Parlor Schtick

A face full of predator urine does strange things to a fella. Take it from me. Just last week I was a highly distracted TV cameraman, flitting from one silly assignment to another with little more than lunch on my mind -- until a rescue lion cocked his arse in my direction. That's when it hit me: I gotta walk the Earth. No, I'm not going to wander from village to village dispensing frontier justice with slow-motion karate chops and monosyllabic nods. But I am determined to recast my role on this planet and I'm going to start by embracing NON-photog behavior. Why, just the other day I was spotted hovering over a weighty tome at a trendy downtown eatery. And not once did I shine a light in a stranger's face and ask them open ended questions! Well, there was that one time, but I was merely trying to find the little boy's room.

Relax, I was just attending the first ever BOOKUP - a local event in which interesting people gather around to read -- to themselves. If you think that sounds like your average Saturday night at Barnes and Nobles (minus the roving band of Goth kids), you'd be wrong. Hell, that's I thought when writing pal Joe Maeder (author of When I Married My Mother) invited me to attend the inaugural event. Of course, I'd probably wash Jo's car if she asked me. After all, she's a published author and as such possesses the kind of insider knowledge a constipated scribe like myself would stab a hobo in the throat to learn! Too much? Let me put it this way: If I don't figure out a way to squeeze my words into print, I'm gonna climb the nearest TV tower and start tossing down camera batteries. THAT will get me nowhere, so I feel it wise to seek a room full of higher counsel.

And what a room! Bin 33 was already filing up with the local literatti when I arrived. Hey there's Parke Puterbaugh, Rolling Stone writer also known for Phish: the Biography. And is that Brian Clarey? Editor of Yes Weekly and author of The Anxious Hipster (and Other Barflies I've Known)? Where's my free drink ticket? And why does my head hurt so? Must be because Brian dragged me out to help celebrate his birthday afterward, whereupon he pummeled me with alcohol and solid writing advice. I just wish I could remember it all. Here's what I do recall (and I paraphrase): "Ease off the adjectives. Good writing is all about the verb. Forget everything the jackholes with the MFA's and elbow patches have to say. You're a blue collar, Southern writer and they can't teach that shit in schools. Fiction, Memoir, you can write it all - but you CANNOT hold back. Readers will see right through it and you'll be stuck dodgin' lion piss 'til your back finally gives out..."

If anyone needs me, I'll be in my news unit...squeezing drops of blood onto a notepad.

The Lion Zing

Just when I thought I'd seen it all, a steaming stream of lion piss clouds my vision. Stick with me here... It was a gorgeous afternoon in central North Carolina, which is a good thing since by the time reporter Brandon Jones and I pulled into an undisclosed compound deep within the Piedmont, I'd already zapped a battery in the name of news. Still, none of that mattered to Brandon or my bosses. They just wanted us to bag a quick feature story while no one's looking. Mission Accepted. Not that I had a lot of choice. When you wander through life with a camera on your shoulder, people tend to tell you where to point it. That's cool. I consider myself a closer. Come up with something you'd like to see documented and I'll follow it into the tall grass and teethe on it 'til it bleeds. Today, however, another apex predator would call his shot and it would send me scampering away, bruised pride and spotted spectacles in hand.

Ya know, I've put up with many a peril while standing under glass. Rogue waves, runaway trucks, extended city council meetings - I've dodged them all. Animals, too! Once upon a time I was a regular visitor to the North Carolina Zoo, profiling everything from cuddly puffins to dozing polar bears to the heftiest of elephants. I once even fed ostriches from the back of a pick-up truck and never once ran over any heads in the sand. But nothing I ever eyeballed from afar down in Asheboro prepared me for the outpouring of attention I received today. Which reminds me, when a nice lady with a bucket of raw meat says, "Watch out for that one. He'll spray ya!", don't think for a moment she's flattering you with small talk. She ain't - and I got the YouTube clip to prove it. So yeah, the lion keeper warned me - right before she suggested I cozy up to the fence for a closer shot. That's the kind of idea a guy like me can't resist. After two decades of camera management, I got "Zoom with you feet" tattooed on my soul.

So when Bucket Lady ushered me up to the edge of that big cat enclosure, I went willingly. How else you gonna get the kind of shot people expect from a fancycam? Besides, if I wanted to stay warm and dry all the time, I'd sell stereos or insurance or crack. I damn sure wouldn't be pushin' glass where it don't belong. As it was, I felt pretty safe there before the fence, so much that my mind began to drift. That's when it happened. Acting upon either deep seeded instinct or a hidden hand gesture from my host, that feline in question cocked his arse in my direction and let loose with a burst of urine that would put a drunk sailor to shame. I caught sight of the impending plume half a second before it showered my camera, my glasses, my face. Suddenly I was moving, vaguely aware that A) those weren't beads of sweat hanging off my nose, B) the camera caught it all and C) I just might have something to blog about tonight. And while it's not the kind of thing I'd stand in line to experience again, I knew immediately it was one of those encounters I'd enjoy living down forever.

But don't take my word for it. Witness the pissing for yourself.



Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go shower. Again.

