John Boal Photography

I recently came back from New Mexico. Aside from visiting my wife's family in Rio Rancho, we were able to see a little of the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta.  High winds ruined the first day of balloons so we weren't able to see the mass-ascension in the morning, although we did have the enjoyment of waking up at 430am and waiting in lines and riding school buses to and from the park for a few hours.  However, the next evening we attended the Balloon Glow, an event where hundreds of balloons inflate, tether, and ignite their torches and glow at various times after sunset.  Fireworks brought the night to a close. Click on a picture to see a gallery of the images from this post.  I think it's a really awesome feature Blogspot added.  "Carne Red Burrito" from Sadie's, balloons, and near-perfect weather.  Seriously, how can you complain? Inflating a balloon as we watch, backs to the setting sun. You'll never be disappointed in the light you f...

Since I left the paper in March, my life has definitely taken an interesting turn.  A busy turn.  I stay at home and take care of my daughter, who is now approaching 7 months...and in the mean time I do a lot of assisting.  What's been difficult is finding jobs where I actually shoot.  This is a collection, with comments, naturally, on what I've been shooting  in the past month. I revisited Ricky Chang ( see my project and blog post here ) to see what he was up to, as well as photograph the launch of his friends' bike across america fundraiser ( see their blog and info here ).  It was great to see young people taking such an active role in helping someone out.  These are some pictures from that morning.  In addition, I've received some work from The Fairfax Times, as well as some freelance work with my old paper, The News & Messenger.  The funny thing is that when I shot these assignments, I couldn't help but reflect on the...

I recently attended the LOOK3 photo festival in Charlottesville, VA for the first time.  This is definitely a festival I'd been wanting to attend since I first heard of it several years ago.  Here are some pictures and thoughts on some of the stuff I saw in the past week. -I'm embarrassed to say that I didn't really know Alex Webb's work.  His was the first gallery I walked into.  Alone.  I was there a day early to see the TREES talk with David Doubilet , so I got some exploring out of the way early, without a thousand people around me, which was great.  I was blown away.  In fact, my first response to seeing all this work was, "damn, I should just quit.  there's no way I'll ever be this good".  I'm not quitting, but damn, was I inspired. -I loved being able to meet random people, hang out with them, and then meet the people they know, collect business cards so you can look at their work later.  It really is an inspiring week to m...

This past weekend was my last at The News & Messenger, a paper I’d been a full-time staffer since November 2008. When I first started to write this, I wrote too much. Then I realized I could write this very simply: With the arrival of my first child in December, it became readily apparent that staying with the paper was no longer viable. My wife and I decided that it made the most sense for me to stay at home with the new baby and freelance. First, I don’t have to sign over my paycheck every month to a childcare center. Childcare really is that expensive…or that’s an indication of how little I got paid. Additionally, it allows me to focus on freelancing, which is where I was headed anyway (especially with the disappearance of staff jobs from the larger, more prestigious papers). I like to think I did my best while working at The News & Messenger. I know I’ve become a much better photographer, and much of that is due to daily assignment work. Here are pictures from every ...

The other day I had an assignment to get a photograph of a sophomore who would be participating in the upcoming dunk contest at Hoopsfest, a basketball skills competition/fundraiser our paper throws every year. The idea was to get a "clean" shot of him dunking the ball so we could use it in a variety of ways for the cover of the program and maybe a t-shirt or something. I had an idea of what I wanted him to do, where I wanted the lights...etc. In these situations (without assistants, naturally), I need the subject to stand in so I can prefocus, then we can go through the 20 or so shots of him leaping into the frame. If I move my position, we do another "prefocus" and then repeat the shots until we get what we like. Usually these shots are throwaways, however, when I looked at the computer back at the office, there was a small collection of cool, wide portraits. I have no idea if he was posing (well, one of them he was, obviously) or not, but I love these shots. The ...

Yes, this is a year-in-review post. Yes, there are words and not just pictures. Scroll down to see the pictures and skip the words. This year was quite a year for me. A year of firsts. A year of much growth, professionally and personally, although on this blog, I generally post my thoughts as they pertain to my professional life. However this year brought such profound personal change, it'd be silly not to mention it. This was the year I learned (and co ntinue to learn about) multimedia storytelling. In December of 2010, I purchased a Canon 7D with the understanding of its importance, but not yet understanding how powerful it would be. At that point I had already started shooting my project about Ricky ( Live Fast, Ride Faster ). I've already blogged about that experience, here . However I was pleasantly pleased to see that my first true multimedia venture was recognized in a couple contests. 2nd place in the March Multimedia Contest of the National Press Photographers Associat...