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January 31, 2008
Overtime Victory By Caps Over Canadiens Is Sweet Revenge
Tonight's game felt like a playoff, with the crowd on their feet chanting and stomping. Alex Ovechkin also had a great night scoring 4 of Washington's five goals tonight in their grudge match against the Montreal Canadiens.

WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 31: Alex Ovechkin of the Washington Capitals scores the game winning goal in overtime against goalie Cristobal Huet of the Montreal Canadiens during a NHL hockey game on January 31, 2008 at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC. (Photo by Allen Clark/OffWing)

WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 31: The Washington Capitals celebrate following their overtime win over the Montreal Canadiens during a NHL hockey game on January 31, 2008 at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC. (Photo by Allen Clark/OffWing)

WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 31: Sergei Kastsitsyn of the Montreal Canadiens scores a goal during the second period against goalie Olie Kolzig of the Washington Capitals and during a NHL hockey game on January 31, 2008 at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC. (Photo by Allen Clark/OffWing)
See more photos from the game soon by visiting our Photoshelter gallery or our Flickr gallery.
If you are a blogger and would like to use our photographs please contact us.
Posted by Allen Clark at 10:35 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
January 29, 2008
All The Possibilities
Today we are inviting you into OffWing's labs. Our experiment uses Soundslides, which is used by many different organizations and very popular among newspapers.
When we cover a game we will select to provide you with only our very best pictures, typically that means about 4-8 photographs. The following slideshow includes 168 pictures with a soundtrack. The photos come from an earlier shoot this past fall at the Virginia International Raceway.
The slideshow includes photos that would not ordinarily stand on its own, however as part of a larger package it all works...I think. We are considering other options as well, including YouTube and a PodShow format. Please let us know what you think.
How would you like your OffWing served up?
Posted by Allen Clark at 11:13 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
January 27, 2008
Taking Care Of Business
The business of photography is in a huge state of flux.
OffWing Opinion and OffWing Photo are children of the online world. As painful as it is we are developing along side as both journalism and photography reinvent themselves. As eternal optimists
we believe this to be a good thing, something that will allow OffWing to survive and flourish.
Following are some of the online resources I have found and now regularly read. They are in no particular order:
- Marketing Photos with Mary Virginia Swanson
- Photo Business News & Forum
- Photo Monkeys: A Weblog For Photojournalists And Photographers Who Aspire To Greatness
- The Business of Photography
- Photo Allies
- Confessions of a Photographer
Some of these resources are from established photographers and others are from aspiring photographers. They offer a place of community and synergy (sorry for the 90's term) that is difficult to find elsewhere.
Finally, I have to make a special note of another resource that I have been meaning to follow, but haven't. Well this week was the week I needed to hear from Franklin McMahon and his Media Artist Secrets' podcast. Listening to a couple of early installments of his from 2006 got me off my butt and trying some new things which is what surviving all this change requires.
Posted by Allen Clark at 09:41 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
January 17, 2008
Sports Photographers Have The Super Bowl Covered

