Herman Leonard

Herman Leonard, a photographer who created some of the most famous images of such jazz greats as Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday, Duke Ellington and others, died Saturday at Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles. Mr. Leonard, 87, lived in New Orleans until Hurricane Katrina struck and destroyed much of his collection.

http://www.nola.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2010/08/herman_leonard_photgrapher_of.html

Dave Dixon

New Orleans lost a great one in the passing of Dave Dixon today.

http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2010/08/dave_dixon_driving_force_behin.html

Venice, Italy

Select images from a recent trip to Venice, Italy.


Venice, Italy - Images by Parker Waters

The Best NFL Fan Site

Yesterday, I gave you information on getting the Sporting News for free and hope you took advantage of it. Here is an even better tip, especially if you are a New Orleans Saints fan. SaintsReport.com is a message board run by Saints fans for Saints fans. More than just being a well run message board and forum on Saints topics, it is a true community. I have been a member (posting under the name of Dubya) for seven plus years. Do yourself a favor and check it out. You'll find that if you want news and feedback about the Saints, you'll go there first...even before visiting the official Saints site or ESPN.

Be sure and click on the SSF tab to go to the forum about the Saints and other NFL news. Also, check out the EE tab (Everything Else) for a variety of topics. The EE forum is a discussion of politics, giving dating advice to one another, exchanging recipes and many more topics. A while back, I posted a question about wiring for a ceiling fan and got a bunch of responses.

See you there...and Go Saints!!!

Catching the Light

Jerry Lodriguss got his start in sports photography right here in New Orleans working for the Times-Picayune and went on to shoot for Sports Illustrated and then the Philadelphia Inquirer. I came across his website "Catching the Light" and which has some excellent tips and techniques for shooting sports. Here is the link to his site.

Sports Photography Tips

In talking with others who are interested in photography and more specifically, sports photography, the question always comes up about "what do you do" or "what tips do you have" regarding photography. There are a lot of people who have been doing this longer than I have, so I thought I would share some of the tips from one of the real experts, Jerry Lodriguss. Jerry started off the with the Times-Picayune, shot for Sports Illustrated (a dream for us all) and with the Philadelphia Inquirer.

I like his approach to photography and thought I would share his tips and techniques from his website, "Catching the Light".

An evening with Bill Fortney

I attended a seminar tonight at UNO which was hosted by Lakeside Camera. The speaker was Bill Fortney, a photographer and representative for Nikon. Bill has been a photographer for almost 40 years and worked in a number of areas including sports, nature, medical, scenery, etc. He has published 5 books on photography, the most notable being his two recent versions of "America from 500 feet"

I found Bill to not only be a fascinating speaker on photography, but he was also a down right great person. He is a two time cancer survivor, humble and seems to have his life and faith in order. In addition, he has a great sense of humor.

Without going into detail about his 5 points of taking better pictures, here they are. 1)It's going to take time. 2)Simplify your approach, gear and composition. If you have trouble explaining what your picture is about, the picture isn't going to work.3)See the light. Understand the role of light in a picture and when it is available. Loved the quote on the biggest impediment to great nature photography is "breakfast and dinner". 4) Get in touch with what you really care about. 5)Enjoy the Journey.

One thing to remember. Sharpness=Using a Tripod

You can visit his page here.