Celebrating 50 years

[tegan]

I first started taking pictures in 1958 with a Kodak Starmeter and tried to keep up with my mother going into buffalo herds, shooting bears at 10 feet away, and encountering mountain goats climbing up a mountain in B.C.

I progressed shortly to a Minolta rangefinder and competed against my mother in what was then called the National Association of Photographic Art. We came off pretty well even in awards.

I later moved to reflex cameras and did journalistic photography while still in high school. After university, I got into multi-media and slide shows and went to community college to learn television and film.

I got a job that then branched out into many areas. I produced, directed, and did shooting of live television, did hundreds of presentations for groups as large as 1,000, produced, and appeared on educational television, hung out of airplanes, shot from skis, did advertising, public relations and political photography, edited and shot for a local paper, and did multi-screen presentations with equipment that stretched 8 feet high by 6 feet wide with multiple projectors, programmers, sychronizers and other equipment. I also got the chance to work on productions involving Mother Teresa, John Howard Griffith and Patrick Watson as well as one of the previous mayors of Toronto.

I got into computer animation with (believe it or not) the Commodore 64 and digital photography with the Canon Xap Shot: 300 by 200 pixels. Later I produced a $12,000 program on Computer Animation for TV Ontario.

I am currently working on several projects including a book, and a very large law suit, although I am supposed to be retired.

Tegan

[Marko]

Thanks for sharing that wealth of experience tegan!
It's amazing you get any sleep at all

[tirediron]

And that sounds to me like fifty years well worth celebrating.

Congratulations!

[tegan]

Thanks, Marko and Tired Iron. My experiences were certainly varied from very funny and amusing to downright dangerous.

Some of the most unforgetable incidents included wearing shirt, tie, jacket etc., climbing over a barb wire fence into a wrecking yard protected by dobermans to take pictures. Then there was the administrator who lost the transmitter for a wireless microphone down her skirt and tried to retrieve it while talking on live television. There was the time that I had to move from the front to the back of an audience of 1,000 to turn on a mass of media equipment. Needless to say they turned out ALL the lights. I finally congratulated myself from getting to the correct location without tripping over any of the guests and pushing the right button, ONLY to discover that someone had pulled out the plug. I was shooting a stage play in front of a live audience and was worried about whether the circuits would handle all my lighting and television equipment. Everything was going great until a girl in the play turned on a small light. I was so close, that the addition of that small amount, blew every circuit in the place to pitch dark. Finding the right set of circuit breakers in a large building in the pitch dark was quite a challenge.

Tegan

[Travis]

congrats Tegan... some great stories!

just lemme know if you feel the need to tap into my vast reserve of 5 months experience.... lol..

[Marko]

Thanks for those stories tegan - we all have them!

One that always sticks out for me is taking pictures of fire dancers in Indonesia. I was too close and needed to back up and walked backward and fell 4 feet into a wet and muddy rice paddy. I was soaked, the camera was completely soaked (but I still have it and it works) and the locals were pissing themselves laughing at the stupid tourist.

[Travis]

... fell 4 feet into a wet and muddy rice paddy. I was soaked, the camera was completely soaked (but I still have it and it works) and the locals were pissing themselves laughing at the stupid tourist.

Another case for durability of film cameras!!!

[tirediron]

Another case for durability of film cameras!!!

Yep!

[tegan]

Thanks for those stories tegan - we all have them!

One that always sticks out for me is taking pictures of fire dancers in Indonesia. I was too close and needed to back up and walked backward and fell 4 feet into a wet and muddy rice paddy. I was soaked, the camera was completely soaked (but I still have it and it works) and the locals were pissing themselves laughing at the stupid tourist.

To beat that one, I was at a garden party of top executives, so I was wearing a white shirt and blue tie with (believe it or not) yellow pants and a blue blazer. I was to take a photo of the group, so I got them all arranged, but had to back up to get them all in.

I backed into a TV tray and knocked over a bottle of red wine all over my pants. Talk about embarassment.

Tegan

[tomorrowstreasures]

I lovesssssssss the lighter side of Tegan!!!! (just found this thread today) and, a bit belatedly - congrats on 50 years! (I will have my 50 years -that is, of living, in 09 )