Kody Watts
Over the years I’ve had the opportunity to shoot Kody many times. I’ve covered him on the basketball court, the football field, on the baseball diamond, shot the sports portrait below and also shot his senior portraits. Here are a few baseball images of Kody. He’s a great guy both on and off the field. He was drafted by the Pittsburg Pirates but he chose to attend the University of Portland and get his education. I am sure we will see him in the pros after college.
Profile Portrait
Senior Year Team/Individual Photo
Senior Year Team/Individual Photo
Scouts with radar guns on Kody during his last high school game. He reached 98 MPH!
Scout with video and radar.
Scouts with radar guns on Kody during his last high school game.
Watts, after hitting a home run.
Watts playing 3rd base.
Kody at 3rd base.
Pick off attempt.
My First Published Photograph
A few weeks ago I was invited to speak to the student staff of Clark College’s newspaper The Independent. I prepared a presentation on my iPad using the Keynote app and displayed the presentation on their projector. As part of the presentation I thought it would be cool to show them my first published photo. It was published in a newspaper and I made a whopping $15 (over 25 years ago!). The photo below shows the yellowing newspaper clipping.
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Sports photography in Portland OR, Vancouver WA and Seattle WA.
New Equipment
Just before the holidays we purchased some new equipment. The lens and camera body just sat in the camera case because we hadn’t scheduled any shoots until after the new year. I received an ice ball tray as a gift from Maker’s Mark Bourbon. Jordan and I made the ice balls and added one to a glass of Maker’s Mark. We decided to check the high ISO capability of the new Nikon D7000 camera body. The shot below was created with the new 80-200/2.8 lens and D7000 body. Excellent results!
Unusual Venue
I followed the Skyview Storm basketball team to the Rose Garden to photograph their game against the Prairie Falcons. This was quite a venue to play a regular season high school game at. Many thanks to the Portland Trailblazers for giving the players a taste of what it is like to play in the Rose Garden. I’m sure they will always remember it!
Steve Kizer – Skyview Head Football Coach
The Seattle Seahawks needed a head shot of Skyview High School head football coach Steve Kizer. Shooting Steve’s portrait was a special assignment for me because in addition to being an excellent football coach, Steve is a great guy and a great role model to the young men that he coaches. To top it off, my son Ryan benefited by being on the Skyview football team and coached by Steve.
The time slot that I was able to shoot Steve was during one of his weight training classes which included 60 athletes. I set up my white background and two lights as the students were gathering for class. Steve sent them out for a warm-up run while we finished up his shoot.
The Storm football team just became the Greater St Helen’s League champions for the 3rd year in a row and are currently in the WA state playoffs looking for their first state championship.
Best of luck to Steve and the Skyview Storm!
Matt Spears
I’ve known Matt for a couple years and followed him through 2 football and 2 baseball seasons. In fact, over the years our family and his family have become very good friends. Below are a few of the images that I’ve shot of Matt over the years. Good luck to Matt as he moves on to his college studies and college baseball.
Jordan and Ryan – Then and Now
Jordan and Ryan have grown up with my camera pointed at them. I guess it’s only fitting that they eventually became photo assistants. And now at ages 18 and almost 20 they are excellent photo assistants. It wasn’t our plan to have them work in the family business but they wanted to work. It was more for the sake of earning spending money than it was to learn the business but looking back at the way things turned out, I’m glad they made the decision they did. I get to spend time with my sons, sometimes on easy gigs and sometimes solving complex lighting problems. The thing that I am most proud of is that regardless of whether they are working in freezing cold or moving 400lbs of equipment on location, they always work to my ever demanding high standards. To say they are an asset is an understatement.
In the first photo below, taken with a Polaroid back on a 4×5 view camera, the boys had just secretly “decorated” a light stand with close to 150 stickers they had accumulated from shopping trips to Albertsons. Despite the many cleanings that light stand has undergone, it still sticks when we try to open or close it. The second photo is much more recent!
Skyview Profiles (01)
This football season we were fortunate to be able to work with a dozen Skyview High School athletes creating profile portraits (sportraits) for my Storm website. We worked over a two day period shooting at Kiggins Bowl, Skyview’s home stadium. Jordan, my photo assistant (and son), really got a workout as we took 400 lbs of studio equipment on location and had to move it all over the stadium. Congratulations to the Skyview football team for making it all the way to the WIAA 4A Semi-Finals!
Below is the first set of portraits. I’ll present more in a future post.
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My Personal Project – Skyview Sports
Every photographer needs a personal project and I am no different. During the first ten years of my photographic career more than 50% of my assignments were sports action coverage. My clients included daily newspapers on both coasts, national sports magazines, major universities, and the governing bodies of many pro and amateur leagues. I moved on to other types of assignments and my days of sports action seemed well behind me… Then, in 2007, my wife suggested that I shoot some of the games of my son’s high school football team. Skyview High School sports became my personal project. It’s refreshing to be able to shoot without any commercial expectations attached and to give a little bit back to our local community. Below are a few images I’ve shot over the years. If you would like to see more, check out www.storm.davescottphoto.com.
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