Graduate Level Training

People might get the idea I spend a lot of time at the Army's National Training Center at Fort Irwin, usually a couple trips a year, they just happened to be now. I suppose it helps that the NTC is in San Bernardino County like The Sun Newspaper. This event was special because often I hear on assignments, "You should have been here for this or that" or "Next week we will do this." It gets a little frustrating knowing you missed the best photo opportunity. This time it worked out. Unlike the first day, (the week before), where I shot about 700 images (and used 8 in 2 papers) this time I shot 1,300 pics and we used 4. That is the nature of the paper biz. Luckily the Internet has my back. This assignment was a challenge because when there are so many subjects to photograph one may have the feeling that they are missing something else. My philosophy is, I am exactly where I am supposed to be and I will make the best picture I can, here and now.



With the mind-numbing and ear-piercing rattle of machine gun fire bouncing off the steel-walled shipping container "buildings." It made it a bit harder to concentrate on pictures, but also added to the excitement. I kept thinking how glad I was that no one was using real bullets.


Thanks to AnnJohansson.com for the pic of me (standing around doing nothing) during a "car bomb" attack on the village ;)