Hanging Out at the Pond

A slow day with no photo assignments and no community events that would work out visually left me crawling in the pond scum with the toads. Better company than some of the politicians I’ve met :)

A frog finds shelter under a fallen branch as a light sprinkle of rain fell around him at a pond on the Smeck Farm historical park near Baltimore on Tuesday, August 16. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Scuba Class

I met Danny Hall while shooting an assignment about a local town that got a grant to repair their pool. Hall mentioned in passing that he teaches scuba classes at the pool each summer. We are required to write a short article to accompany our photo packages twice a week, so I was pretty happy when this one fell into my lap.

Scuba diving instructor Danny Hall, (top-right corner) discusses the next underwater lesson to students Cheryl Haid (top-left) and her husband Jamie (bottom-center) before going underwater again in the deep end of the Millersport pool during a scuba diving class Saturday, August 6. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Danny Hall says that if, in a hypothetical situation, you were to find yourself 20 feet underwater, your natural instinct would be to hold your breath and swim to the surface as fast as you could. And it’s that kind of instinct that Hall tries to un-teach to his students in order to make them good scuba divers.
“It’s totally unnatural to breathe underwater, but that’s what you’ve got to teach yourself to do,” says Hall.
Hall, who was the founder of the Millersport Dive and Rescue Team (now called the Fairfield County Special Operations Dive Team), spends several weekends throughout the summer teaching students how to swim with a self contained underwater breathing apparatus, or scuba gear. Although his class teaches everything from how to set up and inspect your scuba gear to taking care of a diving buddy who may be in trouble, Hall says that, “It boils down to developing good instincts and habits.”
Hall first became interested in scuba diving when, as a child, he fell into the ice while playing hockey. Hall did not go completely under, but said that he realized that there may have been no one to help him if he had.
After learning to dive and becoming proficient with the scuba gear, Hall founded the dive and rescue team in order to save those who were in danger on Buckeye Lake as well as nearby streams, which can become dangerous during heavy rainfalls and spring thaws. Unfortunately, says Hall, by the time the team is usually alerted, they must go into recovery mode because the water has already taken away any chance of rescue.
The bulk of students in Hall’s summer courses are police officers and firefighters wanting to learn rescue and recovery techniques. However, there are also quite a few students who are interested in enjoying the crystal clear waters in Key West or the Caribbean, more than swimming around in the murky waters of Buckeye Lake.
On Saturday, August 6, Hall worked with students Jamie and Cheryl Haid, of Millersport. The Haid’s take frequent vacations to Mexico and were interested in learning proper diving habits in order to best explore the underwater world along the coastlines there.
The class began with a few hours of lecture about how to set up their gear, how to do a buddy check, and how to use a dive table, which is used to chart how long a diver can stay underwater, based on depth of a dive, number of dives and the length of breaks between dives.
After the lecture and dive charts were complete, the Haid’s and Hall suited up and took to the water at the Millersport Pool. During this portion of the class, the students learned how to make a proper Giant Stride entry into the water, how to aid another diver in case a compressed air tank were to run out and finally, once they were comfortable in the water, the students entered the pool sans scuba gear and had to don their equipment underwater.
“When it’s all over,” says Hall, “I want my students to leave the class as self sufficient divers. Divers who can handle things on their own.” (Story Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Seen past a diving vest and compressed air tank, Cheryl Haid and her husband Jamie, (left) of Millersport, listen to a lecture from scuba diving instructor Danny Hall (right) during a scuba class at the Millersport pool Saturday, August 6. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Scuba diving instructor Danny Hall describes the use of a pressure gage and depth altitude compensator on a typical diving gear vest before taking to the water with his students during a class at the Millersport pool Saturday, August 6. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Jamie Haid makes sure that his compressed air regulator is working properly before diving in to the water during a scuba diving class at the Millersport pool Saturday, August 6. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Jamie Haid, of Millersport, uses a dive table to chart out how many dives he can do, at which depths and for how long during a given period of time. Haid and his wife Cheryl were learning to do this as well as diving and breathing skills while taking a scuba class at the Millersport pool Saturday, August 6. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Cheryl Haid prepares her scuba gear before taking to the water in a scuba diving class at the Millersport pool Saturday, August 6. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Adorned by a wet suit and scuba gear, Cheryl Haid makes a Giant Stride entry into the deep end of the Millersport pool during a scuba diving class Saturday, August 6. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Scuba diving instructor Danny Hall resurfaces from the deep end of the Millersport pool during a scuba diving class Saturday, August 6. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Students Cheryl Haid (right) smiles back at scuba diving instructor Danny Hall as he gently reprimands her "buddy breathing" technique during a scuba class at the Millersport pool Saturday, August 6. Haid and her husband Jamie (left) were practicing "buddy breathing" where a diver shares his or her air with a fellow diver who, for what ever reason, is not able to get air from their own tank. According to Hall, his student was taking a bit to long to return the air regulator to her husband while they were underwater. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Reflections of the Car Show

