I realized the other day that I'm coming up on the 40th anniversary of the first Indiana University Athletics events that I photographed. Two things brought me to attend IU, the movie Breaking Away and a desire to major in telecommunications. My first job as a student was at the campus PBS affiliate, WTIU-TV, and then at one of the oldest television stations in the country WTTV-TV. In high school I had the opportunity to start working in TV production and was enterprising enough to land jobs on production crews at sports events like the Indy 500, the USFL, NFL, Big Ten Football and Basketball, and Team USA Soccer with ABC, CBS, NBC, ESPN, Lorimar, and Anheuser Busch Sports Marketing. I got to a point where I needed to be in a union to have this career expand, and when that didn't happen I switched to print and broadcast journalism.
Making connections
Indiana has prepared many great photojournalists, many who are still in the business. In the 20 years I was in Bloomington I had a chance to work with many of them while I worked at a great student newspaper, the Indiana Daily Student, with the Associated Press during a major period of growth and transformation, and with a wide range of national and international media. You can see my work here.
When I moved to New York I grabbed the IUPhotos.com domain to build a network among the photographers who have connections to Indiana University, either as students or professionals in the area who covered IU. Along the way I have continued to cover IU whenever possible, mostly in the Northeast. The expansion of the Big Ten to the area has helped greatly. What hasn't helped as much has been the implosion of the print journalism industry. After the closing of Inside Indiana, and the takeover of most daily newspapers by Gannett, I have been working with The Daily Hoosier.
In the coming months I have big plans again for IU Photos (rebuilding the website after a major server crash is at the top of the list), and hopefully make photographs at as many IU events as time permits.