I'm Not The Boogeyman

I'm not here to bite you.

I'm a guy....who happens to be holding a camera.

Believe it or not but most of the time what I'm filming is usually beneficial for the subjects involved. Sure, if you're on trial or a politician you may not want to see me, but when I'm sent out on a warm Sunday afternoon to get some warm weather video and I end up at a public golf course in Northeast Baltimore I'm not there to do some expose about golf course embezzlement or stalk someone on the back nine. I'm there to get video of people enjoying the warm weather and just playing golf. Seriously!

So when the local course rep rides his golf cart up to me in a haste asking for authorization and permission from them to film on a PUBLIC course, it gets a little frustrating.

I deal with a lot of red tape bullshit when I film places. (Malls are the worst) I've come to expect it from certain places. But not a golf course off of St. Lo drive. Come on! Just let me get 5 shots of people teeing off and if they don't want to be filmed, they'll tell me, and I won't! If anything I'm giving FREE press to an outdoor activity that benefits the city. Don't you think I'd have an open invitation?

I'm not here to steal children.

I'm a guy with a camera.


Current Jam: J Roddy Walston and The Business - "I'm Goin Out"

"That's the thing about this job. Its got nothing to do with life."

I'm a huge fan of David Simon.  Loved The Wire.  Read his book "Homicide: A Year On The Killing Streets."  And now I'm getting into the old Homicide TV show.  WGN airs it a 3am or something crazy on Sundays so thank you dvr. I'm a bit of a sucker for recognizing places in movies or tv shows.  I like that I've been to Fells Point enough to get exactly where the characters are and where they filmed certain scenes.  

Thinking about it, there is a reason so many films and tv shows have been filmed in Baltimore.  It has EVERYTHING you need for good drama.  The richest folks in Roland Park living a mile away from some of the poorest in Waverly.  The beauty of the water and the uniqueness of a block of rowhomes.

One of the lines David Simon writes about in Homicide is an old adage that "If you can't live in Baltimore you can't live anywhere."  And its true.  Every neighborhood is different.  We got something for everyone. :)

Stones and Circus'

I was able to shoot a preview of the Cirque de Soleil event that is down at M&T Bank Stadium.  Really amazing.  I've never seen any Cirque but I can see why it's so popular.  One of those times the saying "fun for the whole family" may actually apply.  

The circus was towards the end of my  work day yesterday.  The beginning was filled with rocks thrown at me my camera by 12 year olds.  

I had to go do a liveshot from Lemell Middle School.  Which is one of the schools that may be closed to shorten a city school budget gap.  

I drive down to the school, and set up on the other side of the street from the school.  As I'm pulling cable, setting up a light, I hear something whizz by my head.  I look up to see these kids shouting obscenities at me, flipping me off, and throwing rocks at me.  

Now I did nothing to them.  Didn't say anything, didn't provoke them in any way.  And just my presence was enough to set these kids, and they were kids, to throwing things at me.  Well I called the cops.  Not for fear of my own safety, but if one of those kids got a really good toss in, They could crack the lens of my camera.  

The police got there in great time, and were able to hang out long enough for my reporter and I to get our shot off and out of there.  

A kid was killed outside this school last November.  Maybe the kids got their fill of the media after that event and were still frustrated.  I dunno.  I'll never know why they did it.  Just chalk it up to another "only in Baltimore" moment.

Driving home from work..

E. Fayette and N. Wolfe.  

Guy sitting on a bench looks my way.  I look back.  

He raises his arm.  Gives me a playful salute and a wide grin.  

I drive home with a smile on my face too.

Time

The world revolves around it.

We dictate our ages by it.

News is dominated by it.

Gotta start on time.  Gotta get out on time.  Gotta keep the package a certain time.  Gotta get to the presser at the right time.  (The Governor and the Mayor are always 15-20mins late though.)

I can't be late.  I hate being late.  It's a fear that I'm sure my mother instilled in me at a young age.  So I think I fit the timing world of news fairly well.  What becomes an issue is when I work with someone who doesn't have the same concept of time as myself.  

