ENVIRONMENTAL - ROB CORPUZ

BRIGHT MINDS AT WORK - Washington, DC, USA I've got a question about this photo, but first, some background… I took this shot as a gift for my friend Michael (the subject of this photo) and his father, who was one of my many remarkable professors at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, USA. I had noticed on a previous visit to Michael's place in Washington, D.C. that he's got a wonderful picture of his father, which you can see on the wall in this photo. Michael's dad introduced me to one of my favorite books "A Soldier of the Great War," by Mark Helprin. This book, and Professor Klein's class discussions concerning it, as well as the (admittedly) pathetic essay that I attempted to concoct about it, were instrumental in shaping my view of the world. As such, I was pleased to have the opportunity to express my gratitude for this enlightenment. If I were a father, I thought, wouldn't it be nice to receive, as a gift, a photo of my son that echoes the spirit of the image of me which my son chooses to see every day? The idea of taking this shot was born, partly, out of guilt: in the spring of 2010, because of circumstances entirely out of my control, I happened to intrude on Michael's hospitality at the absolute worst possible time: I needed a place to stay at the last minute for a long weekend in D.C. in order to acquire Russian travel documents that, due to the powerful and temperamental Russian bureaucracy gods, were suddenly unavailable at the New York embassy. Michael was, simultaneously, hosting the family of his lovely girlfriend at his apartment which, while cozy and comfortable in every sense of the word, is not, having one main room, particularly suitable for hosting loads of people. So, I decided to try and redeem myself for imposing at such an inconvenient time by trying to take a photo of Michael that would resonate the quality of that original image of his father, which I fully admit is far better than mine. In it, the professor sits at his desk, hunched studiously over his computer, with daylight streaming in from the window illuminating a charmingly disordered array of books and papers piled on his desk: a perfectly captured portrait of an intellectual fully immersed in his work. My interpretation of this photo isn't nearly as good but, at least, I feel it does capture the essence of a thinking man mulling things over. If one believes a desk is an extension of one's mind, Michael's desk does tell a tale: the Kenyon College baseball cap tossed casually in the corner, a symbol of his ability to problem-solve and the loyalty toward the institution which helped teach him to do so, the old nalgene water bottle suggesting an awareness of environmental and social issues, which his history with the Peace Corps and Habitat for Humanity can surely attest to, the various post-it notes stuck here and there suggesting a less-than-perfect memory that often walks hand-in-hand with genius, the conspicuously absent shoes, and the open cupboard door revealing a roll of duct tape, with which one is almost certainly prepared for any foreseeable physical challenge. Michael eyes assess any such challenges clearly, albeit through shockingly strong contact lenses, and give off the kind of sparkling blue that would normally be disarmingly piercing, if your own eyes weren't already squinting from the blinding gleam reflecting off of his lustrous head. I suspect this is why he usually wears that Kenyon hat. The baldness wasn't always present, of course… his hairline didn't begin receding until approximately the age of eight. I initially met Michael during my very first class at university, when his hairline, while retreating, was still stubbornly hanging on for dear life. If memory serves me correctly, when I walked into that first class, Michael was sitting, not actually in a chair, but on top of one, with his feet placed rebelliously where the buttocks were designed to be, and his arse perched entirely un-precariously on the back of it, wearing his trademark faded blue jeans, white T-shirt, black leather jacket, red bandana (to disguise his thinning hair), and prickly beard (which even he would later acknowledge had been a serious miscalculation, as far as the ladies were concerned). We were not to become really close friends until over two years later, when I was invited on a cross-country spring break road trip mainly because another friend of his had dropped out and they required a fourth person to split gas expenses. But close friends we became, and that bond has persisted over the years, in spite of the usual tendency for youthful friendships to fade as the realities of life march steadily forward, with Michael moving on to bigger things as an attorney currently specializing in veteran's benefits, and me moving on to… well… things. During this shoot I took other frames of Michael facing away from the camera, like his father in the original photo, but I eventually chose this version because I felt it was important to show his expression, which, because Michael was actually engrossed in his work at the time, is an accurate representation of