TIME Magazine Assignment

I had a half hour off the other day. Decided to just look through some of my old TIME magazine and Sports Illustrated assignments and I stumbled across this photo that I did for them to celebrate the opening of Giant Stadium. I was totally blown away when I heard they were going to build a new stadium. It seems like yesterday they just built a new stadium. Of course, a businessman friend of mine explained that it's all about the super boxes and the Fortune 500. Well, considering my only interest is between the goal line and the goal line, a super box just doesn't do it for me. If TIME asks me to go and shoot the new one, it's gonna take me a little longer to get to the birds' eye perch.  See you at the game!

Joe D.

Frame Grab

I'm not quite sure that the Lumiere brothers are not rolling around in their graves right now. Rapidly followed by W. Gene Smith and Gordon Parks. The more I know about this medium the less I know. If I'm running at 100 MPH forward, I'm probably in reverse. But, I promise myself I'll try to keep up. This photograph is pretty amazing. Enjoy!

Following blog post by Vincent LaForet.

http://blog.vincentlaforet.com/2011/06/07/what-camera-did-i-use-to-make-this-still-picture/#more-5772

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What camera did I use to make this still picture?

June 7th, 2011 in Active Discussions / Articles / Hardware / New Technology

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Go ahead and guess what camera was used to make this photograph in the comments above.    It was made with a new camera that many photographers have not yet heard of… I suggest you click on the image above to see it at full resolution (and make sure you zoom in to 100%) Some of you will guess right away and already know about it…   Others will be astonished when I reveal what camera shot this photograph.    It’s a camera that has the potential to change things – radically.__________________________________________________________________________________________

ANSWER: This image is actually a FRAME GRAB.   It was not shot with a STILL camera but with the RED EPIC M digital cinema camera at 96 frames per second. For the techies:  The image was made with a Zeiss Compact Prime 25mm f 2.9 ,  natural light,  at  T 2.9 , 1/200th of a second at 800 ASA in RED’s RAW R3D format – a RAW format similar to aCR2 or NEF (for Canon and Nikon users respectively.)  

The camera’s "cinema" resolution is 5K – more than five times the resolution of your HD Television (see chart below)…     Other than a quick color correction – no enhancement whatsoever has been made to this image. Perhaps just as importantly : there were 95 other frames that were shot EACH SECOND that I rolled on the camera… 95 other shots to choose from… shot handheld on a moving subject – not posed.

"In a world that seems to be moving at light speed, the new technologies should be embraced.  We as visual communicators should always remember the photograph comes first.  The content is more important than the pixels or the manipulation after the fact.

My love affair for this medium has only grown ten-fold.  With the advent of digital it’s like starting all over again.  Our future generations will look back at this time the way we looked back to the Lumiere brothers. What a great time to be involved in photography and filmmaking."

                                                            ~Joe DiMaggio

Mermaid Parade

I remember my mother and father taking me to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Sitting on top of my dad's shoulders and looking at the giant floats, the beautiful colors, the great music, and here we are a couple of years later spending the day at Coney Island at the Mermaid Parade. My new policy is one camera, one lens, two batteries, two cards. This time, I chose to test a new lens, a  135 f/2. Last year's parade, I used a 10-22mm. Obviously, a huge change! But, changing it up is a good thing. What I'm about to say is not a scientific fact. It appeared to me for every person in the parade, there were 3 photographers. I could be off, but I'm not that far off.

Photos © Joe Dimaggio

Queue the Rapids!

I was contracted by the Canadian Olympic Association to photograph basketball, boxing, soccer, track and field, and kayaking. I fell in love with kayaking and proceeded to kayak for the next 20 years and moved to ocean kayaking. One of the things that I used kayaking for was eye-hand coordination and remote photography. Will try to dig out some of the film- Yes, Alice, there was film in those days! I'll see if I can show you a few examples. But, in the interim, every once and a while I like to take the rust off and go photograph kayaking. Here are a few frames. Hope you enjoy them. Shutter speed ranged between a 500 and 1000, ISO 200. 80 to 200 mm lens. Pick a number- f4.5.

