Angie and Mike's Blog

Harley's sad because Angie didn't come home from work today. She's in KC until Thursday and poor Harley just doesn't understand. Apparently she does this when I leave for an extended period of time but I've never gotten to witness it until tonight.

Labels: Angie, Harley, KUSM-W, work

Karen and I photographed Lori and Derek's wedding last weekend on Lori's family's farm near Windom. Her father, Jim, is the fourth generation to farm the land in western McPherson County. Lori's brother is next in line to take over guaranteeing that the farm will remain in the Nelson family for many more years. While scouting locations after the rehearsal dinner, we happened upon this old red barn which just happened to be near the house that Lori grew up in. And the chair? It was just sitting in the middle of a nearby basketball court as if it were waiting for other to show up for a game of horse. We repositioned it and I showed Lori how I envisioned her posing. Of course, she did a much better interpretation than did I. Thanks, Karen, for snapping this frame of me in a (somewhat) compromising position.

Labels: Crossover, Heartland, Mike, On Location, work

I spent the past weekend playing wedding photographer with Karen at Erin and Shane's wedding in Lawrence. I know Erin through her sister, Rachelle, with whom I went to high school. They first contacted me nearly two years ago to talk about wedding photography. I'm so glad they bought into our style and vision for wedding photography! As we were waiting for the shuttle bus to take the guests from the chapel to the reception, I gathered everyone behind the newlyweds for a fun group photo. Go on over to the Heartland blog to see a preview.

Labels: Heartland, Lawrence, Mike, On Location, work

Angie accompanied me to the medical school today for the opening reception of my exhibit "Keepers: A Collection of Newspaper Photographs." It's up through Feb. 27. It contains 20 of my most favorite images from my newspaper days. I was asked by the medical school's art director last summer to consider doing a show. It was a bit stressful trying to get it put together at the same time I became a new dad but the warm welcome I received today made it all worth my while. Let me know if you're interested in seeing it before it comes down.

Labels: KUSM-W, Mike, work

My co-worker James made this caricature of me today and titled it "Mike's Typical Weekend." For the past couple of weeks thats certainly been the case although I'm not really sure about the overalls!

Labels: KUSM-W, Mike, work

I teamed up with Heather Essian to photograph Karen and Erik's wedding yesterday. On their way out of the reception following the last dance, the happy couple stopped by our work station for a self-portrait. To her credit, this is the only frame Karen, the founding partner of Heartland Photography, shot all day. There's a brief preview over on the Heartland blog and I'll be adding more as I editing throughout this week and next.

Labels: Crossover, Heartland, Mike, work

Northwest tailback Andrew Etheridge (22) sprints to the endzone ahead of Bishop Carroll's Michael Peters (30) in a game Saturday at Maize High. This was the second of two games I covered for The Eagle this weekend. This one didnt make the paper because as dominant as Northwest was in the first half it came out flat in the second and was easily defeated.


A nice defensive play on Northwest's part saw Deangelo Grim (8) break up a pass intended for Bishop Carroll's Joe Brown (34) in the first quarter. Again, this one didn't make the paper, either, although it did find a home in an online gallery. Maybe I'm old school, but a photo has to make it in print to count.

Labels: Eagle, Mike, work

Harley's been the talk of the medical school this week after her picture was published on the flat screen monitors throughout the campus. There's a safety training seminar being held Saturday and the school asked for staff, students and faculty to submit photos of them with their pets. Probably a couple of dozen people responded. Jennifer, the gal in charge of changing the screens, did ask if it was alright to refer to Harley as Angie's "dog baby." What else is she? :)

Labels: Angie, Harley, KUSM-W, work

Karen made a couple of images of me this past weekend. Here I contemplate my first Cozy burger in Salina. I decided to eat it which would come back to haunt me in the middle of the night. The Cozy Inn, in downtown Salina, is well-known for its mini burgers, which are served sans wrapper six to a bag.


Here, ring bearer Braxton watches as a I download a card following group formals from a wedding this past weekend. Is that what I really look like?!! I'm starting to understand why people, for the most part, dislike having their picture taken.

Labels: Heartland, Mike, Salina, work

I'm in Phillipsburg for a wedding this weekend. While scouting locations, Karen and I walked around downtown. Only in small town America have I seen it where you can park in the middle of the street ... all the time.


We asked where the best place to eat was. This Oriental restaurant, simply called The Oriental, is ran by Cambodian refugees who sought refuge in Phillipsburg more than 20 years ago.


We ordered a ton of food. Those are supposed to be half orders of Beef Broccoli and Almond Chicken in front of me. About the only thing half about them was that I could only eat about half! We had all that food for $20, too, which is probably about half what a dinner in Wichita would cost you.


What you need after eating all that Chinese food! Mary and Ty are getting married in a real cute church tomorrow but this is the scene inside the main entrance to the fair grounds pavilion, their reception site. I wanted to pull off a funny photo out of this scene but there was someone associated with the wedding setting up for tomorrow and Karen didn't have a newspaper in her car.