his thinking face, one which those who know his father would recognize immediately. I don't know exactly what was occupying Michael's engorged brain at this moment, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if the extrapolation of his thoughts would somehow make the world a better place. The philosophical question which I was referring to at the beginning of this caption involves the the fact that the photograph of Michael's father hanging on the wall in my image is faked: I took a separate shot of the printed photo and used Photoshop to digitally insert it much later. Those of you who sensed that something was not quite right about that picture can now pat yourselves on your backs. Almost as soon as I arrived at Michael's office for our photo shoot, I realized that we definitely should have brought the framed picture of his father with us to place on the desk as part of the composition and provide a reference point, but circumstances dictated that going back to retrieve it was totally impractical at the time. Since I was stupid enough not to figure out in advance that I should've included the original picture in this photo, I was faced with the dilemma of either excluding it entirely, which would render the image incomplete, as far as I was concerned, or editing it in after the fact, which wouldn't be faithful to reality. As you can see, I eventually decided to include a photoshopped shot of the snap of Michael's father on the wall within this photo (complete with contrived curved edges and feigned shadows) and I'm curious as to whether you, the viewer, think this was an acceptable or totally stupid idea. Please feel free to leave a comment telling me what you think. And while I'm interested to know what others see in this photo, I can't help but see a son who, although he's forged his own path through life, still displays attributes of his father: a scholar whose luminescent head enlightens the minds of those around him. P.S. Although this shot is lit almost entirely with strobes, I didn't want the lighting to draw attention to itself, and thus the on-camera ring light, the flash behind the wall bounced off the ceiling, and the hidden speedlite behind the cabinet illuminating Michael's face, were used to create depth and shaping, to enable a sufficiently large aperture for overall sharpness, and to overpower the existing, greenish quality of the fluorescent ambient light which human vision conveniently sees as white in person but, in photos, registers as pure ugly. P.S.S. It took great restraint on my part not to refer to Michael as "Shark," which is the only name by which I have known him, for as long as I have known him, for reasons that have faded from memory… but it's worth noting that the fact that "Shark" would eventually become a lawyer is purely a coincidence.

NOA - Honolulu, Hawai'i, USA I should've shot this on a basketball court. As beautiful as Hawai'i is, a dark, musty gym or an outdoor court with asphalt under his shoes and a net-less rim above his head would've been a much more appropriate setting for a portrait of my friend Noa, who I've known longer than anyone I'm not actually related to. Noa has basketball in his blood. As kids, he and I bonded over our mutual obsession with the game (and the L.A. Lakers), and we were both coached by his Dad: a tough, gruff, no-nonsense, yet caring man who both inspired and intimidated me. I busted my butt in practice partly because I wanted to improve, but mostly because the thought of disappointing Coach Kellett was unthinkable. Of course, like any Dad who coaches his son, Noa's dad was harder on him than the rest of us, and Noa responded by being the literal center and heart of our team, dominating the opposition in the paint in every game. Even way back then, I had no doubt whatsoever that Noa would one day be a coach too, and like his father, he's devoted his entire life to helping kids who grow up in underprivileged neighborhoods to stay off the streets and out of trouble by keeping them on the basketball court. I wasn't underprivileged, but my parents worked hard to provide for my brothers and me, and I know there were times when, if one of my folks got sick, we would've been in big trouble. They've never owned a new car or gone on vacations other than rare trips to visit family, because they were saving up to make sure their children were taken care of, and even more importantly, I never doubted for one second that I was loved. I also worked for a while in a group home for troubled youth, an experience which deepened my appreciation for what Noa and his Dad do every day for those who have much less than I did growing up. You can read more about Noa and his wonderful family here: http://archives.starbulletin.com/content/20090524_family_finds_mission_at_ymca For every professional athlete, there are a million kids like me, who fantasized about becoming one but didn't possess the gifts to make it happen, and thousands who might have had a shot at it but didn't have luck on their side. Regardless, the opportunity to compete in team sports reaps enormous benefits. Whether you're playing full-court, five-on-five