My Photos: Winter Storm hits the University of Missouri

Photography, unlike any other medium, can freeze moments in time and tell powerful stories. Apart from doing broadcast news, which is my first choice for story telling, I love photography. This past Friday when a winter storm hit the Columbia campus at the University of Missouri, I went out and captured some stills. Enjoy the show!

Camera Lens 101-Things You Should Know or at Least be Familiar with When Buying a Camera lens

If you are interested in purchasing a really nice camera, there are a few things you should know before you do. Below are some important camera basics to understand so you are a savvy shopper and get the most bang for your buck.

Camera Lenses 101

When it comes to D-SLRs the camera body is one thing and the lens is another. There are two really important aspects when purchasing a lens

1) the mm (millimeters) and

2) the aperture.

Understanding "mm vs zoom": video cameras use "zoom," still camera lenses use "mm"

When it comes to still cameras, the lens "mm" is the zoom. Your eye sees at "50mm" fixed. So 18mm is zoomed further out then your eye sees things. This is great for making a small room look big or taking a picture of a big item without having to walk really far away from it. 135mm could be described as more than double the closeness that your eye sees. Objects will appear much closer and much larger then what your eye sees. (Most outdoor portraits of people are taken at 100mm or more so that the background is out of focus and looks nice.) If you are trying to convert mm to zoom I have heard that you can divide the the mm range to get the zoom. For example 18-135mm lens would be 135/18 or 7.5x zoom. I don't know how accurate that conversion is, but it gives you an idea.

Understanding Camera Apertures: Aperture 101

Aperture is the size of the hole that lets light into the camera. It is a fraction, so it is one divided by the number. The smaller the number the bigger the hole. 1.4f is among the largest possible and is about the size of a 50 cent piece. 29f is about as small as possible about the size of a needle head. Lenses are numbered by the largest possible aperture they can have. That means a 1.4f lens (big aperture) can get as small as a 29 aperture, but you can't have a 5.6f lens (moderate aperture) be a 1.4f. If that doesn't makes sense, don't worry, just keep reading. Remember aperture is a fraction so the smaller the number the bigger the hole and it works exponentially. 1.4f is several times larger than a 3.5f which is several times bigger than a 5.6f.

Things to remember:

1.4 is a huge aperture

5.6 is moderate.  It is nothing to write home about but will work in well-lit areas. Outside 5.6f can take a great picture anywhere...until night time.

Most lenses aren't smaller than 5.6, except perhaps some really huge zoom lenses. Really huge zoom lenses are like 70-200mm or 300mm. This could be good for sports if it is outside and really bright. However, the lens can be really heavy, really big, and often their aperture is small unless you spend thousands of dollars.

A lot of lenses now a days adjust like the one described at the top (18-135mm 3.5-5.6f). That means at 18mm zoomed all the way out the largest aperture possible is 3.5. When I zoom in the largest aperture possible will only be 5.6.

The Budget Crunch, Reflecting on Journalism

Great journalism takes heated, complex issues and simplifies them so individuals can make informed decisions.

Neal Conan, NPR

NPR's Talk of the Nation with Neal Conan yesterday focused on the purposed Federal budget cuts specifically on the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). Besides open debate, argument and reasoning, what made this program stand out as good journalism is the way the topic was handled. NPR is publicly supported by the tax money that is purposed to be cut, yet the program presented good arguments with many perspectives from both sides of the issue.

The program covered concrete facts, and let people voice key opinions. Conan read emails and tweets. People called in to express their ideas. All this in addition to having three key leaders interviewed on the show: Tom Rosenstiel, Doug Lamborn and Earl Blumenauer. Each was given equal time. The program is so polished it makes journalism look easy, but it's not.

Below are some my notes of the arguments presented both for and against using tax money to fund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Earl Blumenauer D-OR 3rd D.

Arguments to Keep CPB's Budget

• CPB educates people.
• No other commercial news organizations cover foreign affairs as throughly.
• The content found on public radio isn't found on commercial stations.
• CPB Provides essential infrastructure to help educate, engage voters.
• CPB facilitates national dialog.
• Start by cutting big fish and worry about the small ones later.
• Cutting smaller programs will give a false sense of real fiscal improvements.
• Republicans simply cutting its budget because of its political ideology.

Doug Lamborn R-CO 5th D.

Arguments to Cut CPB's Budget

• Budget cuts must start somewhere.
• Budget cuts won't eliminate CPB.
• Everyone needs to give.
• Taxpayers can't pay for everything.
• If private sector can't sustain it then maybe it isn't worth keeping.
• CPB can find new sources of revenue.
• CPB might not be the national treasure that some people think it is.
• Others are also giving up things they don't want to loose.