This is just a fun shot from one of our many area car shows. I hope you like it.

Reflected in the chrome hubcap of a 1937 Studebaker Dictator, Francis Sherlock, of Bremen, walks around the front of his 1963 Oldsmobile Dynamic Eighty-Eight at the Bremen Oil Derrick Days Cruise In Saturday, August 6. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Ethics Discussion

Hello, William P. Cannon has started a good discussion about balancing personal political views with balanced campaign coverage. Check it out at: http://newsfotos.blogspot.com/

Old Barn to Find New Life

This interior view shows the main floor of the timber frame barn, which will be dismantled by Julie and Matthew Pepper and their family and relocated and raised on their land in Morgan County. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Emmett Greenleaf, a timber-framing advisor from Fairfax, Virginia, uses hand motions to guide a forklift into the barn while aiding the Pepper family in the dismantling of the structure Friday, August 5. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Chuck Byble, 21, of Columbus, helps to shift a large piece of timber from the girts in the center of the barn and onto a forklift while helping his girlfriend's family dismantle the structure Friday, August 5. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

This was part of one of our many photo packages that we do at our paper. To see it and others you can log onto www.lancastereaglegazette.com/photogalleries

Wild Art Searches

With temperatures reaching the mid-90's in Fairfield County Wednesday, August 3, Hannah Widener, 5, of Lancaster, reacts with glee to the cool water from a sprinkler in her family's front yard. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

On the other side of the spectrum from my last post, wild art hunts have their own challenge. When you stumble on the situation photographed here, a good shot is very easy to get - just keep your distance, let the child forget about you and be patient. The challenge is finding these shots. At our newspaper (and probably most papers our size {16K}), we are expected to find at least two or three wild art shots a week in addition to our regular workload. Sometimes this is easy, and other times I drive every city street and country road in the county looking for someone who is doing something visually appealing. When time permits, we search the newspaper’s community briefs, talk to school teachers and pee-wee football coaches in hopes of having a focus to our wild art search, but on the days when there is nothing going on (most days), we’re back to the road.
The other challenge, and really the biggest challenge is variety. There are some photos that we burn through early in each season that are only good as the seasons change. At our paper when we get one of these shots we call the other shooter and say something like, “I just shot kids in a snowball fight, that’s all of that for this winter.”
The fun of getting those pictures is finding a way to shoot them differently than you have in the past.
Other shots are always there, but you can’t shoot them every time you go out. One of the photographers that worked at The Star Press while I was an intern there used to chide me for shooting construction as wild art. It’s easy to get good shots with nice lines and neat angles, but why should it be in the newspaper AGAIN?
Now I always try to ask myself, why should it be in the newspaper? If I can answer that question without any BS, I stop and shoot, otherwise I drive on.
Some call these photos fluff, but I love feature shots. I’m not a fan of the overkill of wild art that we have to hunt for. However, when I shoot a cute kid in a sprinkler, a bee on a sunflower, or some girls spinning on a merry-go-round, I find out just how many people are looking at my work. As long as the people respond, and I can balance out the load of bad news with a quick smile, I’ll keep looking for the fluff.

