Experience as an outsider

November 4, 1998

 

Being an outsider from what is considered the norm is, for most people, undesirable.  While most people want to be different from others, they do not want to be an outsider who stands out as someone who does not know or is unaware of cultural norms and values.

In 1995, a friend and I spent two months in South America.  Most of the time I was in Santiago, Chile, teaching English to first through sixth graders at a school.  I remember the first time my friend and I went to visit the school.

My friend Sam and I had purchased nice felt hats at a tourist market and decided to wear them to the school that first day.  We knew that we stuck out as foreigners but the hats did not help at all..  While the hats may have been in keeping with the traditional Chilean culture, we soon realized hats of that sort were not worn by very many people in the city.  We successfully became the object of many stares as we made our way down the street trailing our host.  When we got back from the school that afternoon we stored our hats for the remainder of the trip.  Continue reading

Model Release App : Easy Release

Getting model releases signed and organized has always been a hassle for photographers and videographers especially when they ‘re on the move. Now “there’s an app for that” too!

Now photographers can use their tablet or smart phones to get the releases signed and even translated on the go! Then you can have the Getty Images-ready release e-mailed to you in jpeg or PDF form ready for archiving. The releases even include a ID image so you can visually match the shoot to your images later on!

What a great idea! I’d love to try this one out

Easy Release by ApplicationGap replaces inconvenient paper release forms with a slick, streamlined model release app designed by professional photographers for professional photographers.

via Model Release App : Easy Release by ApplicationGap : HOME.

Our Debt: A Fire Out of Control

This is a short essay I wrote while a freshman at college in 1996. Things have gotten worse since then.

Our national debt began like a necessary, comfortable fire but has grown into a blazing inferno that is devouring our resources. Some have said that debt is the price of freedom or a “necessary evil” because that money was needed to kindle the financing of our fledgling nation and our war for independence.
According to Robert Burn’s article, “Born in Hock” in The Kansas City Star on March 1, 1993, our debt began with the Revolutionary War (1775-1783) and by 1789 was at $77 million. That was 38 times larger than our governments yearly revenue! Because of government concern about the debt, they were able to reduce the debt to a mere $38,000 by 1893, even after the costly Civil War.
Since 1893 our nation has increasingly lost consciousness about our financial status. Our debt has increased with each war and even reached the $1 trillion mark in 1981. Looking back we can see that our nation went through two World Wars, Korea, and Vietnam, but the shocking fact is that since 1981 our debt has more than quadrupled and now stands at the enormous amount of $5.2 trillion. The Linn County News of August 28, 1996 quotes our debt at $5,213,488,943,748.22, a nearly incomprehensible number. On a scale where five inches equals $1 billion, $5.2 trillion is more than 2,085 feet away. That is longer than six football fields end to end or $19,629.55 for every man, woman and child in America (based on a population of 263.5 million people)! Continue reading

THE ORACLE: A Photographer’s View (from 1996)

Fall 1996

I have enjoyed my experience as a staff photographer for Oral Roberts University’s The Oracle.  This semester provided an opportunity for me to gain experience in diverse photojournalism techniques and situations from close-up shots at dinner to impersonal parking lots.  My time spent as a staff photographer has been well spent.  When I joined the staff, my purpose was to gain a reason to be continually involved in photography and learn any new photojournalism techniques that would present themselves over the semester.

Toward the end of this semester, I was asked to go to The Oracle offices on Monday mornings and read over the headlines.  This may be a small job, but I am now able to take a part in making The Oracle just a little better.  Besides, I am gaining experience that will assist me later if I turn in a job application to my hometown newspaper over the summer.  I had previously written and taken pictures freelance for The Fort Scott Tribune, but now I have a semester of experience which I can put in my resume`. Continue reading

Six Weeks in Asia

 In fulfillment of the International Community Development  Internship, I spent May 14 through June 28 in central Asia.  The seven-member team of which I was a part, was active in various forms of assistance and evangelism in the nations of Nepal, Bhutan, and India.

Overview

Our itinerary sent us all across the area of northern India and Nepal and briefly into Bhutan.  The entire internship can be separated into three segments:  Conferences, Trekking/Medical assistance, and Discipleship.

Conferences

Our conference itinerary sent us to the Nepal-India border town of Karkavitta, Nepal, for our first conference.  Then we took an overnight bus to Kathmandu, Nepal, where we painted at a youth center and lead another conference.  After nine days in Kathmandu, we rode in a bus and jeeps to the Bhutanese border of India where we attended a secret pastor’s conference in Bhutan, an extremely anti-Gospel nation.  During that week we also led a youth conference in Jaigon, India. During the conferences, I spoke (through a translator) on the topics of: “Growing in the Lord”, “Destiny”, and “The Armor of God”.

