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Coast Futbol Alliance player Ford Graves, 4, takes shots at the goal Thursday during practice at Socastee Recreation Park off Butler Road in Socastee. The league, comprised of youth 4 to 14 years of age, plays their games at the park.

Last week the editors of The Sun News changed the style in which our photos are credited in the print editions.

In the past a small credit line simply stated the photographer’s name followed by “The Sun News”. For example, a photo taken by my colleague Charles Slate read “Photo by Charles Slate The Sun News”.

These credits are small and usually range in the 8-point size range. They are located under the photo and in the lower right hand corner.

To get the staff better connected to the community we changed the crediting by simply replacing “The Sun News” with our individual e-mail addresses. Now my credit line is “Photo by Randall Hill rhill@thesunnews.com

This may seem like a small change but I’ve already noticed the impact by the number of e-mails I’ve received. The day of the change I was graced with 2 e-mails about the above photo. One of the e-mails was a query about how to get a photo reprint and one was a reply thanking me for the coverage.

It felt good to get a response so quickly.

I’m excited about this change and I hope it leads to contacts for lots of great stories and photos. I look forward to this connection to the readers.

rlh

From inside his pin, Chester, a fox terrier mix, greets a visitor Tuesday at the Grand Strand Humane Society in Myrtle Beach.

Okay I’ve been busy lately.

Since I’ve started adding video to my list of storytelling tools, I have less time during the day to get my work done. Assignments, photographed but not edited and captioned, pile up in my computer.

Time flew by today with my first stop at the humane society for a story about the shortage of donated animal foods. This request was live so I had to edit and caption before my second request. I did calm down and take some quality time with little Chester. He was so cute and loving and I hope my photo on our front page gets him adopted.

Later I was off to a features request about spending quality time with children. This was not live but needed to be edited and turned around so the pages could be designed on Wednesday.

Robin Small (left) and her son Tre Baldwin, 8, build cars and homes using legos Tuesday at their home in the Burgess community of Horry County.

After a quick bite to eat, I hurried over to the Myrtle Beach basketball game. The school has a poorly lit gym so I brought some extra flashes with slave units.

During halftime I edited the first half images at the gym to help make my 10:30 pm deadline for sports.

Myrtle Beach’s Darius Hemingway, 15, and Brookland-Cayce’s Alex Furtick, 5, goes for a loose ball during 3rd quarter action Tuesday night at Myrtle Beach. The Seahawks beat the Bearcats 67-51 to advance to the lower state championship game.

The game now over, I packed up my gear and headed back to the office to make my final choices for the sports front.

After my deadline and as a final push to get caught up, I edited and captioned two requests from late last week. I finished with all my work at 11:00 pm and drove home.

Time now to relax. ugh!

rlh

Recently on the yahoo listserve newspapervideo, there’s been a heated discussion about the ethics of adding music to newspaper videos in postproduction. If you’ve viewed any of my attempts at this new medium, you’ll notice I like to use both visual and musical elements to set the mood.

On many of my videos I’ve written and recorded specific musical passages usually with an acoustic guitar. These musical themes interpret the mood of my videos in the same way my visual style contributes as I photograph.

I use this recorded music only on feature videos and never on spot news.

With that discussion brewing, I had just finished “The Caines Boys” video I featured in an earlier blog post. I added music recorded specifically for that video in post. I feel the music helps with the pacing and moves the video along during the transitions. I don’t feel the music is unethical in any way.

Everyone has the right to an opinion on this issue and I welcome anyone’s thoughts on why I shouldn’t put the music in.

Get the Flash Player to see this player.

This week I used the discussion to challenge myself. I put together the above video of fisherman Walt Hughes without music just to prove I didn’t need it for pacing and mood. I like the video as is but I feel it could of been better with my music.

To view the discussions of music and other topics on newspapervideo you have to join the group. Many of the members are visual journalists like myself who are working with video in addition to shooting stills for print editions. Some members have switched entirely to video.

There are many talented journalists on the listserve and it has been a valuable resource for me over the last year in my struggle with video. 

rlh

Sara Parrish of Columbia, S.C., rests on a bed of ice after running in the 2008 BI-LO Myrtle Beach Marathon. The ice was discarded by vendors near a trash pile and used by several runners to soothe sore muscles and joints after the run.

Our paper, the day after the marathon, is by far the biggest of the year. We set new circulation records each year on the Sunday after the event.

Thousands of runners come to the area some trying to qualify for one of the bigger races like in Boston or New York. With that in mind, the Myrtle Beach race is about the purity of the sport and so it’s a fun event to cover.

Go to myrtlebeachonline.com to see the gallery by yours truly and my colleague Janet Blackmon Morgan.

Janet covered the start of the race and traveled the course. I stayed at the finish line and captured the images of the runners at the end.

She posted first so her images are toward the end of the gallery.

rlh

While on the way to an assignment about adoption, I was rushed and tried to convince myself I had to miss photographing the wonderful sunset that settled over downtown Conway Wednesday evening.

Sometimes photojournalists overlook the beauty of the simple sunset. In our world, like silhouette images, sunset photos can be cliché and boring.