Twisted Listener

In the exciting world of TV News photogery, you get to drive past the barricade, hobnob with the rich and broken, then splay their fate all over the tube. Mostly though, you attach microphones to people. For example, here I am pinning one on Kat Siladi, moments after interrupting her best carrot seed material. I had no choice. She was breaking photosynthesis down to toddler level, forcing me to lunge from the row of rutabagas row and indulge in a little cameraman charades... Sounds like, "I'm totally screwed if you don't put this thing around your neck." Actually, I was smoother than that. Not enough to avoid skeeving out a few of the Moms on hand, but smooth, I tell you! Actually, there is an art to microphone placement: knowing when to approach, properly telegraphing your intentions without bringing the room to an awkward halt, remembering to retrieve the damn thing when the interview is through. by the way, have you ever tried to track down a state trooper that didn't want to be found? Those jokers lay LOW - no matter what's stuck to their lapel...

Anyhoo, there's more to microphone management than knowing when to strike. There's proper placement. Do I run it up under their sleeve? Loop it around their collar? Bury it in their bosom? The answers, my friend, are blowing in the wind - but if you don't choose correctly, a little moving air static will be the least of your problems. Don't believe me? Sidle up to a biker bar and start playing pin the tail on the donkey. They'll never find your body. Or bum-rush a beauty pageant with talk of silicone rub and droopy acoustics. Some of those women are black belts. Hell, I nearly got a full body scan from the TSA while trying to stick a mic on a beefy flight attendant. How was I supposed to know lady was a dude? Don't answer that. Just know that I'll be more careful the next time I use the line, "from one sexy stew to another". I'm still not allowed back on that concourse!

Okay, so we've covered the troubles of being your own sound guy. We've talked about when to do it, how not to do it and why you should always check for an Adam's apple when considering where to bag a few soundbites. What we haven't discussed is lineage. Think of it as Six Degrees of Amplification. See, I only got one lavalier microphone. And since I blanch at the sight of those King sized overly-logo'd hand(held) jobs, I use my lav A LOT. Thus, the microphone I clip to the neat freak CEO may very well have just come off the homeless guy he stepped over on the way to his Benz, the same one I used to record some American Idol wannabe crucifying Whitney will soon snuggle up the powder blue baby-T Simon Cowell's stylist picked out for him. Oh, and the Governor wants to know why the thingie I attached to her designer scarf smells so funny? It's just a little cadaver dog. Okay, so it was a BIG cadaver dog, but he had the most plaintive howl, so I ran the microphone up his collar and chased him up a river bank. Like YOU'VE never done that.

Sooo, what have we learned? Simple. Microphones are intrinsic but clumsy. The people you most want to pin rarely submit, but that truck driver's more than willing to step out of his Carrharts if it'll get him on the tay-vay. Oh - and batteries only die when the speaker is inaccessible, famous or about to say something so cosmically wrong, they'll open an investigation as to why you didn't properly capture it. I just wish some engineer type would invent the ever-hovering invisi-clip(less). You know, some naked to the eye electronic bug that floats just above the subject's sternum. I myself have mad a few sketches of such a device, but if I were smart enough to develop it, I wouldn't be laying in wait beside some egg plant, untangling the same cord I ignored the day before as a Horticulture Major eyes me with growing disdain...

I guess that goes without saying.

Splinterquest!

It doesn't take much talent to point a camera at a pile of sticks, which is probably why I'm so good at it. Then again, I've had a lot of practice. For two decades strong, all manners of calamity have passed through my glass. Minivans flipped by wind, homes broken open up by fallen forests, flimsy splinters driven into sod -- I sometimes think I've shot it all. I haven't. Nor have I swarmed around every type of storm victim, a lesson I learned today when I stumbled upon one Terry Lawrence. But more on him later. First, the news: I don't know if it made the papers up your way, but Mother Nature took an unexpected dump on North Carolina Monday night. I was lucky enough to sleep through much of it, but I arose this morning with the certain knowledge that I'd spend the day paying for that uninterrupted slumber. Was I ever right.

It seemed like hours before I hit pay-dirt. In fact, it had only been eighty minutes since I tore out of the door at the TV station, a cameraman on a mission. "Go find Randolph County damage," someone said as I peeled out of the parking lot and onto the interstate. Several miles and a few phone calls later, I was deep into said county and altogether lost. Oh, I knew where I was; I just didn't know where I was going. The overnight storm had raked across the region, leaving isolated pockets of toppled trees among otherwise unscathed neighborhoods. But without solid intel as to where the destruction was, I was forced to drive blind, scouring the passing countryside for any signs of downed branch, tangled power lines or drunken wildebeests. I guess two out of three ain't bad.

Eventually, I found just the kind of carnage we needed to keep the commercials from bumping into one another - but it wasn't due to my stunning hunting skills. No, it was social media. Folks like Terry Lawrence flooded the station with photos, tweets and clips of what nature hath wrought, providing with he street addressees needed to harass them accordingly. Which is why I was so impressed with Terry. Cordial to a fault, he took time away from staring at the tree in his kitchen to show a photog all the best angles. Had the fallen tree trunk not blocked access to his fridge, I do believe he'd have offered me refreshments. And I would have taken them too, for you don't turn down a man with a red oak in his breakfast nook and AC/DC for his ringtone...