If I had it my way we would have non-linear editing equipment in all the news vans and we would never have to come back to the station to put a story together.  Keeping people in the field keeps them away from distractions that could delay, and potentially put in danger, the quality of the product placed on the air.

I can't even begin to tell you how many times I have been rushed, or someone else has had to finish the edit of a story, due to lack of time.  

Maybe I'm just being to stressful....another wonderful genetic gift that I'm sure is leading to the ever growing size of my forehead.  But I would rather be stressed and get a story done than be lackadaisical and rushed.  

Shortenings

LCTR

VOSOT

PKG

NATPKG

OPACY

BATCO

News has an almost military like interest in shorthand phrases.  Sure it makes information easier and more quickly conveyed.  It also leads to a club.  A group of people that know what those terms mean.  A group that would scoff at someone who did not.

I was a film major at Towson.  When I started as an editor I had no clue what a VOSOT was.  A guy looked at me funny when I asked.

LCTR - Locator.  These are fun.  This is when something horrible happens to someone in Baltimore when we aren't working.  We have to go back to the scene and film where it happened.  Without police.  With pissed off neighbors. 

VOSOT - Voice Over/Sound on Tape.  The term for a shorter story read by the news anchor and not a reporter.  Photographers are usually sent solo to pick these stories up.  Shooting some video of the scene and  then one quick interview with someone from the location.

PKG - Package. A standard news story with a two person team of a photographer and reporter. Usually shot, written, and aired in a single day.  (I got a t-shirt from a friend that said "My Package is so famous it's in the news."  Big hit at work parties.)

NATPKG - Natural Sound Package.  The story that shooters make to show off their skills.  A story told through the people without any reporter track. Really hard to do but amazing when done right.

OPACY - Oriole Park at Camden Yards.  Honestly this took me forever to figure out

BATCO - Baltimore County.  BATCO also gets the unique title of being 'the county' Anytime something is "Out in the County" they're referring to Baltimore County.  Sorry Howard County.  You suck.

Chilly

At 8:15pm I had a great story.

At 8:20pm It was gone.

The doctor had called.....

4 Hours Earlier:

Getting into work today the initial plan was to do a winter weather storm piece.  Seeing how it wasn't snowing and wouldn't be snowing for another 24 hours that plan was scrapped and we moved to the story of a fund raiser for the Roland Park Fire House, the oldest in the city.  The story started well with my reporter and I visiting the firehouse and hearing about all the repairs that needed to be made and then moved to the event hall two blocks away where the community was holding a chili cookoff in an attempt to raise money for the firehouse.  Now there's one way into all photographer's hearts and that is through their stomach.  Needless to say free delicious chili made the day go very well.

Upon leaving the event we get a frantic call from our frizzled assignment desk worker saying that WBAL had gotten an interview with the doctor from Baltimore who is charged in an assisted suicide case in Georgia.  We were instructed to try to go to this guys house in Hampden and try to get some sound as well.  

Well, surprise surprise the good doctor was not home.  We left a message and went back to the firehouse story.  

We probably aren't back for more than 10 minutes before the scanners blare:

*Truck 2, Engine 44, Battalion Chief 2 respond.  3200 block of Beeche Ave. for the report of a building fire.  Operations on Charlie 1*

I'm back out the door.  

The fire is right around the corner off of Keswick in that inbetween Hampden-Remington area. 

Great Stuff.

Smoke still billowing out when I get there.  Plenty of onlookers to just run up to and interview.  Hampden always gives the best sound.  

Well who do I see respond to this fire but none other than the crew from the Roland Park firehouse.  The same ones that a fundraiser was held for earlier today.   Visions of awards immediately start dancing through my head.  What a great day-turn this will be.  Not only do we have the benefit for the firefighters but we also have them in action.  Helping the community.  Showing what this fundraiser was all about.  To keep this unit local and to allow them to continue to serve the public.  Its great.  It seems like a winner.  I'm pumped.  

The doctor calls.

Mr. Suicide can now talk.  

Management strips the story.

We're moved. 

There is something very frustrating about having something you care about taken from you without your control.  By the idea of a more important story.  By lack of staffing to send another crew to pick it up.  Instead of having a great story about the economy, the community, and all the intangibles we're on a Dr. Kevorkian wannabe.  At 8:20pm.  The news starts at 10.

