©2010 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
T Bone Burnett won his first Oscar last night, for Best Original Song from”Crazy Heart”. Walking onstage, the gentlemanly Burnett was wearing his familiar sunglasses and signature dark suit. His dark outfit made for an interesting image in the alley of the Vic Theater in Chicago when I was assigned to take his portrait on one of his visits. I was grateful for the light in the alley that day. It was one of those moments when the sun was out, and the light was skimming the surface of the bricks. You hope your subject is available before the light changes, or clouds move in. The lighting seemed appropriate. At the time, he was coming out with his first album in 14 years, so I offered the theme of “emerging from shadows” back at the office. Even with a portrait, you try to tell a story.
©2010 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
Members of a high school academy rugby team mix it up during a scrimmage at Garfield Park on an early morning before school. I came upon it while driving around for features. The scene had all the makings of the kind of crazy-rough-ball-chasing-crazy-blizzard pictures that one hopes for in a sports picture, so I was delighted when it started and a little bummed when the scrimmage itself ended after about five-ten minutes. But after an hour of drills, the kids were fuh-fuh-fuh-reeeeezing, so I was glad to see they would be getting some warm relief – even though it was to the expense of more dramatic snow pictures…
©2010 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
A commuter walks among the 9-foot tall cast iron legs of “Agora” a public art installation at Michigan Avenue and Roosevelt Roads. I’ve seen this several times, but didn’t see a time in which a photo could work really well. I passed by it this morning and for the first time saw that commuters had forged a path between the legs. Shooting at eye level would have been a bit pedestrian, so I laid down in snow when I saw a commuter coming around the bend. People are such good sports. I got up covered in snow and asked for her name for the paper. I’m sure I was quite the sight, but it never ceases to amaze me how little I have to explain before complete strangers tell me what their name is and what they’re up to. In this case, maybe there was some sympathy for the photographer at work…
©2010 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
Naperville skater Evan Lysacek appeared here previously in a collection of other portraits of Olympic hopefuls, but I didn’t make any comment about his photo. Now that he rocked the Olympics by being the first U.S. man to win a gold medal in skating since 1988, I thought I’d post some specifics. In that post, I described some technical details on how the photos were supposed to look, but the look he was creating was one of focused intensity. I’m not exaggerating or lassoing a star when I say that of the seventy-some athletes I shot during those three days, Lysacek was the one whose intensity stood out. I was actually a bit startled by it. Maybe it was his eyebrows and tightly clenched jaw, or his dark eyes and quite demeanor – or all of that. As you look at his photo, especially the one at left, remember that he’s facing me and a crazy crowd of activity behind me – photographers, agents, athletes, etc.. all bumping into each other and creating a raucous roar. Some athletes handled that by being funny or irreverent. Some appeared a bit tired or distracted. Lysacek stood in and quickly stared at me with such concentration, I knew he was focusing more on the picture than I was.
©2010 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
Legendary Chicago Bears coach Mike Ditka made an appearance in a Boost mobile ad during yesterday’s Super Bowl, in which his (one-time) New Orleans Saints went marching out with a victory. 25 years after he led the Chicago Bears to a raucous Superbowl win, Da Coach still is the man for many Bears fans. My one portrait of him was not made in a studio with an art director, agents, and assistants scurrying around serving everyone’s needs over a sumptuous buffet, with 3-4 setups ready to go. As with most newspaper portraits, this shoot was no-frills – it lasted about 45 seconds in the corner of his steakhouse right after an interview. I had two direct flashes pointed directly at him from both sides – why would you put a softbox on a gritty character like Ditka? A few frames, and then he had to go. Of the many quickie portraits I’ve made of famous people, this one worked out better than most.
©2010 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
This scene at Montrose Harbor along the lakefront was visible to me and several other motorists who watched from their cars the goings on of a large collection of birds. You could say it was like a drive-in theater showing of “Animal Kingdom”…
©2009 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
Christmas Eve was a bit busy, so I didn’t have a chance to post this photo from a shoot at Meigs Field, er…Northerly Island. There was a very cool display of ice covering vegetation everywhere you looked, a few images of which you can see in a Trib online photo gallery. In the end I chose this one to post because of the eye-popping red, but also because I keep getting the thought that if trees were able to grow chocolate-covered berries, this scene would make for an interesting picture, but an even better dessert. Some really stunning winter pictures, especially of a tree bent over by ice, can be seen at this Chicago winter classics gallery.