Check the Heartland blog early next week for a preview of Mary and Ty's wedding.

Labels: Heartland, On Location, Phillipsburg, work

The governor came to the medical school yesterday to sign of a bill authorizing the expansion of KU's pharmacy school to Wichita. Following the ceremony, she mingled with some pharmacy students from Lawrence who came down for the event. Monday was also the first day for new students and new residents start Thursday. With so much going on, I almost felt like I was back in the newspaper business. I'm glad I'm not, though. The Eagle announced layoffs last week that snatched two in the photo department (the night desk editor and a shooter) and my good friend Chad lost his job in Daytona Beach on Monday. Hang in there, Chad ... there's life after newspapers!

Labels: KUSM-W, work

I've spent a good portion of this weekend doing something that I haven't done since I moved back to Wichita: I freelanced for The Wichita Eagle. I had four assignments in two days that included a portrait of Larry Tyson, the commander of VFW Post 6957 in Haysville. The instructions on the assignment said to make him look like a veteran on Memorial Day and suggested that we go to a nearby cemetery. As I pulled out of the garage to make the 11:00 assignment, I spotted the Old Glory that my father gave us after moving into the house. I took it with me and I'm glad I did. There wasn't anything at the cemetery that would make a good picture. One of his colleagues from the VFW is holding the flag while my flash is to my right on a stand.


This is how Larry's portrait appeared in today's paper.


After the cemetery, I grabbed some lunch before meeting up with Eagle reporter Bill Wilson to do the obligatory lake story on Memorial Day. We headed to Cheney Lake where I met the Lang family from Hutch. I had this vision of shooting from a boat, perhaps of a skier or passengers, but the Langs' boat, named Family Time, was the only one to go in the water while we were there. Here William lets his six-year-old daughter Taylor take the helm. If I only had a full-frame D3 or a fisheye lens, this picture might have been more in line with what I'd hoped to get.


Saturday I covered two state championships. Interestingly, both games featured one of Wichita's two Catholic high schools. Also interestingly, they both lost. Bishop Carroll's softball team rallied for a nine-inning 1-0 win over last year's champ, Ark City, in the semis, but dropped championship 3-0. BC's pitcher in both games threw all 16 innings on Saturday and is seen here walking through my frame while the opposing team celebrates. Definitely impressive regardless of the ultimate outcome.


After softball was over, I scooted over to LD Stadium to see Kapaun drop the Class 5A baseball final to Topeka Seaman. When I arrived, the scoreboard indicated that the home team had a 3-0 lead. I assumed that Kapaun was the home team. It wasn't until the fifth inning that I realized that the team I thought was winning indeed wasn't. Fortunately, I made a couple of decent plays of Kapaun losing. This one didn't make the paper.

After the game, in the press box, I ran into Capital-Journal reporter Rick Dean. He confirmed that I was in Wichita and considered that move an upgrade from Topeka. I agreed. "Yeah, I don't really miss Topeka," I said. His reply, in a cynical, sports writer's tone: "No one's ever said that before."

Labels: Eagle, newspapers, work

I've spent the past two days at a workshop in Valley Center featuring Mike Colón, a high-end and highly sought after wedding photographer from Los Angeles. I've got more than 10 gigs worth of images to weed through but here are a few of my favorites from an initial edit. Soon I hope to have a few photos of myself at the workshop and of the guest of honor. On the first day we photographed on an old farm, at the River Festival carnival and at the Keeper of the Plains. On Tuesday we photographed with a sweet ride from 1957 near the Valley Center grain elevators.

Labels: Heartland, work

About once a week I have to shoot these things at work called JayStars. They are "on the spot" recognition of a job well done. Think of it as an employee-of-the-month type award without the regularity. They don't usually make a picture but I go anyway, because, well, I'm expected to. So I go. It's less of a hassle that way. Just the other day I was thinking that I should get a JayStar for shooting all the JayStars.

Today, I got my wish! The staff in University Relations nominated me for a JayStar because of the work I've been doing. It's apparent that the medical school hasn't had a real photographer for some time, if ever, so the fact that I like to crawl out of my studio every now and then and actually shoot our students learning medicine is something of a novelty.

Between the people in UR and the people from HR and the people from my department, there were about 15 people gathered outside my studio today. There was just one person missing – me. There was no one there to shoot me receiving my JayStar.


So I made a self-portrait today. If it looks like I'm happy to have received a JayStar, it's because I am. I've never worked at a place that encourages and nourishes a positive environment. It's something that I'm still getting used to.

Labels: KUSM-W, Mike, work

Angie models a new outfit before leaving for her first day of work at KUSM-W. Today she started in the HR department at medical school. Yes, we see each other ALL the time now. And we're Jayhawks. Ick.

Labels: Angie, KUSM-W, work