscarora's Mikey Marquez in the Virginia Class 4 State Championship Game

MY FIRST BIG 10 COLLEGE FOOTBALL GAME

High school football has been a great training ground to practice my sports photography. I've been prowling the sidelines for a few years getting action shots. At the same time, I have been working on my Adobe Lightroom post processing techniques. I cringe at some of the earlier shots that at the time were considered good. They could have been so much better, but it is a constant learning process.

Viva Loudoun (https://www.vivaloudoun.com/)
, a sports photo site covering all sports in the Northern Virginia area approached me about shooting with them early in the season. Now, I know the quality of work some of their photographers put out and I wasn't sure I was up to that level. But they talked me into it and I'm glad they did. It opened up opportunities to shoot at higher levels - college and professional.

QB Sean Clifford handoffs to Journey Brown

Back in September, I had a dream opportunity for a Penn State football fan - a chance to shoot the Penn State at Maryland football game!! (Okay, I know that is 2 months ago, but I've been busy.) It was an interesting experience picking up credentials, working in the media room, and working around all the other media and equipment around the field. It was a night game and I expected the Capital One Field stadium lights to be a little brighter that they were. Other photographers told me that this stadium isn't as well lit as other college stadiums. I had to bump up the ISO. But my photos came out okay.

Maryland Terrapins mascot

Wide Receiver KJ Hamler on the run

Running Back Journey Brown headed to the end zone

WHO NEEDS GPS ANYWAY?

We all know where we took those pictures, don’t we? GPS is only needed by those travelling photographers that globe trot or are documenting something, right? Wrong! We all should be using our GPS settings as I found out recently.

My previous post talked about how too many unnecessary photos were slowing down my computer. Actually, we all do. My Lightroom cataloge had more than 100,000 photos that had accumulated over the past 15+ years and dumped into an external hard drive.  They were added to the catalog without thinking through my file management strategy and purging bad shots and duplicates as it grew.  Time to clean out some files and make room!

Whaleback Lighthouse, Kittery Point, Maine

Okay, Bill. What’s that have to do with GPS settings on your camera? My memories, like old prints, faded with time. I came across a file folder with these seaside photos and could not remember where they were taken.  It led me on a quest to figure out where it was. I knew it was somewhere along the New England coast. But where? Hmmm. It had to be near where I travelled for business. The lighthouse was a big clue so I searched for photos of lighthouses in each of the candidate states to no avail. None of them had that building attached.  More frustration.

Finally, I blew up one of the photos and saw a town name of Kittery Point, Maine on one of the boats. Eureka! Or so I thought. But the lighthouse in the photo didn’t match the lighthouse photos I found on the internet. After looking at Google Maps, I discovered the reason. The building wasn’t next to the lighthouse. It was on an island between where I shot from and the lighthouse!

My point? I could have saved myself a lot of effort and frustration if the metadata for the files included the GPS coordinates! And you could too. Lesson learned.