The station sacrificed a winner for a vosot.  (Voice over/Sound on Tape.  Not a full story)  I think Dr. Suicide was a meaningful and interesting story.  I'm frustrated that mine was taken from me.  Both of which could have made air if we had one more nightside shooter tonight.  

That's too easy though.

I got a comment about my Daniel Coverston blog that I felt should be discussed.  Below is the comment made on the blog post and my response.

 TasteMaker said...

This death is sad and all and I share your cynicism for this city. But it almost sounds to me like because this kid is not from inside city limits and has a Facebook page with 800 friends, that this is somehow denotes a real tragedy, and that all the other (I believe 34) deaths within city limits- poor, non-sociable bastards unlucky enough to have Comcast and a burgeoning friends list somehow aren't real. 

As a black Towson student who commutes from an inner city community (Edmondson Avenue) with a rampant murder rate, maybe I should start boosting my friend list and start twittering so I won't be one of those fake tragedies in the Murder Ink column.

 CCCam said...

TasteMaker, Thank you for your comment. Through this post I was not trying to trivialize every other murder in Baltimore. I was trying to show how this particular incident struck me, and how the social networking age has changed the way media outlets gather information.

I wish we could take the time to run full stories on every person murdered in this city. But as I'm sure you know from living here that the sheer volume of violence makes that impossible. I'm sure we're missing stories on real victims and I hate that. No one deserves to be killed whether you're a drug dealer or a law abiding citizen. 

Unfortunately its the break from the norm that makes the news and for Baltimore City, murder has become the norm.

Now, I understand Tastemaker's frustration.  Everyone is a tragedy to someone and everyone deserves to have their story told.  

The Photographers Hangover.

Drink one for the noisy news van.

Drink two for the rushed liveshot.

Drink three for the crime scene in Northeast Baltimore.

Drink the water when called in early for work the next day.

current jam - The Hold Steady "212 Margarita"

Murder Most Foul

We started with a name.

Daniel Colverston.

It was the wrong name.

We didn't know that yet.

The press release from Baltimore County Police stated that a 24 yo male was shot in the head in an apartment in the Fairways at Towson apartment complex.  I knew it better as Glenmont.  A current name change to maybe boost the image of a housing development highly populated by Towson students.  The victim? According to the police it was Daniel Colverston.

I got into work and checked facebook, myspace, google.  Nothing.  I couldn't believe that a 24 year old would not leave an internet footprint.  Was he a loner?  

Striking out on the internet we went back to the apartment complex.  We interviewed concerned residents and my reporter spoke to two women sitting in a car near the door to where Mr. Colverson lived.  

They wouldn't go on camera.  But gave us valuable information.  Daniel was a former Towson student.  He graduated last year and he was an athletic assistant with the volleyball and basketball teams.  

Great.  We knew more.  My reporter had a contact with Towson U.  The contact put us in touch with someone from the athletic department who would provide us with a picture of Daniel if we came up to the Towson Center to shoot it.  

When we got there this individual was very nice.  Came right out, brought us the picture and said.

"You know they're spelling his name wrong right?  It's Daniel Coverston."  

The right name.

We get back to the station.  I hop on facebook.  Daniel Coverston comes right up.  He has over 800 friends.  Certainly not a loner.  

Being a Towson grad I was able to get full access to his profile.  He had over fifty tagged pictures.  Those became a part of the story.  We now had a face to go with a statistic.  I downloaded five or six pictures and inserted them into our package.  In 5 hours I felt like I was starting to know Daniel.  Hell it seems I even have two friends in common with him. 

I cropped the people with Daniel out of most of the photographs.  I left one in.  A very touching picture of Daniel and a friend looking incredibly happy.  It fit with the script my reporter had written.  

Should I have used a picture of Daniel with another person?  My producer didn't think so.  I felt it was appropriate but I can see how the other girl in the photo may have been upset.  

But this is how Facebook has changed our world.  At the start of the day I had a crime scene and an incorrect name.  By the time our story aired at 10 I had a face, a personality.  A real person to go with the violence that hits our region.  