© Jack Howard
There is a great story over on the Popular Photography website detailing how the Super Bowl is covered by photographers of different news organizations. The have a slideshow, interviews with Peter Reed Miller and Joe DiLora, and some other interesting items.
- Story: Super Bowl XLII: The Ultimate Shoot-out
- Super Bowl Slideshow
- Slideshow and interview with Peter Reed Miller
- Slideshow and interview with Joe DiLora, Assistant Manager of Canon Professional Services
- Story: How To Shoot a Stadium From the Stands
Posted by Allen Clark at 11:36 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
January 10, 2008
Workflow: Image Storage And Archival
Previously we covered how to get the photos to your computer. This installment of photography workflow will cover how to best store and archive all the images.
My system for storing and archiving photos is based on a couple of principles. I have applied these principles then to my current situation which may be different than yours.
- My photos are my number one asset
- I am always looking to improve my system
- Multiple back-ups
- Images should be easily accessible
Making the back-up happens quickly in my workflow because cards and hard drives can and will go bad, guaranteed. The only question is when. For this reason I store my photos on two external hard drives (HD's).
One HD is my working drive which has the images that I will work from as I process them. The other drive is a back-up that includes the same images.
With the size and number of my photos rising and the price per gig of HD falling I chose to use external drives for my storage. In addition I back-up all "final" images that I provide clients on CD's or DVD's.
When I began with digital I used CD's and DVD's to back up but this quickly became unwieldily and time consuming. Using CD/DVD's also required another system to organize them in a way that I could quickly find an image if needed. The other thing that I didn't like is that once my images were out of site they were also out of mind.
My current pair of 320gb HDs are storing two years of images. I am anticipating that they will be filled in the next month.
There are also online services that will provide the archival of your images with the ability to access them anywhere in the world, while also providing an industrial strength back-up system. This seems beyond what I currently require but can see the benefits of this kind of system. The two leaders in this are Photoshelter and Digital Railroad.
The "HOW" of managing all the images will be my next post on workflow. While it can be done manually I have software to help me manage the thousands of images, spanning years. Stay tuned....
Posted by Allen Clark at 09:46 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
January 04, 2008
Friday Chuckle
This post is a little off topic but will certainly bring a little joy into your day. I just came across this and I am still laughing...or crying.
This goes to show you how easy photography is. Enjoy the following link to the professional photographers of Olan Mills.
Posted by Allen Clark at 04:24 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
January 02, 2008
Caps Ring In New Year With Big Victory Over Senators, 6-3
I got this post up last night at Offwing, here it is if you missed it. Here are a few more pictures from last night's game.

WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 1: Brooks Laich of the Washington Capitals scores a goal against goalie Ray Emory of the Ottawa Senators during a NHL hockey game on January 1, 2008 at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC. (Photo by Allen Clark/OffWing)

WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 1: Goalie Martin Gerber of the Ottawa Senators stops the puck during a NHL hockey game on January 1, 2008 at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC. (Photo by Allen Clark/OffWing)

WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 1: Nicklas Backstrom of the Washington Capitals and Antoine Vermette of the Ottawa Senators firght for control of the puck during a NHL hockey game on January 1, 2008 at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC. (Photo by Allen Clark/OffWing)
See more photos from the game by visiting our Photoshelter gallery or our Flickr gallery.
If you are a blogger and would like to use our photographs please contact us.
Posted by Allen Clark at 05:16 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Caps Ring In New Year With Big Victory Over Senators, 6-3
For the first day of the year, families filled the Verizon Center for today's afternoon game between the Washington Capitals and Ottawa Senators and went home happy. Washington scored an impressive 6-3 victory and is now unbeaten for the year (haha-not the season). This leave the Caps in third place behind Ottawa and Pittsburgh in the Eastern Conference.

WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 1: Brooks Laich of the Washington Capitals scores a goal against goalie Ray Emory of the Ottawa Senators during a NHL hockey game on January 1, 2008 at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC. (Photo by Allen Clark/OffWing)
Ottawa pulled starting goalie Martin Gerber in the first period after he gave up 3 goals in the first period, replacing him with Ray Emery. Olie Kolzig allowed 3 but stopped 34 shots on goal.

WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 1: Alex Ovechkin of the Washington Capitals goes down onto the ice as Goalie Ray Emory of the Ottawa Senators during a NHL hockey game on January 1, 2008 at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC. (Photo by Allen Clark/OffWing)

WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 1: Donald Brashear of the Washington Capitals and Brian McGrattan of the Ottawa Senators get in a fight during a NHL hockey game on January 1, 2008 at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC. (Photo by Allen Clark/OffWing)
See more photos from the game soon by visiting our Photoshelter gallery or our Flickr gallery.
If you are a blogger and would like to use our photographs please contact us.
Posted by Allen Clark at 12:23 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack