work in progress http://blog.ivyashe.com Wed, 15 Feb 2012 05:41:41 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 Hurling: The Sport of Champions http://blog.ivyashe.com/2012/02/hurling-the-sport-of-champions/ http://blog.ivyashe.com/2012/02/hurling-the-sport-of-champions/#comments Wed, 15 Feb 2012 05:41:41 +0000 http://blog.ivyashe.com/?p=3656 The Irish History class at the high school staged a hurling game a couple weeks ago. I didn’t know a thing about this sport, other than that it’s in Irish game. It’s an odd combination of lacrosse, field hockey and baseball, and is older than all three by about a millennium. The kids made their own hurleys (sticks) in wood shop, and substituted a tennis ball for a regulation sliotar (I don’t know how to pronouce that…). I don’t think they’ll be joining a Gaelic league anytime soon…but this was very fun to photograph.

]]> http://blog.ivyashe.com/2012/02/hurling-the-sport-of-champions/feed/ 0 Middle School Basketball: In the Land of Giants http://blog.ivyashe.com/2012/02/in-the-land-of-giants/ http://blog.ivyashe.com/2012/02/in-the-land-of-giants/#comments Wed, 15 Feb 2012 04:55:50 +0000 http://blog.ivyashe.com/?p=3640 (I wish the high school gym had better lighting. Had to make these black and white because not even custom white balance was helping…)

I went to cover the middle school basketball championship games tonight. The girls’ matchup, between West Tisbury and Edgartown, was unintentionally quite funny, because half of the girls on each team had had their growth spurts…and the others hadn’t. Makes it easy to set up a defense if you have that kind of advantage to work with. It also made for this picture, which reminds me of one Vivian took at a PeeWee football game during Staff Photo:

Needless to say, Edgartown had the size advantage and thus the better defense, so they tromped West Tis. They also did a better job jazzing up their uniforms:

The boys’ game, however, was a different story. I suspect this had something to do with the more even height matchups, which made for a much more even game. Oak Bluffs, the team that didn’t even make a basket for the first five minutes of the game, rallied in the second quarter to win 31-26. Pretty exciting for middle school hoops; I mostly stopped taking photos in the second because I was trying to write down all of the back-and-forth manueverings.

I did get this shot in the second quarter, though, and it’s my favorite basketball photo I’ve ever taken (the layup didn’t go in):

West Tisbury’s coach is a woman, which I thought was very cool. She coached them to a 9-0 season before they lost this game.

Weird flash effects!

I’m very behind on blogging, and will try to get back up to speed this week…

]]> http://blog.ivyashe.com/2012/02/in-the-land-of-giants/feed/ 0 Alpacas in the Snow! http://blog.ivyashe.com/2012/01/alpacas-in-the-snow/ http://blog.ivyashe.com/2012/01/alpacas-in-the-snow/#comments Tue, 24 Jan 2012 22:53:07 +0000 http://blog.ivyashe.com/?p=3616 I’ve been wanting to photograph alpacas in the snow since I first started my part-time job at the farm, and on Sunday, after we got 7 inches of snow here, I got my chance. I spent most of my shift shoveling the parking lot and making a pathway to the far barn, and…when I finally made it to the far barn, the herd of alpacas who live there decided that would be a great time to go explore their other pasture. And then they started frolicking around in the snow. Photo magic. I couldn’t have planned it better if I’d tried.

These were all shot with my 50mm.

Frolicking! Felix (the one in the middle) is such a little hambone.

]]> http://blog.ivyashe.com/2012/01/alpacas-in-the-snow/feed/ 3 Sledding in the First Snow http://blog.ivyashe.com/2012/01/sledding-in-the-first-snow/ http://blog.ivyashe.com/2012/01/sledding-in-the-first-snow/#comments Sun, 22 Jan 2012 00:41:04 +0000 http://blog.ivyashe.com/?p=3600 If you’re a little kid (heck, even if you’re a big kid), it must be the greatest feeling in the world to have the first snow day of the year come on a weekend. Especially if it’s a snow day that really does last all day—not just some measly little flurry that barely covers the ground.

When it first started snowing, I knew I would be out feature hunting at some point, but I had no idea where the good sledding hills were. As it happened, I drove right by this one on the way to another assignment, and when that shoot was over, came back right away.