©2009 Alex Garcia
“You know, there’s ZERO visibility up there”….”Zero visibility, you know that sir”…”Zero visibility today. Can’t see anything. Nothing”. By the time I got past the three different employees who warned me that there was nothing to see at the top of the Willis Tower on a foggy day, you begin to feel that your public persona is either that of a fool, or of a person on a suspicious mission. I just wanted to see whether there was any possibility of photographing building tops through the shifting cloudbanks. As it turned out, I had some company up there – a smattering of visitors from around the world, who probably had one afternoon to see the Willis Tower and this was it. Some of them may have realized this, but if you can get beyond the fears of being that high up, enveloped in a cloud that obscures the vision much like darkness, it can turn a sightseeing attraction into a contemplative moment.
©2009 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
On a previous post you saw the scene where I photographed quickie portraits of Olympic hopefuls in Chicago at the Palmer House in a room crowded with athletes and other photographers. These were some of the more interesting photos from the bunch. I shot all of them in a vertical format with a tilt-shift lens while using a ringflash. Just a little cumbersome, especially when you only have a couple minutes of shooting time. I also wanted to create a cyan-bluish tone to the images, to create a sense of winter cold. To do so, I used a cyan colored background. The reason it appears white in the photos is because I overexposed it. The white then dissolved into a cyan as the light fell off the subjects – creating a cold edge. It’s a slight effect. You can see that more in the images of athletes wearing dark colors, or in the duo at bottom. All in all, I enjoyed the process. I was really struck at how the personas of the athletes tended to come out in their pictures, especially among those who have participated in previous Olympics. I also could see how those personas might possibly outlive their Olympic experiences and endear them to millions around the world.
©2009 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
I’m on antibiotics and cough syrup shooting rainy day photos. I’m feeling just Grand…:-)
©2009 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
Actor-director-filmmaker Kevin Smith is back in the news with a new book, so I thought his fans might appreciate this portrait of him from a couple years ago that never made it into our family newspaper. If you know his work, you might say “That’s him alright”:-) When it was time for a photo after his hotel interview was completed, it was Smith who suggested sitting on the toilet with his pants down for a picture. I didn’t even know what to say except, “uh..great!” As a photographer shooting visiting celebrities, it’s challenging to make a celebrity portrait look like it wasn’t taken in a hotel room with a 2 minute timer ticking. In all my brainstorms, I can honestly say I hadn’t ever thought of asking a celebrity to “drop trou”. Suffice to say it was a very unusual moment.
©2009 Alex Garcia
Oh, I didn’t let the fun and games at the pumpkin farm fool me. Yes, there was a smorgasbord of wholesome fun to be had this weekend, including an inflatable trampoline, a petting zoo, hay bales galore and all the wonderful non-scary fun of Midwest Americana. But when my little-big-boy got on board that tractor, it was clear he was getting down to business in choosing a career. As far as I can tell, it will involve wheels – big wheels. I’m guessing either pumpkin farmer, race car driver, monster truck driver, or even Hot Wheels brand manager. I don’t believe I steered him towards his interest in loud, noisy, powerful engines, but if you consider his sources of inspiration around our house, “Roary the Racing Car”, toy construction trucks, and Lightning McQueen, it seems that he’s got enough positive reinforcement to last him until he graduates to rocket boosters…
©2009 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
In this photoblog’s attempt to help you appear informed and city-wise at any cocktail party, I submit to you the perfect name to be casually dropped in conversation: Adrian Smith. His influence at helping make Chicago a great city far outweighs his name recognition. He’s the architect for the renovation of State Street, the basic outlines of Millennium Park, the NBC and AT&T buildings and the soon-to-be-completed Trump International Hotel & Tower, at right. He also designed the plans for the world’s tallest building building in Dubai, which will be the tallest in all four categories in which buildings are measured. When I met him in his office at left, he had a cornucopia of imaginative models for buildings, which took a while to light to get the right reflection in the tall model at left. The reflection at right came from a much bigger light:-) Architects like Smith help make the city of Chicago known not only as the “City of Broad Shoulders” but also the “City of Broad Imaginations”…
©2009 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
This week, the Tribune ran an obituary on an 89 year-old Chicagoan who I was sad to see pass. As we wrote, “Lawrence Pucci was one of the last remaining master tailors from a bygone era of American style. A proud, lifelong Chicago resident and booster, Mr. Pucci custom-made exquisite, hand-stitched suits that were sought out by the rich and the powerful. Household names including former Bears owner George Halas, Hollywood stars Dean Martin and James Mason and musician Victor Borge were among his customers…” When I photographed him on Michigan Avenue, I was struck by how much of an ambassador he was not just for Michigan Avenue and the city, but for that bygone era so far removed from my world of blue jeans and casual shirts. I’m not one for sartorial flair, but if you were to spend time with Mr. Pucci you would see it wasn’t about an expensive suit but about the whole essence of dressing, acting and being the polite and refined gentleman. It wasn’t just a style, but a world view. Since meeting him years ago, I still carry a greater appreciation for the formality of an era that our world has long since passed by.