I remember a time several weeks ago, a reporter visited my desk to let me know about an awesome sunset brewing on that day. I was on deadline and reluctantly pulled myself up from the desk for the viewing. When we walked outside I was glad I stopped for a moment to see. The beauty of the now is the most wonderful moment of all and like the simple sunset our lives are fleeting and short.

With that thought I stopped and took this photo.

Thanks Jennifer for stopping by that day.

rlh

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How could brothers Roy and Jerry Caines not charm you?

I had the opportunity to spend the afternoon with them to gather video and stills for a story about their switch to decoy carving 2 years ago. The brothers are genuine folk and deserve success no matter what they do.

Somehow this video came together and I’m pleased with the pacing. I struggled with the decision to use their “steps of the decoys making process” but “the boys” were just so charming. My fear was the clip would make the video a little too promotional. In the end it stayed because every time I watched it I laughed out loud.

I hope people notice the changes I’ve made in producing my last several videos. I’ve learned a lot from watching videos produced by my friend Travis Long. He has inspired me to use the tripod and pan head more during my static shots.

I’ve also tried to incorporate different storytelling styles into my latest videos.

With “The Boys” I mixed up the audio and included sound from the camera and audio recorded on my digital recorder. I recorded the audio only tracks first and this gave me a chance to talk to the brothers and get a sense of their history. While shooting the video I tried to get footage that would correspond with the recorded audio. The music I recorded later was designed to speed the pace of the video. My goal for the music track was to make the three minutes seem like two.

I’ve also learned and have enjoyed using the Sennheiser wireless lapel mic issued to me by the paper. This microphone and remote has done wonders to better the quality of my audio. With producing videos like these, I feel a good audio track is one of the keys to making these hold the interest of the viewer. Of course the subject matter is the most important.

During my visit with the Caines boys, I couldn’t help but think of my own brother Mike Hill and how much I care for him.

I miss you brother. When are we going camping?

rlh

The early arrivals for the Anderson SCNPA meeting pose in front of the upscale art warehouse Saturday during a break in judging for the 2007 SCPOY 

This year’s South Carolina News Photographers Association meeting was held in Anderson, S.C. and sponsored in part by the cities great newspaper The Independent-Mail. My friend and SCNPA member Ken Ruinard was the host and did a great job of putting together a wonderful meeting.

Congratulations to Chris Berry of The State for winning the big prize and being honored as POY for 2007. Mic Smith of the Post and Courier won best of show with a powerful photo essay about Charleston’s notorious city jail. I feel it is the best story produced in South Carolina since I started working here in 1999.

Hopefully the photos will be posted soon on our website www.scnpa.org.

Until then you can see the photos, which won from last year’s contest.

(Photo by Barbara Ellison) 

rlh

This has been the first trial coverage where I’ve been doing updates throughout the day via the web. This is difficult because I worry I’ll be at the computer working images when action happens during the trial. So far there’s been a two-hour break for lunch each day. I grab a quick bite to eat and get back to do my updates before the trial resumes.

Defense attorney Stuart Alexrod gathers his thoughts before the start of closing arguments during the trial of Vladimir Pantovich Thursday at the Georgetown County Courthouse.

Click to myrtlebeachonline.com to see the gallery I’ve updated throughout the trial.

After closing arguments, the trial was given to the jury late Thursday. After no decision was made, the judge decided to break for the evening and resume on Friday. I will update tomorrow with the images from the verdict reading.

rlh

Courtroom spectators Norma Tyler (from left) Regina and Edward Glinka and Cecil Blanton (hand on forehead), react to testimony Wednesday by defendant Vladimir Pantovich during Pantovich’s trial Wednesday at the Georgetown County Courthouse.

This week I’ve been covering the trial of Vladimir Pantovich who is accused of killing his estranged girlfriend Sheila McPherson during a heated argument in March of 2006. That same week in March, three women were killed in domestic violence cases in our coverage area. Two of the three trials are in process this week.

Pantovich has pleaded not guilty and claims self-defense in the killing. During his testimony he stated McPherson came at him with a fireplace poker and in turn struck her with a softball bat.

Defendant Vladimir Pantovich gets emotional during testimony Tuesday at the Georgetown County Courthouse. Pantovich was listening to the testimony of his son Marco Pantovich who was the first witness for the prosecution.

The autopsy photos show McPherson was beaten savagely. Pantovich admitted to tying the victim with ropes and blankets and stashing her in his car. He was caught running scared in the North Carolina Mountains near the home of his son.

The trial has been emotional but lacks the extreme conflicts and drama normal to most murder cases I’ve covered. There are very few family members present for the victim in this case.

This is the first time covering a murder trial, I didn’t get the sense I knew the victim. So far I’ve not seen one photo of the victim presented to the jury showing her while she was alive.

rlh

After making a clutch basket at the end of the game, Saint James guard Mikey Hall, 23, is embraced by teammates Brandon Atkinson (left), 25, and Skylar Brown, 4, during the Sharks 45-37 win against Socastee Monday night at Saint James High School.

The beauty of using my wireless card is now I’m able to spend more time at games documenting the action and less time driving to the office to work images. Now when covering preps, I shoot the whole game and transmit from the gym or from my car.

I do a rough edit of the images from the first half during the break at halftime and then the final edit after the game. The wireless connection gives me the freedom to stay and pick from the best of both halves of action. This way I can get those images, which tell the true story of the game.

rlh