Blog on Blog

I was in a pre-production meeting last week with an old client, a new creative director, and a young lady who was in charge of social media. You know what? They didn't teach us this stuff in school. It's downright amazing how fast things are moving. Trying to keep up is a full-time job. Actually, that's not a bad idea. We need to get 2 or 3 interns- one for blogging, one for tweeting, and one for starting the car in case somebody puts a bomb in it. On that note, to all the ships at sea, we've got another blog! Here's the link.

http://www.blogjoedimaggio.wordpress.com

Wet Willy

John Iacono from Sports Illustrated and I have been friends for as long as I can remember, and my former next door neighbor and fishing partner. There is no doubt in my mind that he's one of the greatest sports photographers of our time. And yes, he's a drop-dead sweet guy. I have never heard one bad word about Johnny Eye. Having said that, I think he should keep his tongue out of my ear. I'm not going to tell you where his right hand is. By the way, his right hand was on his high-speed Nikon camera. And I know that because I could hear the mirror box in my left ear.  Let's be honest- if nothing else, we always have a lot of fun! You can tell by the look on my face. I'm just so giddy!

10 Greatest Indy 500 Moments

DiMaggio's photo selected as one of the 10 Greatest Indianapolis 500 Moments. His photo was selected number three. With a little bit of practice, maybe number one!

Use it or Lose it!

One of the biggest complaints JoAnne and I hear from amateurs and pros is that they have nothing to photograph. When I hear that sometimes my jaw clenches, and if I'm not careful, I could break a tooth. The reality is you could spend half a lifetime in your backyard and never make the same photograph twice. Let's beat up two more cliches, Practice makes perfect. The other complaint I hear is that, "I don't have enough time in the day to make great photos." My answer is, MAKE THE TIME! One of my students, Larry Malang, asked if I would do his portrait for his webpage. Of course I would be happy to do his portrait for a $1500 sitting fee. Larry thought that was fair. We spent about 20 minutes in the studio, had several usable frames. Oops! I don't mean frames I mean digital images. Sometimes I fall back to  ASA. Okay, I know it's ISO. One of the reasons I jumped at this photographic opportunity is because he is an extremely bright and creative gentleman. He has been reincarnated several times. I find his face and his intensity charming. Larry, the check is in the mail right?

The Third Man In

We've all heard the expression, "The third man in the ring". Man people who don't follow boxing don't realize how important that third man is. When I saw Arthur Mercante Jr. step into the ring and saw that black arm band, it really got to me. His dad, Arthur Mercante Sr., went to school with my father and I met Sr. 40 years ago. There is no doubt in anyones mind that he was the greatest boxing referee of all times. He was the class act, nobody better. When Arthur Mercante Jr. took charge of the Cotto- Foreman fight, it was amazing. He never let the control slip away from himself. Like his father before him, he handled himself properly, like a gentleman, and with the power of his convictions. There was no doubt in my mind that Arthur Sr. was looking down with a gigantic smile on his face and was so proud of his son. I take my barret off to both of them.

Photos © Dylan DiMaggio

Not The Outcome We Wanted

June 5 2010 will go down as a day I watched two people I genuinely care about lose their fights; James Moore and Yuri Foreman. That's the bad news. The good news is they both fought with tremendous courage and pride and neither one of them gave up. The first thing they teach you at the University of Missouri School of Journalism is to never get involved with the people your photographing or filming on any level, period. I've not only believed it but I've told scores of other photographers and filmmakers the same thing. What a hypocrite I must be, I did everything I could do not to get close to either one of these guys. Even though the relationships are radically different, I would've loved to had seen them succeed in their goals. Success is a good thing. Winning is a good thing but I guess we all have to learn from our non successes. I can't use the f word because failure is not an option- it's never an option. I've spent 5 years working with Harry Keitt, James Moore, Yuri Foreman and several other very bright, talented people.

