Highlights and lowlights of an (aging) photographer

By Ed Piper, Jr.

I'm looking forward to Tuesday, Nov. 29, the opening game of the La Jolla girls basketball season at home. I'll have the same pleasure Friday, Dec. 2, with the Viking boys team's first game, which happens to be at the tournament at Hilltop High.

I love the "pure" art of being able to take photos of these young student athletes with my camera equipment. An advantage of the court sports, at least basketball, is that I can position myself in one spot for a while and enjoy taking shots without putting the burden on my aging back of moving my heavy camera, lens, and monopod around.

So, I embark on the winter sports season with mixed feelings. It has been impressed upon me very weightily--by the pain in my lower back--that I have to continue to limit my photography during La Jolla football games.

If you watched me at all the last two seasons and took stock of my location during games, you noticed that I shut off the shutter either after one quarter, partway into the second quarter, or at the latest halftime of football games.

I had to. Otherwise, I would pay a heavy price of back spasms not only that night, but increasingly the next day and Sunday, making my weekend not too restful or enjoyable.

When your back hurts, your attitude is affected.

Your back, like your legs and feet, support a lot of your body. So it plays a crucial role in movement.

I'm thankful, at the tail end of this Thanksgiving weekend, I can do the photography I do. I've commiserated with other photographers, one who a couple of years ago told me her back went completely out and she had to take a year or more off.

I emailed a sports and nature photographer I met through our family's stay at Yellowstone Park five years ago. He told me a couple of weeks ago that his back went out on a trip to Asia, and the problem lasted for four months.

So, the athletes may not be able to tell on my face, and parents and coaches might not detect it either. My opportunities for shooting photos of LJHS sports are decreasing as the school years pass by. I would do a lot better if I only shot basketball, baseball, soccer, lacrosse, field hockey, and water polo, among others (I do golf, too), and avoided football.

Football is the only sport in which the two teams line up and move forward on the field--necessitating my carrying my equipment down the field. I tried last year staying in one spot. You might remember my days in a wheelchair, when I had blisters on my feet. That was hilarious.

What I found, though, was that I wasn't going home with any useable shots. The athletes were too far away to make the photos croppable and useable.

I continue to do football, despite the physical price I pay, because Friday night games bring the most people together: football players, their families and friends, the cheerleaders, the band, and the community. Football gets, by far, the most attention per game of any sport I know of.

So, when you see me this winter sports season, you'll see me enjoying plopping in one spot, whether it's basketball, soccer, or wrestling. Then I try to pack everything into my rolling case before repositioning myself somewhere else on the sidelines.

I'm glad I'm still doing it after 13 seasons.