for the N.B.A. championship, or half-court, two-on-two on the slanted pavement outside your buddy's garage, the goal is simple: your side needs to put the bouncy sphere through the high circle more times than the other side can. Every sport can be whittled down to similarly basic elements. And when you're in "the zone," whatever problems and complications that exist off the court melt away, and until that game clock ticks down to zeroes or somebody reaches 21, life becomes pretty focused: you're united with the rest of your team in that one, common goal, albeit with an infinite number of variations available to achieve it. For a little while, you forget about everything else except what you can do to help your team succeed. Admittedly, the beauty and grace of good basketball has been tainted by the commercialization of the sport, as demonstrated by the professional basketball lock-out of 2011, with owners and players bickering over how to split up millions upon millions of dollars of profit, and I readily agree that in an ideal world, it would make sense for people who directly save lives to be paid more than athletes, but it would be a mistake to dismiss basketball, or sports in general, as a frivolous, empty activity. Young people enamored with a sport are inspired by those who play it at the top of their game, and that inspiration allows guys like Noa and his Dad to channel that energy, teaching them about the value of hard work, practice, camaraderie, working with others, self-improvement, and building memories. While a series of consecutive injuries (two ACLs shattered, meniscus torn, shins splintered, finger dislocated, and more ankle sprains than I care to remember) led me to "retire" from my entirely unremarkable career as a basketball player, the experience rewarded me with many cherished memories: I can still remember the endless squeak of rubber on hardwood, the beautiful sound of a ball I shot hitting nothing but net and the attempt to appear nonchalant while strutting back to play defense and hoping that my parents in the bleachers (along with that cute girl from English class) were watching, the inside jokes with the guys during the bus ride home after a victory, getting reamed by the coach in the locker room after an embarrassing defeat, the simple joy of hearing the two most beloved words that a coach can utter during a practice ("water break"), the strange pleasure taken from having every muscle and joint in my body be totally exhausted and screaming in pain, the feeling of copious amounts of sweat pouring into my eyes and being too drained to wipe it away, the tears after getting cut from the team, the satisfaction of finally getting to wear Magic Johnson's jersey number as a high school senior, the adrenaline rush of knowing that, with a few seconds left on the clock during a tight game, we were all going to be either ecstatic or miserable very, very soon... During actual games, I spent a lot of time sitting on the bench cheering for my more talented teammates, and I understand now that my body was never designed to play basketball. Any brief escape from mediocre play resulted partly from my own stubbornness but mostly from the efforts of guys like James, Byron, Duane, Gary, Allen, Dave, Mike, Dick and others: all coaches I had, who, like Noa's dad, would accept nothing less than my best effort. While Noa and I do touch base every now and then, I hadn't seen him in ages, so I was excited to meet for lunch when I was back home for a visit. We talked about Kareem and Magic and Shaq and Kobe for a bit, but we talked more about the passage of time and our fathers and love and hopes for the future. With good friends, even if time and distance has kept you apart, when you meet you focus on what's important. Naturally, I brought my photo gear along and insisted on doing a portrait. We didn't have a lot of time, but the lovely Ala Moana Beach Park was only a few minutes walk away, and I picked a spot and angle with a pleasant backdrop where I could augment the sun coming from over his shoulder with supplemental lighting. Almost immediately I realized that there should've been a basketball in the shot somewhere, but since that wasn't an option at the time, I moved on, doing some standard shots of Noa flashing a shaka (Hawaiian hand signal for all things good) along with his big, contagious smile, but when I asked him to imagine he was coaching his kids, I knew I had something interesting. Yes, I know he's squinting, and the fact that he was staring into a big PLM umbrella reflecting the sun right back into his face was certainly a factor, but I've seen that look on both his and his Dad's face before. It's the look of his gears turning, of analyzing the problem at hand and searching for the right combination of solutions. Of finding the right compromise between letting his gifted players run with it and putting his bench players in at a time when they have the chance to accomplish something they'll remember their entire lives. It makes me smile to know that my friend Noa is out there giving kids the tools they need to become winners, both on and off the court.