'Hell's Bells', I think it was...

Fritter and Waste...

TV News. It ain't ALL high speed chases and breathless live shots. Quite regularly, the pace of the hunt slows to nearly unbearable levels. Nowhere is this phenomenon more common that when engaging the judicial system - where cameras aren't always allowed in court. It's when the committed lenslinger has to tap into the powers of inattention that landed him such a silly gig to begin with. Don't believe me? Just ask Paul Martin, who demonstrates the proper loitering technique all the way from across the pond. Of course NOW we all just stare at our Blackberry, iPod or Droid, but you get the idea...

Valor On Tap

In a world where television journalists are considered to be lower life forms than lawyers, it's refreshing to see reality trump perception. Case in point: Rob Cook. Wednesday night the WLEX photojournalist was driving his station's satellite truck to Houston for the Final Four. Just outside that city, Cook witnessed a fiery car crash up ahead. A car hit a median; a fire ensued and smoke soon filled the interior. That's when Rob Cook acted on instinct and in doing so, elevated our profession. He approached the burning car, ripped out a window and pulled a woman to safety. Another Good Samaritan managed to free a second passenger. Soon after, flames engulfed the car. Both occupants of the car received minor injuries, but thanks to Cook and others, they lived to tell the story. Heroic? Youbetcha. But of the photogs I know, 3 out of 4 would have attempted the same. That makes us no better than any other wage earners, but it does make us decent human beings with our compassion intact. Sadly, that's a news flash to some. So here's to YOU Rob Cook. We've never met, but I know your type. I work with and compete against them everyday.

Dichotomy's Rot

Okay, this is the part of the show where I pull a few fresh photos and assign some irony to them. To be honest though, it's Sunday night: in the past two days I've ridden 18 hard mountain bike miles, quelled a few sibling insurrections and changed the cat box a time or two. I'm tapped out. Still, it's my self-appointed duty to provide cogent cameraman analysis, so here goes...

Anoop Desai is a nice guy. (Hey, that rhymed!) He's also the smartest American Idol contestant you'll run across at Charlotte's Freedom Park. That's where Shannon Smith and I met him Thursday morning, not quite by accident. See, we're putting together a 'Where Are They Now' piece on some North Carolina Idols and that kind of thing would simply be incomplete without a visit with everyone's favorite UNC Grad student turned R&B singer. Anoop (Dawg) is done with Idol, of course, but he's still making music. Currently unsigned, he's living in Atlanta and shopping his tunes around town. It can't be easy. Don't get me wrong: Anoop's got serious vocal chops and a helluva brain to go with it, but fame is a fickle bitch. What was so fresh and new two seasons back is often but a distant memory to the twelve year olds and asexual shut-ins who hang on Idol's every ingenue. I just wish Anoop would a write a book about his post Idol experience. Contractually, he probably can't - but dude's got some sober-eyed observations on what it's like to step OFF that global merry-go-round. Me? I'd be holed-up in some bad hotel lounge reminding anyone who would listen just who the hell I used to be. Not Anoop. He's got too much savvy, class and talent to go that route. Look for his music soon. Hell, use the twenty you were saving for that Adam Lambert disc and buy from the one American Idol contestant on the planet who could explain the social implications of our state's urbanization without using all his fingers...

Speaking of fingers, I'd just wrapped mine around a most righteous hamburger when I got my next assignment of the day: Babysit the plane crash. Okay, that's not a direct quote, but you get the idea. Some eighteen hours earlier, a small plane had crashed into a High Point neighborhood, killing the pilot and a passenger. Tragic, yes and big news to boot. Before neighbors could even grasp what had happened, a squadron of photogs, reporters and even a few management types were assembling on scene. I myself was lucky enough to miss it, as other duties pulled me out of pocket. But a debris field waits for everyone. Which is why, a full day after impact, The Suits dispatched me post-haste. It was not my first plane crash scene and most probably not my last. But unlike other crash locales, this one was occurred in a neighborhood much like my own. Trees clipped in descending order, fuselage wedged in a house, intact engine sitting in the street...let's just say you had to be there. And the media WAS there - print, TV, even a radio reporter or four. By five o clock, we'd gathered in a semi-circle, each crew vying for an unobstructed view of the destruction. Did we stop to gawk at the plane parts, wax emphatically on the frailty of life, vow to never board a stump-jumper again? Not really. We were all on deadline, you see. We were far more concerned with editing, audio and IFB. The fact that the backdrop was a debris field was sad, but not particularly distracting. If that makes me a jackal, well, you know where to send Animal Control.

Now, about that irony. Honestly, there is none. Interviewing a pop-star wannabe in the morning and shooting a fatal crash in the afternoon is about as unique as that burger I barely finished. Or maybe I've just become numb to the vagaries of the chase. Do anything for long enough and it becomes the norm - be it looking at life through a tube or feeling compelled to write about it (most) every night.

Now if you'll excuse me, there's a beveled reflection I must avoid...