+Spiritual needs

The Karkavitta conference there was attended by people who had traveled more than three days specifically for the conference.  Beginning on a Sunday night, the conference sessions continued until noon on Wednesday, May 20.  It was a joy to see a visiting Hindu teacher accept Christ while others rededicated their lives to the Lord.

The Kathmandu conference was aimed more for youth of Kathmandu so we spent time of fellowship in small groups and playing sports with them.  This time of fellowship was a good time to get to know the people and showed them that we are real people who enjoy life just like they do.

The final conference we preached was in Jaigon located on the border of Bhutan and India.  Bhutan is one of the most closed nations to the Gospel.  Persecution of believers is continual in this tiny nation nestled in the tropical foothills between India and Tibet. Continue reading

Overexposed: The Dim Future of Photojournalism?

D. Sharon Pruitt, taking photos of her daughter Hayley, is one of a growing number of amateur photographers who earn small fees for their work. From the NYT article referred to below

I’ve written about it before, but the future of professional photography as a solo art isn’t looking any more lucrative than it did several years ago. In fact things are becoming more specialized and “good” is becoming “good enough” for cash strapped newspapers, magazines, print and web venues.

In the NY Times story, “Image of a shrinking path”, talks about how professional photographers are being overwhelmed by the amount of stock images and cheaper competition from amateur photographers who are flooding the market for weddings, portraits and even magazine and print work. The photography market has become overexposed with cheap but quality digital cameras that even those with little or no training can use to make quality images that pass for most customers.

I agree that someone who was looking for a career as a studio, portrait or even journalism photographer isn’t going to find themselves in a hot market…however someone who is willing to wade into that field, be excellent at what they do AND diversify their imaging abilities they could find themselves in a good position to grow with a hybrid industry that is still in blossom: Still/videography

Three tips for up and coming photographers:

1) Be the best photographer you can be and find ways to be better.

Devin Graham’s Facebook profile image

2) Learn and shoot video too. Check out the likes of Devin Graham who is taking YouTube videos to a new level and making money doing it. Besides even for photojournalists, this is the digital age and videos are part of image reporting now.

3) Do what you love. If you don’t really enjoy the work and toil of photography, find a way to make it enjoyable or do something else that you  do love and go be the best at it!

 

A product of my culture

September 23, 1998

Some students go to a museum of art or a symphony to “get cultured.”  But, in a much different way, I have already been cultured and continue to experience the affects of what my culture is in nearly everything I think, say, and do.

An individualized work ethic and desire for purpose in the things I do has been ingrained into me.  I gathered a purpose-oriented mind-set from the individualized learning and studying I did at the Christian school I attended and the farm where I was raised.  With this mind-set, I get many things accomplished, but sometimes I wonder if I am not merely doing “things” for the sake of doing them.  While I enjoy people and working with them very much, if I’m not doing something or going somewhere with a purpose I feel uncomfortable and out of my “cultural zone.” Continue reading

Spring Break at the Shead Farm

The lilliputian crew on Spring Break

March 27, 1998

Spring Break

Some students have to go to a beach or some snow-swept peak to enjoy their Spring Break; others find ways to blossom in their own backyard.

Going home to the Kansas farmhouse where I spent 18 years of my life was nothing new, but taking along five friends helped chilly mornings become afternoons filled with gales of laughter and stories of our childhood memories.

The beautiful spring weather I remember from childhood decided to take its own break, so my friends and family kept wood in the furnace while winter battered at our door.  Thanks to old Jack Frost most of my family was kept home from school part of the week.  The more the merrier! Continue reading

Amish and Compulsory Education

School has been an issue which the Amish have come into conflict not with each other but with state and local governments.

In Elmer Schwieder and Dorothy Schwieder’s book A Peculiar People: Iowa’s Old Order Amish, the Schwieders document the conflicts between state officials and Amish families over the compulsory education issue. The 1960’s began a series of fines, jail terms, and court cases. In Iowa’s Buchanan County the school superintendent, J. J. Jorgensen, filed complaints against the Amish school leaders for sending their children to unapproved schools.

After a series of fines and the October 28, 1963 judgment of District Judge George Heath that the Amish are not exempt from such school requirements, the conflict rose to a rapid climax. It was the fall of 1965 when the Amish defendants refused to pay the $24 fines and it became obvious the soon Amish land would have to be confiscated and sold which would eventually ruin the area economy. Continue reading