Well when exciting stuff is goin on. I am a free lance photographer for local papers and tv stations...

As far as I know... no one was home at the time of the blaze. Pics are in the order they were taken...























Doug Raflik
wxnut@charter.net

wow!!

Crazy.

that is so incredibly sensua... I mean tragic.

You start fires to give you something to photograph? Have I got that right?

Those are really good.

fathermcmeekle said:

Awesome pics.

My sister and her husband are both firefighters, and it just scares me to think that THIS is what they do though. I try not to think about it too much.

But these are really cool.

the ladder picture is striking
but they are all great

such a nice house
glad no one was home
how was it that you managed
to be there before the trucks?

emm said:

yeah, PYRO-boy....how did you manage that???

Seriously though those are awesome pics....my daughter is into photography...one of her nature shots got selected to be in a coffee table book....

NAnomaly said:

yeah! REALLY good!

ZombieKitten said:

oh, cut that out...

NAnomaly said:

ZombieKitten said:

This is why I will never be a professional photographer. I wouldn't have a clue how to shoot with that little light without it looking underexposed or how to capture that much movement in such poor light conditions without it all looking blurry.

I could frame it at least that nicely though.

WOW! Spooky!


..

emm said:

Yeah, that ladder one looks like they're going up into the unknown Kinda scary.

AnckSuNamun said:

that photo is nice

minneapolisgenius said:

SFFD?

retina said:

Those are just details you can learn. And actually there's tons of light. You could get a great shot from the fire alone (see first pic), and the truck has a giant spotlight on the house. And use fast film.

So you've already decided you'll never be a professional photographer?
[Edited 3/9/07 7:24am]

heartbeatocean said:

Well you would think there's tons of light (it sure looks like it to the naked eye), but I've lost count of the times I've tried and failed to get good shots with fire and/or a solitary source of artifical light.

For there to be proper sharpness and exposure you need lots more light than that. You're a filmmaker too, so you probably know what it's like to do night shoots; you light up the whole damn set so that it almost looks like daylight and then you "tone it down with camera settings" and can thereby give the shot a crisp, clear look.



Always when I do that it gets grainy. Look at how black the sky is in the pictures above, mine would look grainy and greyish.



Well no. I would like to at least incorporate it in my professional life and I think I can manage that eventually, but I think I've hit a plateau when it comes to my technical skills. No matter how much I play around with the settings there are still some noticable technical flaws in the end product. It sucks, because I feel like I'm still evolving in terms of what I'm adding to it creatively; choice of subject and angle, ability to capture the right moment etc.

Either way, thank you very much for caring. You've always been extremely supportive of my photography. I'm still waiting to see your short films by the way.

retina said:

I know what you mean. I shot a whole campfire scene once with two actors. My cinematographer thought we could do it with the fire alone. Not! It came out extremely dark, unusable footage.

I can actually see quite a bit of grain, especially in the first shot above. Maybe wxnut could give you some tips?

I love how the stripes on the firepeople's jackets turn white in the second to the last two shots.

I'll see if I can send you a quicktime movie I made.

heartbeatocean said:

Ouch. That must be an inexperienced cinematographer who didn't even think he needed contrasting light. Lighting is one of the most basic things a cinematographer should be good at. I've had something similar happen to me though at film school where we were all inexperienced. Shot on 16 mm, waited nervously for it to come back from the lab, and then realized we might as well toss it in the trash. It sucks.



Yeah, that would be good. This thread seems pretty abandoned though.



It's a cool effect.

retina said:

It did suck. We had to travel out of town and it would have been a great scene. My cinematographer was good, but not that night. It might have been my fault...maybe I didn't reserve the lights...and I think we were trying to be discreet since we didn't have a permit...etc. I can't remember, except that he was really cranky and coming down with a cold. It all added up to a useless shoot and I had to cut the whole scene from the movie.

Very well taken photographs. You got to feel for the unlucky sods who's place has burn down though

To ask the question which somebody asked earlier, was it just right time, right place for those shots or were you called to the scene to accompany the local Fire Department?

Post incident, any idea what caused the blaze or is it depending investigation?
[Edited 3/10/07 8:42am]

AnckSuNamun said:

Is that Jenny Lee in your avvie, sometimes referred to as Jennifer Lee or even as Jen Lee on ocacsion


The Marigold gloves and Fairy Liquid are under the sink! As detailed... Get to Work!

Wow great pictures, did the firedepartment have lightcanons on the house? The lighting is perfect

I'm still lurning how to work with my new digital camera, but it's a lot harder than I emagined.
I'm still used to working with my old (acient) pentax reflex and can't seem to get a hang of it .....yet.

how tragic for the family whose house that is.

BlackAdder7 said:

Yes, very

BlackAdder7 said:

Here, here. That's why I couldn't say "nice photographs". Very professional, is the best I could do.
[Edited 3/10/07 14:51pm]

senik said:

It's actually Kathleen Hanna who's in my avvie. To quote our great President: "Fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again"