Crime is NOT limited to Baltimore City.  There isn't some forcefield around the city limits that keeps them away.  It can affect anyone.  And tonight it seems like this was a real tragedy.  

Heart.

I heard a saying once about photojournalism that I've really taken to heart.

"If you're not happy with your pictures then you're not close enough."

This was very fitting in my story today.  I was covering a benefit event for the Brady family.  Maybe you may or may have not heard, but this family was involved in a fatal car accident in October in Bel Air where the family of four was driving down I-95 and hit by a drunk driver.  Mrs. Brady and her oldest son, Wilson, were killed in the car accident and today at Perry Hall high school a benefit concert was held for Mr. Brady and his youngest  son Ian who survived the crash.  

The concert involved a volunteer orchestral band performing at the school.  When we arrived the orchestra was already playing.  I began shooting with a wide shot of the band and began working my way forward.  Seeing that there was easy access to the stage I made my way right next to the band.  Getting a lot of great closeups.  I tried to do my best to avoid interfering with the view of anyone else in the crowd but I also realized that anyone watching on tv wanted to feel like they were there.  I stalked the orchestra.  Moving my way through the string to the percussion sections trying to get as many shots as possible.  

I understand that I may have been a temporary inconvenience to the audience but I also understood that through doing that I was helping better tell the story to the thousands of people watching at home for the 10pm news.  

During my shooting I notices two other photographers from channels 13 and 2.  They stayed far back from the band.  Keeping a safe distance and shooting wide shots.  I didn't watch their newscasts but I'm positive their video did not have the same impact that mine did.  The audience wants that sense of immediacy.  They want to feel part of the story.  And you cannot do that from fifty feet away.  You can do that from 11 inches away.  

Today was a heartbreaking but uplifting story.  We interviewed the surviving Mr. Brady and his tale broke my heart.  Which in and of itself is becoming harder and harder to do when surrounded by a barrage of bad news every day.  But doing a story like this feels good.  It makes you proud to do what you do for a living.  I brought to life a struggling family and a positive community that just wants to support them. 

Current Jam - The Gaslight Anthem - "1930"

Car companies wouldn't be in such bad shape if they just advertised like this.

Gotta love John Waters.

Current Jam - Billy Bragg "A New England"

There's a Story to Every Corner

Baltimore is tiny.  Some people call it Smalltimore.  It fits.  Socially you don't even need Six degrees to connect people you meet in this town. 

Two and a half years ago when I graduated from Towson I didn't know much about the city geographically.  But now I've probably driven past every street.  

When new reporters start the photojournalist turns into more of a tour-guide.  (We are already more like professional drivers but that's for another day).  

Roland Park  -  "That's the street where I got the truck stuck in the ice after going live all morning with the double fatal fire."

North and Warwick - "Oh, I was here shooting a car that was flipped completely over after hitting a curb too fast."

Lombard and President - "One day I couldn't get the mast of the truck to descend and was stuck for two hours."

Too Many Streets - "I was at a shooting here."

News people new to this city get up to speed really, really quick if they drive around with talkative photogs enough.  

I like that I've had so many good and bad experiences working and living in Baltimore.  You get possessive of a city you spend so much time in.  I never felt that way growing up outside of D.C. but Baltimore fits its nickname.  Charming.

Current Jam - The Pixies  "Tame"

Why Does a Dog Lick Its Own Ass?

Because it can.  

Why do local news organizations put their reporters live in the field constantly?  Because they can.

Welcome to the world of the dog-lick live shot.  Where photographers and reporters commiserate over a common hatred.  Going live with a story that could easily be fronted in the studio with the same effect.  

Somewhere fifty years ago, some researcher, some now hated researcher, came up with a statistic that stated that viewers responded better to reporters live in the field than in the studio.  Sure, this makes perfect sense when the reporter is on the scene of an event that is currently unfolding.  Snow.  Fire. Shooting.  But why make a reporter go live for a national story on the economy?  Why make a reporter go live from a scene that ceased to be active 8 hours prior?  Because you can?