Fire Destroys Home

As smoke billows out of every opening of the building a firefighter makes his way around to the front of a home at 3335 Old Columbus Road, between U.S. Route 33 and the Fairfield County Airport Tuesday, August 2. Five fire companies were on hand to battle a blaze that destroyed the home of Mark and Polly Francis. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Some photojournalists love spot news more than anything else. While I never have trouble getting the story telling shots, I sometimes I have a hard time dealing with the overall situation.
When I started as a shooter, I told myself that we do this kind of work for a greater good – that we show the pain that a family is dealing with from a fire, or a fatal crash or other tragedy so that the photos and story may make a reader think twice about driving drunk, or leaving the kids alone with a gun, or continuing to put off that electrical work that is posing a fire hazard.
I just wonder, though, if it has any consequence. Do the readers just see flames or twisted metal now? Are they desensitized to the gravity of the loss that these people feel?
Let me know your views on spot news. Do you love or hate it? Have you ever had feedback that made it seem vital as a part of our profession?
Polly Francis holds her daughter Montana, 11, close to her side as the two watch their home at 3335 Old Columbus Road, succumb to fire Tuesday, August 2. Polly and Montana were the only two people in the home at the time of the fire, and made it out unharmed. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Looking out for the little ones

Linda Eckfeld (above) laughs with her autistic son, Eric, 7, while playing hide and seek with him in the family’s home Wednesday, July 27. Linda and her husband Tom Eckfeld have 18 adopted special needs children living at home as well as three biological children and eight grandchildren who live away from home. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Seldom has an assignment touched my heart like this one did. The photo slip simply said Linda Eckfeld has 18 adopted children living at home – all with special needs. When I went in to document the home life I had no idea what to expect.
Eckfeld and the four children seen in the bottom photo greeted me into the home. Nurses and physical therapists swarmed throughout the small home to help with the care of the family. The children’s disabilities ranged from paralysis, to autism, to mild learning and developmental challenges.
I half expected to walk into a hospital ward like environment. There were, in fact, hospital beds, respirators, heart monitors and a plethora of medical supplies on hand. Throughout the home, however, there was a true family bond. Some children danced together to children’s songs, others clung to a nurse’s comforting arms and I later saw Eric Eckfeld, a seven-year-old boy with autism chasing his adoptive mother down a hallway in a cat and mouse type of game.
Most of the children in the family were taken in after the birth parents decided that the disabilities were too much to bear.
This assignment was shot towards the end of July. Since then, my wife and I have been blessed with the birth of our first child. He is a happy, healthy youngster with all of his facilities in working order. While I cannot imagine what the challenges would be in raising a special needs child, I can say that I was able to see as much joy and love in the eyes of the Eckfeld children as I see in my son’s eyes.
With or without knowing the case-by-case circumstances that led to each child being left by their parents, I cannot judge those decisions. What I can do is thank God that he has sent people like Linda Eckfeld into the world to give these children love.
There is goodness out there.

Physical therapist Judy Smalley (right) helps Joni Eckfeld, 10, do her range of motion exercises at the Eckfeld family home Wednesday, July 27. Smalley, along with eight nurses working rotations of 12-hour shifts, help to take care of the 18 special needs children that have been adopted and live with Tom and Linda Eckfeld. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

Bethany Eckfeld, 17, (below-from left) and her siblings Lacey, 3, Logan, 7, and Brittany, 16, dance the Electric Slide as it plays on a compact disc player in one of the many bed rooms in the Eckfeld home Wednesday, July 27. Linda Eckfeld and her husband Tom have 18 adopted special needs children living at home as well as three biological children and eight grandchildren who live away from home. (Copyright Ken Ritchie/Eagle-Gazette)

He's Here!

I will be out of the posting loop for a week or so. My wife just gave birth to our first child. His name is Dominic Watson Ritchie. He's 6 lbs 5 ozs 18 3/4 inches long and quite wonderful to behold. I hope to be back into some kind of normal routine soon, but I can't say when for sure.