I turned 60
on December 15th. And I’m
feeling pretty good and happy. I’m a
hockey fan and always wanted to sit on the glass, Row “A” as they call it at
the Jobing.com arena in Glendale, Arizona, home of the Phoenix Coyotes of the
NHL.
So on
December 14, I sat in the front row with Marni and Faron along with my Canon 5D
Mark III and Canon 24-105mm lens.
I set my
camera to TV mode, or shutter priority.
I set my shutter at 1/500th of a second. I also set ISO to auto. Unless you want blur on purpose, a fast
shutter speed is necessary. I could have
set my white balance in camera, but I reset in Lightroom to fluorescent since I
was shooting in RAW format. It takes
maybe a second to highlight all the photos and sync the white balance for
everything, so I don’t worry about that much.
You never
know what celebrity might be in the audience.
Sitting several rows behind me in section 110 was the coach of the
Paradise Valley Community College Puma’s baseball team, Victor Solis. Dropping the ceremonial puck today was
Arizona Diamondbacks slugging first basemen Paul Goldschmidt.
One little
lesson I learned. As I was moving around
in row A, I set my beer on the ledge in front of me, got ready to shoot, and
yes some players banged into the glass in front of me. I thought something felt cold on my
feet. Yup, one beer on the floor in
front of me. Hey, I’m the birthday boy
and I’m sittin’ in ROW A baby, so who cares!
In addition
to Marni and Faron, a special thanks to Haus
Murphy’s of Glendale. The owner came
out and bought me a beer and gave me a free cherry strudel before the
game. And a nice bartender at Westgate’s
Saddle Ranch bought
me a shot of rum before the game started.
No wonder I was relaxed at the game!
By the way,
the Coyotes lost 3 to 1 to the Carolina Hurricanes.
Keep
Shooting,
…and all of my
photos from Row A at the Coyotes are below.