Alexis Iacono

Oh my god, I'm going to say it again, I'm one of the luckiest guys in the world. Over the years I've had a very good friend by the name of John Iacono who has a beautiful wife, by the name of Nancy and an extremely beautiful daughter who is now acting, modeling, and doing voice over's- pretty cool stuff. I remember many years ago having Alexis as one of my models for a photographic ad for one of the camera manufacturers. I believe we used 5 or 6 young people but even then at age 10,11, or 12, Alexis was head and shoulders above the rest not only in beauty but in presentation in how she acted and reacted under pressure. You don't have to be much of a visionary to know that this girl is going a long way. And what a great sense of humor; she said in her last email, "But like Marsha Mason says to Richard Dreyfuss in the Good Bye Girl 'Ask an actor a question and he gives you his credits.'"

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1477266/

http://www.yarnaudioworks.com/

http://vimeo.com/11076595

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/cataclysm/

June 5- Yankee Stadium

I remember Floyd Patterson beating Ingemar Johansson, then it was Cautious Clay (Muhammad Ali) against Sonny Liston. I think a lot of people will remember this fight- Yuri Foreman against Miguel Cotto. As most of you know, I've been working 5 years on a documentary and Yuri Foreman is the main protagonist along with Harry Keitt, James Moore and several other players.There hasn't been a fight in Yankee Stadium since 1976; Mohammad Ali against Ken Norton. In my opinion, the key to any great sport's photograph is timing, shutter speed, timing, and yes, timing again. You study a boxer and you know he throws combinations of 3 lefts, 1 right, 2 lefts, 1 right, and then a hook to the body. You try to time it. Peak action is absolutely critical. There's a point where a glove moving very quickly stops for a millisecond on a person's chin. In a perfect word, that's what your looking for. As a photographer and former photojournalist, you're not supposed to root but that's hard not to do. On the evening of June 5th, I'd love to see 2 people win, James Moore and Yuri Foreman. A simplification of

peak action is 2.8 and be there. Yes it's a take off of F8 and be there. Joe D

Photo© Joe DiMaggio

The Photographic Community

What I'm about to say has absolutely nothing to do with F stops, apertures, depth of field, or depth of focus. It has to do with the photographic community, how I was brought up in it and how it translates to 2010. When I started (x) number of years ago, there was an unwritten law that you would always try to help out a fellow photographer. As the age of the computer and internet arrived, things became a little less personal. I don't believe anybody made a change in attitude with malice of thought but there was obviously some changes. Maybe it had something to do with business becoming tighter and tighter. To be quite honest, I really don't know. Yesterday, I had an hour and a half conversation with one of the greatest photographers of our day, John Iacono. Johnny Eye stated at Sports Illustrated when he was 16 and I think he's now 29, maybe a little older. We've been friends and neighbors for a long time and Johnny is just one of the nicest people God put on this earth. In case I didn't mention it, he is also a great photographer. Earlier yesterday, I ran into another great photographer, Marty Rosengarten from Ringside Photos. Marty is a world class boxing photographer. There's an old Italian adage for someone like Marty, he's a mench. Marty was kind and generous enough to make a photograph of me with my dear friend Yuri Foreman. In the five years I've known Yuri, no one has ever done that- so Marty was the first. Exactly what is the purpose of this blog? What I'm trying to say is the family/community of photographers is alive and well. Thank you Marty, thank you Johnny, thank you Yuri.

Photos © Marty Rosengarten

Backstage Passes

This particular workshop will be unlike any other workshop ever conducted by Joe DiMaggio. Each team member will be expected to shoot 6 or 7 variations on the Bobby Kyle Band; an environmental portrait, an action shot and a candid. The end result will be a final selection of one great photo from each workshop participant. They will be expected to sign a release and they will be the owner of the copyright. Bobby will also have to right to use that photo for the internet, CD or DVD. The photo must not be any larger than 100 dpi. Each participant will have access to some very fast long lenses which will allow them to hopefully push the envelope. Unlike any other workshop, this one will start in the afternoon and go until quite late. The concert will start at 8:00 P.M. There will be rooms available at both Greeley Inn and a few B&B's in the area. Please visit http://www.dimaggio-kalishworkshops.com