Tom Rosenstiel, PEW Research

The Facts

• CPB receives $430 million each year from tax payers of which 75% goes toward public television and 25% to public radio.
• About 10% of NPRs budget comes from tax money.
• U.S. government spending a $1.6 trillion dollar deffecite just this year.
• U.S. national debt at $14 trillion dollars.
• Commercial television news (ABC, CBS, NBC) audience is half compared to what it was 20 years ago and so it's their staff.
• More poeple listen to NPR than all those who watch the major national newscasts.
• If CPB's budget does lose federal tax money smaller rural areas will be hurt the most.
• About 27 million people listen to NPR each week.
• About 20 million people watch the network evening news.
• More people listen to NPR than perhaps any other individual news outlet.

Conclusion

This piece is an excellent example of journalism. It is a touchy subject reported in such a way that each side is represented fairly. Balance and accuracy is crucial to good journalism. I think the piece encourages great journalism. If NPR can cover it's own potential budget cuts without losing objectivity then so should every reporter. Great journalists take heated, complex issues and simplify them so individuals can make informed decisions.

The Story Behind the Story: Blizzard Hits Mid-Missouri, Empties Grocery Stores

Sometimes the best stories are the ones that come crashing down on us when we are searching in a different direction. 

It was a Monday morning, and I had contemplated story ideas all weekend long when I finally decided on one I liked. It involved the Missouri State Auditor's office. I lined up my interviews and headed off to work where I found everyone talking about a blizzard that was supposed to hit town and interrupt everything.

One dedicated shopper fights against 18-mile-per-hour
winds to return his cart to the store.

As any good journalist, I was a little skeptical. There have been times when forecasters predicted tons of snow and none came. There have also been times when forecasters predicted an inch or two that turned into 10 or 12. I decided to take a video camera home just in case.

First came the freezing rain, then negative temperatures combined with 18-mph wind gusts, and it was all topped by 18-20 inches of snow. In less than a day the region went from cold to crippled. In Minnesota this would not be news, but it definitely was in Columbia, Mo.

MODOT truck plows through the intersection of Nifong and Providence.

Driving to the state capital, 30 miles away, was not possible. Even if I could get there, no one would be there to interview but I still needed a story. I found myself fascinated at the sheer amount of snow that covered the community.  I decided to do what all journalists in town were doing: a snow story. But I would need a unique angle, something fresh. Everyone knew it was snowing, icy, and cold, but few were daring enough to go out in it.

I decided to scout around with my still camera and see what I could find. The photos on this page were taken while I was scouting. I didn't find too many people out. Most of those outdoors were workers busy clearing streets and keeping parking lots cleared. However, I did find some people shopping at grocery stores. To my surprise, most were not getting milk and bread, but instead buying alcohol. This is an interesting angle, and it led to my story.

Some without four-wheel drive walk home after buying groceries. 

Questions lead to reporting. These are some of the questions I asked myself as I started thinking about the story. What types of vehicals were people driving in the snow? How are grocery stores impacted by the snow? When there is a blizzard in town, what do people buy? I answer all of these in my video story that you can find at the bottom of the page.

Reporting is an adventure. The outcome is never certain. Often there are twists and turns along the way. The only thing for sure is that at the end of the day the story has to air, whatever that story may be. Journalists need to be versatile. It is important to plan ahead and have a great story lined up, but if snow starts falling, cars start sliding, and the town shuts down then that's your story.

Watch the video below to see the piece. It is worth your time.

Aperture, ISO and Shutter Speed 101

Light is everything in photography.

There are three things that affect the amount of light when a picture is taken. Below is some basic information everyone should know and understand about photography and picture taking.

1) Aperture- how big the hole is that lets the light in the camera.
2) ISO- "film sensitivity", the larger the number the more "sensitive" and the faster a shot will expose.
3) Shutter speed- how long the hole is open to let light in.

Besides affecting light each item affects other things so the best photos are a good combination of each.

Aperture

1) Aperture affects depth of field-how much of the picture is in focus. Think of a hose with water running out of it. By itself the water doesn't go very far. Similarly with a large aperture 1.4 a very shallow amount of the picture will be in focus. But if you cover the hole of a garden hose with your thumb, the water goes much much further. This is like a 5.6 or greater aperture. Much more of the picture will be in focus.

ISO

2) Traditional cameras had an "ISO of 100." This is the base. Today digital cameras can go as far as 6400. This is huge, but the higher the number the more grainy a picture will look, or the more visible grain you will see. Some people really like the grain others don't. The numbers double each setting so it goes 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200, etc.

Shutter Speed

3) Apart from the amount of time light can get in the camera, shutter speed also affects how much blur a photo has. For example The river shots you have seen where the water is all fuzzy and silky was exposed for a long period of time perhaps 5-30 seconds. It is easy and fun to do things like this. However if you are filming dancing or sports you want the person to be crisp and not blurry. This might mean that you need an exposure of 1/640th of a second. That is why the aperture can be so important.