I need to get a pair of better gloves; the fingerless ones I’ve been wearing all year are fine when it’s not windy and snowing, but…I had to cut this short because my fingertips were turning purple. Oops.


I’m working at the farm tomorrow, so am hoping to have an alpacas-in-the-snow post up then!

]]> http://blog.ivyashe.com/2012/01/sledding-in-the-first-snow/feed/ 0 Winter Light at Sengekontacket http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/12/winter-light-at-sengekontacket/ http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/12/winter-light-at-sengekontacket/#comments Thu, 22 Dec 2011 19:11:47 +0000 http://blog.ivyashe.com/?p=3596

]]> http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/12/winter-light-at-sengekontacket/feed/ 2 The Brave New World of Winter Sports http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/12/the-brave-new-world-of-winter-sports/ http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/12/the-brave-new-world-of-winter-sports/#comments Tue, 20 Dec 2011 17:15:35 +0000 http://blog.ivyashe.com/?p=3583 ‘Tis the season for winter sports!

‘Tis also the season for a serious learning curve; I haven’t shot basketball since college, and have never shot hockey. I’m working with a 70-200mm f/4.0 (maybe Santa will bring me an f/2.8!), which makes things interesting. The best part (well, okay, ONE of the best parts) of shooting high school sports, though, is that nobody cares if you use your flash during games, so I can work around the poorly lit gym. Somewhat.

Hockey is proving to be the easier of the two to shoot, mostly because there’s a press booth at the rink, which saves me from having to shoot through the glass (ugh). It’s also easier for me to follow the game through my lens; in most sports cases, I don’t notice having just one eye, but I definitely think it would help to be able to see peripheral action during basketball games, so I could compose things faster. Oh well. Just something to learn to deal with.

On Saturday, all four of the varsity teams had home games (and all four of the teams won, which was pretty great. Go Vineyard!), so I was very busy running back and forth between the high school gym and the hockey rink.

 

 

 

]]> http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/12/the-brave-new-world-of-winter-sports/feed/ 0 It’s Hunting Season… http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/12/its-hunting-season/ http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/12/its-hunting-season/#comments Sat, 03 Dec 2011 03:39:49 +0000 http://blog.ivyashe.com/?p=3577 …and the deer are creeping closer to civilization/safety. Spotted this doe just outside of Oak Bluffs.

She was with her boyfriend:

 

 

]]> http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/12/its-hunting-season/feed/ 0 The Island Cup: MV 10, Nantucket 7 http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/11/the-island-cup-mv-10-nantucket-7/ http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/11/the-island-cup-mv-10-nantucket-7/#comments Fri, 25 Nov 2011 06:25:55 +0000 http://blog.ivyashe.com/?p=3548 If you have a lot of free time on your hands, my actual Island Cup article is here:


]]> http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/11/the-island-cup-mv-10-nantucket-7/feed/ 0 The Island Cup: Jr High + Jayvee http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/11/the-island-cup-jr-high-jayvee/ http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/11/the-island-cup-jr-high-jayvee/#comments Wed, 23 Nov 2011 03:14:58 +0000 http://blog.ivyashe.com/?p=3532

]]> http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/11/the-island-cup-jr-high-jayvee/feed/ 3 The Island Cup: Getting There http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/11/the-island-cup-getting-there/ http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/11/the-island-cup-getting-there/#comments Tue, 22 Nov 2011 05:00:36 +0000 http://blog.ivyashe.com/?p=3517 Each year, the final game of the MVRHS high school football season is a matchup between Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket–the “Islands” part of The Cape and Islands part of Massachusetts. The rivalry unofficially dates to the late forties, and officially became the Island Cup 33 years ago. The game site alternates between MVY and ACK (Nantucket has an odd airport code); this year, it was on Nantucket.

So on Saturday, I caught the fan boat–a Steamship Authority ferry boat chartered by the booster club specifically for this trip; I think there were about 400 passengers–over to Nantucket. I was pulling double-duty, reporting and photographing all three games (jr. high, JV, and varsity (although the latter is The Game), and was also working on a reporter’s notebook story about the fan boat itself.

It was a very long day (thirteen hours, if you include the time spent writing a web update after I got back on-Island).

But it was also a very awesome day, the kind of day that makes you love journalism even more than you already do because there are just so many stories all around.

]]> http://blog.ivyashe.com/2011/11/the-island-cup-getting-there/feed/ 0