2011 Head of The Charles Regatta

Cambridge, MA The 2011 Head of the Charles Regatta took place under a perfect New England fall day which brought thousands of spectators to watch the competition. (Essdras M Suarez/ Boston Globe) BEHIND THE SCENES: I have photographed this event about four or five times in my career and I can not recall a more beautiful fall day. The temperatures were in the 60's but the sun was shining for most of the day. On top of having to get enough images for a gallery in boston.com they wanted me to get features that said fall, thus the beautiful wide angle shot with the rowers, crowd and clouds. I was also asked for other features. Regularly I try not to photograph children and babies for the sake of them being cute. I believe these to be too much of an "easy" subject to photograph. I usually require a moment within context in order for a situation to appeal enough for me to make a photo. In this case the mother hoisting her six-month old worked beautifully because it was a way to show the reader/ viewer the crowds attending the event plus this was a bona-fide moment. The same with the man and his dog. It is because I caught the jump in mid air and how this slice of time blends with its environment and how it told the story of the good weather and the crowds watching that I deemed the scene worthy of this photo. The clean black background in the rower images is because I know where the sun is going to come from and how it hits the faces of the rowers and the dark background of the bridges that I knew enough to be in that spot. However this year I'd forgotten where it was originally and it took me about 20 minutes of walking around to find it again. TECH STUFF: low ISOs between 200- 340. Speeds in the 1000th's of a second. WB at cloudy. EXTRA NOTE: The image of the boat, the crowd, the clouds and the sun starburst I designed by closing my aperture all the way to 22 to make sure I would get that beautiful effect. GEAR: Two bodies a MarkIII and a MarkIV, three lenses: 70-200mm 2.8, 17-35mm 2.8, 300mm 2.8 and a 1.4TC.