Jeff Lautenberger

India in Motion: The Washington Post

The Washington Post’s “India in Motion” contains 22 video vignettes between one and two minutes long, showing sights and sounds of different cultural regions around India. The overall design is clean and condensed. The layout and color scheme (warm tones) enhance the presentation. It’s evident that the multimedia framework is an addition to the overall Web site. It fits into the overall design well enough, benefitting from unifying styles and typefaces.

This project works well in Flash because there are so many parts and chapters. Everything is clearly organized into sections, and navigation is simple. You can browse each category or subcategory visually, or use a dropdown menu for direct access to a specific video. Each individual video can be played or paused by the user, but the default action open opening is to autoplay. This is frustrating, especially when just wanting to browse through. I don’t always want audio to play right away. » Continue Reading…

Eight-year-old Jordan Wingate, of Columbia, glances away from the judging ring as her poodle Ginger naps during the Best in Show judging at the Columbia Kennel Club Dog Show on March 14 at the Boone County Fairgrounds. Jordan and Ginger did not compete in the show.

Went to the dog show with the intention of working on my color correction assignment for Advanced Techniques. I started out using flash and blending techniques, and got some usable stuff, which I might blog later. But, it was mostly just frustrating me, so I decided to just enjoy the puppies, put my strobe away, and shoot for fun.

Jordan here was pretty antsy and bored during the Best in Show judging, and spent most of the time wandering around the rings. Her grandmother (at right), eyes glued to the dogs in the ring, was ignoring her and even her poodle was beat from a long day. I caught this quick expression which I think summed up her mood pretty well.

After the show, I felt compelled to introduce Chris to Christopher Guest’s classic movie, Best in Show.

The Web site of photographer Michael Robinson Chavez -- note the lack of any navigation without having to scroll down.

Michael Robinson Chavez currently works for the Los Angeles Times, but I first became familiar with his work several years when he was a staff photographer for The Washington Post. He is probably best known for his international photojournalism and conflict coverage. Chavez was also awarded a POYi Award of Excellence for Newspaper Photographer of the Year in 2008.

His personal website is cleanly designed, with a very simple layout. The homepage contains a brief “news” section, and one image, which changes upon a refresh.

The Web site’s navigation scheme is organized rather unusually, at least for a newspaper photojournalist. It is set up for sections pertaining to geographic locations, rather than by categories describing the types of photos. The Web site is entirely built around stories and location-specific galleries — there are no single, standalone images, and no single “portfolio” section. This is obviously a personal choice, as Chavez has a large body of work from around the world to display, and he clearly wants to portray/market himself as a global documentarian, but I’d still like to be able to glance at a “best of” section. Lastly, other than a (very) brief overview of each story or gallery, there are no captions with any photos. I have a pretty big issue with this, as I’d really like to know what’s going on in some  of these photos when it’s not really clear who’s shooting at who or why someone is crying, yelling, or bloodied. For a documentary photojournalist, it just seems kind of lazy to not have any context. » Continue Reading…

Missouri forwards Keith Ramsey and Laurence Bowers walk off the court following the Tigers' 63-53 loss to the Wildcats at Bramlage Coliseum in Manhattan, Kan., on Feb. 27.

I think a lot of people were hoping the rematch of Missouri and Kansas State wouldn’t turn out to be as ugly as the game in Columbia on Jan. 9. If you were one of those people, you were probably pulling your hair out last night. If you want to get technical, last night’s 43 fouls were less than the 56 whistled in Columbia, but does it honestly even matter at that point? K-State had nearly three times as many free-throw attempts (34) to the Tigers’ 13. Both teams’ shooting percentages were in the toilet at under 33% for the entire game – in fact, the Wildcats managed to open the game by making 2 of 22 field goal attempts and STILL managed to be tied at the half. » Continue Reading…

Columbia resident Justin Butts smokes a cigar prior to the True/False Film Festival's annual March March parade.

It’s not every day a clown will tap you on the shoulder and ask for help buttoning his collar, but that’s what this guy did. I gladly helped, chatted for a minute, then snapped a couple photos.

I wanted to shoot something today, so I planned my evening to make sure I’d be able to catch part of the annual parade/street romp/bizzarro-fest that happens every year during Columbia’s True/False Film Festival. Film Festivals aren’t exactly my thing, and in three years I’ve never made it to a show or ventured to check out the parade. I’m glad I finally did. Clowns, dancing gorillas, brass bands, Teletubbies, and general weirdness are the perfect recipe for awesome photos. It’s almost cheating. » Continue Reading…

MU photojournalism student Paul Mossine.

I enjoyed being in the studio, but didnʼt quite come away with the results I had planned for. I didnʼt have much of a problem with using the power packs, I understood the ratios and knew which lights I wanted to have more or less power. My biggest problems came with the actual positioning of the lights themselves, and getting interesting poses. My partner, Paul, seems like a really laid-back guy, so I tried to catch him in his natural state, sometimes taking photos just during conversation and when heʼd pause or glance away. He also had a harmonica and sunglasses in his backpack, which we played with as props. Heʼs really into music, but doesnʼt really know much harmonica — still, it was fun to use as a prop, and I really wish I could have gotten better lighting on some of those photos. » Continue Reading…

Great game tonight — everything that needed to happen did, with the exception of Justin Safford landing hard on his knee and barely being able to walk. Hope todays MRI isn’t as bad as the fall looked in person.

I’m still having some problems with my remote setup, and I finally figured out why. Looks like a broken pre-trigger cable, but thanks to the awesome customer service at Flash Zebra, I’ll have a replacement in just a couple days, well in advance of next Saturday’s HUGE season finale against Kansas.

Finally, it was probably the last time this year we’ll see Steve Moore, Tyler Stone, John Underwood, and Jarrett Sutton on the court at the same time. Definitely a feel-good highlight.