A few weeks ago my wife and I toiled in the basement, sorting items we thought we would never use into piles: the sell pile, the keep pile and the trash pile. It was not as bad as those TV shows with all of the pack rats or anything like that, but we had to get rid of some stuff. Long story short, I came across some old 4x5 film holders and a box of film that expired in 2004. My wife often reminds me that it is items like these that create the mess. But I always say I need them knowing fully that I will rarely use things like old film and camera gear. Well, I found an excuse last week.
I was sent to the Longmont Boxing Club to photograph one of the last workouts before six of the members traveled to Kansas City for the Ringside World Championships. In my tenure at the paper I have worked on a few boxing stories so my boss did not hesitate to put this one in my hands. A fellow shooter on our staff said he would like to gather audio at my assignment. From there I decided to ask another co-worker to use his old Speed Graphic camera (an old 4x5 press camera) to take six portraits of the fighters going to the tourney. I raced home, gathered all of my old "crap" and loaded a new battery in one of the many light meters I have, but rarely use since going digital.
I shot six portraits in a few hours with only 14 sheets of expired film, which would be processed in expired chemistry in a darkroom that now serves as a newspaper library, compliments our managing editor. My co-worker put it well when he said, "Josh has a lot of balls in the air." Hell, I can't believe I remembered how to load 4x5 sheet film in a holder, let alone mix chemistry from scratch.
Shooting something like this is rewarding. Not that the photos are show stoppers or anything, but it takes me back to the basics, back to using my eyes and realizing my vision. My problems seem to disappear for the time mainly because I know every shot literally counts. I know there is no motor drive with 5+ frames a second and no checking my exposure by "chimping." The only thing I have to rely on when working with this medium is skill (a.k.a. HOPE) and vision. I truly believe these are the reasons why every serious photographer picked up a camera in the first place.As for me, I will hang onto the "crap" in the basement no matter how many garage sales I have in the future.
Longmont Boxing Club coach Raul Utajara rents a space above a Longmont welding shop on his own dime each and every month, which can get tough sometimes, he admits, considering he also works a full time job. "Sometimes I feel like I don't sleep," Utajara said, given he heads straight to the gym after work to train his fighters. He and his assistants left with six local fighters late Monday night to compete in the Ringside World Championships in Kansas City, Mo. Pictured from left: Raul Carrillo, Matthew Chavez, Adrian Pineda, Carlos Nevarez, Augustine Bantista, Coach Raul Utajara, Julio Quintana, John Neel, Jose Adrian Pineda, Lucas Montoya and Angel Gardea. Photo taken Friday, July 27, 2007. (Times-Call photo by Joshua Buck)
3 comments:
It's interesting to see the photos posted here in contrast to how they appeared in print. This is a much nicer presentation - the TC's muddy, gray print is to blame. I really like what you did here. I was telling a friend of ours that you can always tell a Buck photo without looking at the caption, because it just reads so well, and there's always more depth to it that your average newspaper pic. Lovely work again.
Screw digital! Lets shoot film. Great job Josh. I recently shot some old infrared film that I found and felt the same way when shooting it all with older prime lenses. I'm really diggin this. Word.
Great shots. The top one is especially striking.
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