This workshop will be quite small and it will be first come

first serve. Looking forward to seeing you. Thanks. Joe D

©Joe DiMaggio

Simon Says

While recuperating from my bilateral duel hip surgery, I was visited by friends - Monica Cipnic (which we will talk about at length in another post) and a shortly after Simon Jacob. Simon is an amazing man. He's not only a world class business man but also has one of the most beautiful families I've ever had the pleasure of meeting. From his amazing wife, Barrie, to all of his lovely children. It's all good. In Simon's case, it's all great. He took time out of his very busy schedule to come visit me twice. We spent 10 great days in Israel with Simon and we'll be going back this December. Remember - what Simon says, you better do. That's me trying to be funny again. For the record, this is the 4th photograph I've taken with my phone but I always forget the area code.

Phone? Camera? Phone? Camera?

You have to know that most people do not want to go to the hospital and visit. Let's be honest, there isn't a whole lot you can do or say and most people would rather be having a cup of coffee or maybe a Jameson's straight up. Hell, maybe they would rather be sparing 2-3 rounds with somebody, but nobody really wants to go to the hospital. What a pleasant surprise when my dear friend James Moore showed up and stayed for an hour. Everyone in the rehab gym wanted to meet James so we went down and introduced him. James is not only a great fighter and a great husband but he is one of those genuine people who really cares about his friends. He's going to make history on June 5 in Yankee Stadium. There hasn't been a fight held there since 1976. James will have a 10 round fight with Pawel Wolak. He'll be leaving Brooklyn for his Pocono training camp and he will be coming to Chez DiMaggio for at least one dinner. It's going to be a tough fight but if James fights his fight, I think he's going to be victorious. When he digs in a right hand to the body, my teeth shake and I'm 15 feet away. He's very strong and tough and he's got a heart of gold. Good Luck James.

Bob Mladinich

Bob was not only a great New York City Gold Shield detective, a great writer, author of several books, but he's now a T.V. star. On Sunday night, he was on the one hour special with Paula Zahn- check it out on the internet. On top of everything else, he's a sweetheart. I also forgot to mention, he did two other one hour specials with Paula Zahn. Bob is also a great aficionado of boxing and has written scores of great boxing articles. Bob was also extremely gracious to come and visit me at Hospital for Special Surgery. On top of everything else he's a mensch.

Why Will Yuri Foreman Win on June 5, 2010?

I make it a practice of never gambling on boxing matches or horse races for that matter. I try not to predict winners, it's just not what I do. With this upcoming WBA Junior Welterweight Fight, it's simple and straight forward; Yuri Foreman is bigger, stronger, faster, moves better left, right, back, and forward. He is never a stationary target and is always a moving offense. I forgot something- he's probably the most dedicated trained fighter I've ever seen. I believe he will win convincingly. I hope for the safety of both fighters, it's a great fight, and no one gets hurt.

© Joe DiMaggio

Tech Information: 24-70 mm @24 ISO 50, 30th of a second, F/8

tweak down strobe light 3/4 stop

© Joe DiMaggio

Tech Information: Yuri Foreman Shadow Boxing 24-20mm f/2.8 ISO 50

1,000th of a second at f/2.8 approximately 80mm

Hello To All the Ships at Sea

How many of you have had a bad day? How many of you have had a bad day turn into a rotten day? About 24 hours ago, I was having one of those days, then my cell phone rang. A voice on the other end said, "I'm sitting at the Sea of Galilei watching the sunset and I thought of your smile and I had to call you, my brother." The phone call came from my brother Amir Orly. It was Amir's birthday and of course I forgot to call him but he knew that I needed his smiling face to make a bad day magnificent- and thats what happened, it turned out to be a great day.

My brother Amir and his lovely wife, Hannah
Photos © JoAnne Kalish