New Photo Work Room at Miami’s Sun Life Stadium

Allen Eyestone works in the new photo workroom at Sun Life Stadium.

By Al Diaz

aldiaz305@aol.com 
The Miami Dolphins and the University of Miami Hurricanes have a new photo workroom at Miami’s Sun Life Stadium.

When the Miami Marlins baseball team decided to bug out of Sun Life for the new Marlins Park, photographers Allen Eyestone and Dave Cross went to work on lobbying for a better work space in the football stadium.

Working independently of each other, Eyestone staff photographer at The Palm Beach Post, produced a video showing the hazardous conditions working out of an old trailer outside the stadium and the obstacles photographers faced getting to and from the field. Eyestone then photographed the better facilities around the country. He submitted his research to Miami Dolphins
 Senior Vice President of Media Relations, Harvey Greene.  

The steps to the old trailer was always dangerous while carrying gear.

Miami Dolphins
 Senior Vice President of Media Relations, Harvey Greene. 

 At the same time, Cross the Miami Dolphins team photographer, lobbied for the upgrade as well.

The result is a spacious 1,750 square foot media work room at event level inside the stadium with a capacity for 175 people. The room is equipped with free Wi-Fi and about 40 locations in the room have hard wired Ethernet.

Greene is glad the room is being well received by photographers and says the current space used to house the former Marlins equipment room and players lounge.

He goes on to say that photogs are allowed to eat with everyone else in the main press box before the Dolphin game. At halftime hot dogs and chips are provided in the photo room for free.

If that’s not good enough, master technicians from SouthernPhoto Technical Service will be providing complimentary sensor cleaning, general camera maintenance and minor camera repairs on site.

SPTS is a Factory Authorized Service Center for all major brands of photographic equipment and has been in Miami since 1948.

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SPTS Master technician Wifredo Cruz and Annie Bone at the media center.

Owner Isaac Hadid says they will also be providing the same service at this years Sony Ericsson Open tennis tournament on Key Biscayne and Florida Atlantic University Football games.

The Miami Herald's Charles Trainor Jr. inside the new work room.

The Miami Herald's Joe Rimkus Jr., at left, and The Palm Beach Post's Allen Eyestone at right.

South Florida Sun-Sentinel's Jim Rassol at work.

Tampa Bay Buccaneers team photographer Mike Carlson heads to the field.

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Duke of Canes Football

Miami Hurricanes Duke Johnson celebrates a 54 yard touchdown run in the second quarter.

View The Miami Herald Photo Gallery Here, UM vs BC.

By Greg Cote

gcote@miamiherald.com

CHESTNUT HILL, Mass. -- We have seen the face and the future of Miami Hurricanes football and need but a single syllable to say it:

Duke.

No. Wait.

Duke!

The exclamatory is necessary if you want that syllable to sound like what Duke Johnson looked like here Saturday afternoon in sparking and lifting UM to its season-opening 41-32 victory over Boston College. Read more here:

Duke Johnson on a 54 yard touchdown run in the second quarter

Duke Johnson runs for a 56 yard touchdown in his freshman debut in the third quarter.

The Canes quarterback Stephen Morris celebrates with freshman running back Duke Johnson after Johnson scores in the second quarter to put Miami in the lead.

Anthony Chickillo celebrates on the field after the Canes defeat the Eagles 31-42 in the season opener.

View The Miami Herald Photo Gallery Here, UM vs BC.

It's always great when the Canes travel to Boston. It gives me an excuse to say "leave the gun, take the canolli" at Mike's Pastry in the North End. The weather was beautiful at Alumni Stadium at Chestnut Hill. All the action was shot on a Canon Mark EOS 1D Mark IV hanging on a Black Rapid RS-7 camera strap, using the Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM. The older version of the Canon EF EOS 400 f2.8L IS   is mounted to the second Canon camera body. 

Here is another game story by Miami Herald writer Susan Miller Degnan.


By SUSAN MILLER DEGNAN
SDEGNAN@MIAMIHERALD.COM
CHESTNUT HILL, Mass. -- The Miami Hurricanes found their quarterback.

And thanks to a baby-faced freshman named Randy “Duke” Johnson, they found their way.

Johnson ran for 135 yards on seven carries — including touchdown sprints of 54 and 56 yards — to help the Canes bounce back from a 14-0 deficit Saturday and defeat Boston College 41-32 in the season opener at Alumni Stadium. Read more here:

2012 Football Preview

Football at last, my favorite time of year! Here are some of the preview section fronts and portraits I photographed for The Miami Herald this season.

University of Miami running back Mike James

Miami Dolphins running back Reggie Bush and Booker T. Washington High's linebacker and top college prospect Matthew Thomas. Page design by Robert Cohn.

Florida International University's Wayne Times, (5), Tourek Williams, (97) and Johnathan Cyprien, (7)

For lights I used three Dynalite strobe heads for hair light, fill or background. The main light source is from a Norman pack with a Norman 5 X 22" Soft Light Beauty Dish Reflector and grid. It was all shot on a Canon Mark EOS 1D Mark IV using the EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM.

Stop Shooting, It's Time to Eat!

Jose "Streaks" Baserva owner of Jose’s Real Cuban Food in Bradenton Florida

By Al Diaz

aldiaz305@aol.com 

Boliche? Even though I grew up in a Cuban-American household I don’t remember ever eating it. So that’s what I ordered at Jose’s Real Cuban Food in Bradenton Florida. Boliche, Eye Round Roast stuffed with chorizo, black beans and rice, plantains or yucca at $13.95.