I can see how this can come off as me bitching about doing liveshots.  I'll admit, I hate them.  They are the least creative part of a very creative profession.  They are where the mind of an engineer (which I do not have) clashes with that of a person who would much rather spend another 40 minutes cutting their package (which is myself)

I do not mind doing a liveshot for breaking news.  I tolerate the fact that they are a necessity for weather stories.  But to put someone live for the sake of being live is going to be a never ending struggle between the creativity of the reporters and photographers and the hardline ratings and public opinion driven mindsets of management.  

Current Jam - The Gaslight Anthem "The '59 Sound"

Home Is Where the Heart Is

News is a strange business for the people involved.  On and off Air.  We're a nomadic bunch of college grads migrating from one market to another every two years or so.  Making new lives, new friends, new loves.  Why though?  What makes the people in this industry so willing to pick up their ENTIRE life and start over.  What are we running from?  

Personally, I want to get up and go.  There is something refreshing about having a clean start in a new town.  I feel like I'm in a rut.  Probably self induced.  There's probably just as good a chance of meeting someone here in Baltimore as there is in Atlanta, Portland, Nashville, ect.  But maybe the change is something that will kickstart that.  

It's amazing what we go through in attempts to not be strapped to a desk.  I worked a 3am to 12 noon shift for a year and a half! Right out of college.  I lost a lot of friends, lost a lot of sleep, and still enjoyed most of it.  I went from that shift to working 2pm to 1030pm Saturday through Wednesday.  A step up for sure but I lost my weekends.  

Work has become my life.  But I love my work.  Hell, I come in wearing jeans and a polo shirt every day.  How many other working adults can say that?  I've met Cal Ripken, seen Barack Obama in person.  How many people can say that?  But the great moments in my work life have been at the expense of any personal life progression.  

I guess I gotta find a balance....Maybe in Cashville.

Current Jam - Drive-By Truckers "One of These Days"

Are you kidding me?

From the Sun's tips for the Obama visit: The following items will be prohibited from War Memorial Plaza: firearms, ammunition, explosives, weapons of any kind

No shit!  Who's the guy that's like "Damn I was really thinking about bringing this crossbow since I'm going hunting later.  Good thing The Sun made sure I knew better!"

Has common sense fallen this far?

Current Jam : MGMT - Kids

Greetings from City Hall

Baltimore is getting a lot of press these days.  The Ravens are one win away from a Super Bowl, The President-Elect is stopping by on Saturday, and of course our dear Mayor is in the midst of a political scandal that even Jay Leno is joking about. (Is joking the right word to use for Leno though?  He's terrible... how about 'talking' instead.) 

It seems we can't have too much of a good thing in this town.  We can't just have a major drop in the murder rate, a good football team, and a speech from one of the most historic presidents in American history.  No no no.  That won't do.  No far too much positive for this city.  I'm glad Sheila can bail us out and bring about a scandal filled with gift cards and fur coats and plane trips and all the wonderful things that make News Directors drool.  

It will be a big weekend for me.  I'll be at the Obama speech, covering more of a story about the people watching rather than the nuts and bolts of the event.  And then I'll be around Baltimore and BWI airport again to get fans reaction to the Ravens beating the Steelers.  If 300+ people were at the airport when the Ravens beat the Titans...I can only imagine what it's going to be like Sunday night.  

Current Jam: Jenny Lewis - Godspeed

SRB For Mayor!!

I can see it now.  Leopard print couches.  Velvet drapes.  And a new flavor of sass in city hall.  We'll have cosmetic weeks.  It'll be great.  

Of course all of this stems from Mayor Dixon's Indictment this week.  Thankfully I wasn't working on Friday as dealing with an over-stressed reporter is one of the least enjoyable things about this job.  I don't know too much about law and all these charges so I'm not too sure how likely it will be that Sheila will resign (hell if she doesn't she'll probably be re-elected) but thinkin of Ms. Blake in the big chair sure leads to some fun thoughts.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year.  This is a cell pic from the roof of the Maryland Science Center on a very cold, very windy, very firework-less New Years in Baltimore.  It gave me a chance to go out and see some friends though.  I had expected to be on that roof well past midnight.