2009 Chicago Tribune/Alex Garcia
I was assigned to shoot Tracy Letts, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning play “August: Osage County”, at the Steppenwolf Theatre for the L.A. Times. Happily, this wasn’t just a 5-minutes-and-you’re-out-bada-bing shoot. I actually was able to scout around to find an interesting place and to shoot different situations. Originally I thought the mood should be dark – consistent with the serious intensity of the play and playwright. But I was told his most recent play was a comedy-drama so maybe upbeat would be more current. So my favorite combined a serious look with upbeat colors. It was all ambient. The hot lights with the theatrical flair was track lighting that happened to be in a lounge area. His face and side wall were lit from window daylight (which explains the blue strip at left). The red wall happened to be there. I had brought a ton of lighting gear with me, and was itching to use them. But although I tried to push them into the shoot, this picture would have none of it. Who am I to argue with the picture?
©Chicago Tribune
I finally used a Canon underwater camera housing to take photos at the Crown Fountain. It was an idea that I have been considering for awhile, but was waiting for hot weather to get into the news. Whenever I’ve been out at the park before, I’ve been relunctant to get into the thick of the action because splashing water + wild children + a $6500 digital camera = trip to the photo director’s office. But with the housing, my credentials (to show parents), and a spare change of clothes, I was the emboldened feature photographer. Of course, I couldn’t see a thing while taking pictures - it was mostly all about strategic placement and blind faith. An hour or so later, this was the best picture that emerged from the frenzy.
Just another rainy day at Lollapalooza and a set of strange experiences to go along with… Have you ever stood right up next to a bank of speakers screaming at full throttle? My skin was actually pulsating. Every couple minutes, I had to walk past the edge of the speakers to avoid nausea. I always carry earplugs, so I was prepared for hearing loss, at least… Afterwards, I couldn’t find a dry place to transmit my photos so I ended up covering myself and my laptop with a poncho under a tree. It was leaking like a drippy roof, and I’m sure people were wondering what kind of psychedelic experience that guy was having hunched over in the corner next to the portable toilets…
Normally if I were to take a portrait of a person and their dog, I would not sit them down in the middle of the street and ask them to turn away from me. Especially if the person is a police officer. In fact, I’m sure he thought it was a bit strange for me to make that request. But the concept was being together on the road of life. In the course of a pay squabble with his department, Bradford signed away his rights to pursue claims for back pay in order to keep “Doc”, a Belgian Malinois, who he felt was being used as a bargaining chip. Typically, police dogs are given to their owners after the dogs are retired from service because it is too hard to retrain them to work with others. For him, not being allowed to keep Doc was too much to bear. So there was something of a cinematic end to their story. A loyalty tested and a bond that was saved through sacrifice. I imagine this picture as the closing scene where Bradford turns towards Doc and says, “it’s just you and me, kid….”
I thought many of you might appreciate an inside view of the control room of the famous Buckingham Fountain. The Park District is giving paid tours of the fountain, so you can say this photo blog has just saved you $50 by showing you the “money shot”:-)! Of course, you don’t get to see the boiler room and you can’t turn the levers, either… The fountain has seen better days – it is undergoing a three-phase renovation, and is clearly desperate to drum up more funds. It’s also in the shadow of Millennium Park’s Crown Fountain (y’know, the one that spits water) which has ignited the imagination and delight of Chicagoans. Being the age of interactivity, the Old World-style Buckingham has clearly lost its grip on the city’s enthrall – and I don’t think any amount of “Married With Children” reruns and its Buckingham cameos will change that anytime soon…
It’s not often that I photograph someone who can accurately guess the shutter speed of my camera by simply hearing the click. But such is the attention to technical detail of NASA’s chief scientist John Grunsfeld, a Chicago-born astronaut who repaired the Hubble Space Telescope and who the Tribune profiled this past Sunday. Immediately after his slide presentation at the Adler Planetarium, I was to shoot a cover photo that was more interesting than a guy standing next to a museum exhibit. Pressed for time, we quickly entered the Atwood Sphere, an interactive exhibit, and while a docent held an off-camera flash, I used a tripod and a long exposure to capture the spinning sphere that shows the night sky. It was a bit of a calculated gamble, since we only had time for about 10 frames, and there wasn’t a lot of time for testing. At first I tried light-painting, but there was too much movement on our mechanical platform. Given that his grandfather helped design the dome of the Planetarium building, there was a palpable sense that history and astronomy had come full circle for the Grunsfeld clan.