I stopped by last football season to visit, Jose “Streaks” Baserva, an old high school classmate and now a popular restaurant owner. I was in town on my way to photograph the University of Miami vs. the University of South Florida.

A few weeks before the game a message on my facebook account popped up that said, “ I think we went to school with this guy.”  Posted was a link to a YouTube video with host Guy Fieri on Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives, a television series on the Food Network.

Certainly not the host I thought, but maybe the chef? Could that be "Streaks"?

I hadn't seen the guy since he was a waiter at Pizza Loft in Miami. During the early 90s my wife Cindy and I would eat at the pizza joint regularly. When we would walk in, Jose always made us feel at home and provided excellent service. At the time I did not know the waiter attended school with me at Immaculata-LaSalle High School.

Jose was partially bald and was missing one major identifying feature, a white patch of hair he used to have just above his forehead during our youth. It was not until I overheard a conversation with the couple seated next to us that I found out Jose graduated from high school in 1976. I called him over to our table.

Oye José, what high school did you go to? “LaSalle” he said.

I did not recognize him. 

Well who the hell are you? I asked with a chuckle. We went to school together!

He told me his full name, Jose Baserva. That still did not ring a bell even with a graduating class of only 200 kids. He finally mentioned that white patch of hair. Streaks! I shouted, when I finally realized he was an old classmate. We all had a good laugh.

Pizza Loft eventually shut down and moved to Davie, Florida, and I never saw “Streaks” again until now.

In 1997 Jose opened Jose’s Real Cuban Food at 8799 Cortez Road West in Bradenton.

Tampa Bay photojournalist Brian Blanco says its Cuban food for real and recommends the Lechon Asado - Arroz con frijoles negros, yucca o platanitos…"House Signature" Roast pork, black beans and rice, yucca or fried plantain, $10.95

So while you are covering the Republican National Convention or in town photographing the Bulls or Buccaneers in Tampa Bay, go on and stop by Jose’s Cuban Café and ask for “Streaks.”

Tell him an old high school classmate sent you.

Boliche, Eye Round Roast stuffed with chorizo, black beans and rice, plantains or yucca at $13.95.

Hurricane Andrew: Flamingos in the Bathroom

During Hurricane Andrew, flamingos huddled in the bathroom of Miami Metrozoo. Ron Magill along with the staff of the zoo, now called Zoo Miami, rounded up the flamingos and put them in the bathroom for safety. Photo by Ron Magill. Radio Interview

BY ARIANNA PROTHERO
APROTHERO@MIAMIHERALD.COM
For his entire adult life, Ron Magill has been responsible for taking care of animals.

Twenty years ago, he was the assistant curator at Miami Metrozoo and the man behind the lens for one of the most famous photos to come out of Hurricane Andrew.

In the picture, a bunch of flamingos huddle in a public restroom in the zoo. Hay covers the tiled floor and a white glare bounces off the tiled walls. The flock of birds looks completely out of place between the sinks and bathroom stalls.

The day before Andrew hit, Magill was nailing plywood over the windows at his house. He was also feeding rhinoceroses and rounding up a couple dozen flamingos.

“I remember thinking, gosh, you know, this hurricane better come after this work because I’m working my butt off and it better not be for nothing,” Magill said.

The staff at Metrozoo waited till the very last minute to move the flamingos. It’s a stressful process for the birds. They can easily break a leg. So, the staff wanted to be as certain as possible that the storm was going to hit.

Around 10 a.m. Sunday, Aug. 23, Ron and a group of his co-workers climbed into the flamingo pond by the zoo’s entrance. They formed a half circle and started advancing on the flamingos.

“That’s when all of the sudden we go: OK, one, two go!” Magill said. “And everybody goes in and just grabs as many flamingos as they can.

“And then we’re handing them up – we’ve got people on the bridge — handing them one by one, and they’re walking them to the bathroom, letting them go in the bathroom, coming back, getting more. A person literally hand walks him, holds him up to his chest, hand walks to the bathroom, opens the bathroom door, lets ‘em go.... It’s the first flamingo that gets in the bathroom that’s kind of freaked out. Oh my God I’m the only one here! It’s just a lot of flapping — and flamingos make a very unattractive sound, RAWG RAWG RAWG…”

After all the flamingos were in the bathroom, Ron looked back and saw a tangled mass of long pink bird legs and necks wedged between the sinks and bathroom stalls.

“Twenty to 30 flamingos just standing there. And they’re all in the corner, hovering in the corner, just kind of looking at you,” Magill said, “and looking at their own reflection in the mirror on the wall over the sink. And you look at their faces and they’re kind of like, what the heck is this?”

The zoo had put the flamingos in the bathroom before, during previous hurricane warnings. But this time, Ron had a camera. He had taken up photography because his research was getting published and he needed photos.

On his days off, Ron would shadow Miami Herald photographers.

“I learned from the guys at the Herald that listen, in journalism, you want to capture a moment, you want to have something that will instill some kind of emotion. And for that reason, I always had a point and shoot camera in my pocket. Always.”

So Magill pulled out his camera.

“I didn’t even look through the view finder,” he said.

And he snapped a shot. The shot, as it would turn out. He had no idea that photo would become an iconic image.

Then, Magill went home to his wife, who was nine months pregnant, in West Kendall . He rode out the storm that would ultimately redefine his community and the zoo he loved.
Read more about Hurricane Andrew Here
WLRN Radio Interview with Ron Magill