Do it differently

Posted by Gordon King on May 4, 2011 | Comments Off

Another local Marine was killed by an IED in Afghanistan recently and we covered the arrival of his body in advance of his burial.

We’re not always allowed by the family to photograph the arrival of the body but when we can, we’re lucky to have a high vantage point from which to photograph these arrivals. We have an unobstructed view of the proceedings plus we’re able to stay a respectful distance from the family.

This is the standard shot of  a casket arrival, a shot we’ve run before (or a photo very similar to this):

Repeating the same photo or a similar one is usually a sure bet. But because we shoot the same events every year here, part of the challenge of our jobs here at the Herald-Republic is to find different ways to shoot those same events.

At the airport, I got a big assist from the Patriot Guard Riders, the sun and the wind to help make a different photo of the same event.

This is the photo that led our front page the next day:

The Patriot Guard Riders, a pro-military motorcycle group, lined up on the tarmac, facing into the wind and sun. Their orientation provided nice backlighting for the flags while the stiff west wind made the flags billow.

I shot the standard photo with a 300 2.8 lens mounted on a Canon 5D and then switched to my Canon 1D Mark IV with a 16-35 mm lens for the wider shot.

In this case, the wider shot really works for me and gives a different perspective on what has, unfortunately, become a too-common event.

 

–Gordon King