Big Night

Despite my constant worrying no one would show up, last night's premier of my first-ever documentary "The Miracle of Father Kapaun" went off wonderfully.

Fifteen minutes before showtime, the auditorium was starting to fill up fast.

The Bishop of the Diocese of Wichita, Michael Jackels, jokes with Chase Kear, one of the main subjects of the documentary.

Wendy Lewis, a local artists who painted a beautiful mural of Father Kapaun that was featured in the documentary, exchanges information with Chase afterwards.

Me and the star.

There was a second showing immediately after the first. It was mostly populated by students from Kapaun Mount Carmel High School. Don't ask me to explain the partial roulette wheel above the screen. Guess it was sign to the crowd that they were taking a real gamble on whether it was worth their time to come.

Probably Not Gonna Have A Red Carpet

Drove to Kansas City Friday morning to pick up five boxes that looked like this:

In those 5 boxes were 1000 of these.

So the DVD is done and for sale. Here's the link to order online

Now I just gotta hope somebody watches it.

Time To Put A Fork In This Sucka

The master of audio engineering, Carter Green, masters the audio for my documentary Wednesday morning at Greenjeans Studios in Wellington, Kansas.

This was really the last major step that needed to be done to finish this thing up. As of 9 p.m. on December 2, I think I'm finished. I'm about one day ahead of my self-imposed deadline.

BTW... first viewing for the public is on Dec. 13 at Kapaun Mount Carmel High School in Wichita at 7 p.m.

Kapaun Documentary Trailer #2

Here's the second trailer for the documentary I'm working on.

Kapaun documentary trailer #2 from Travis Heying on Vimeo.

This Proves I've Really Been Working

My first teaser trailer for my first documentary. Pass the word along, will ya?

Kapaun documentary trailer from Travis Heying on Vimeo.

Praying For His Intercession

Last summer I began work on documentary about the life and actions of Fr. Emil Kapaun.

Kapaun, who was ordained a priest in Wichita in 1940, went on to do extraordinary things while serving as an Army Chaplain during the Korean War. Kapaun died while being held in a North Korean POW camp in May of 1951.

Kapaun's actions in the camp, and on the battlefield, helped save the lives of dozens of men. Earlier this month, the Secretary of the Army concluded that Kapaun was deserving of the Congressional Medal of Honor.

In addition, the Vatican is investigating incidents that have happened in Wichita where people prayed for the intercession of Fr. Kapaun to help heal sick loved ones. The Vatican has come to Wichita to look at two possible miracles involving people praying to Kapaun. Read about one of those incidents here.

Right now I feel like I could use an intercession to help finish this documentary. This is new territory for me. Frightening and exciting all at the same time. I have to be finish around the first week of December. I'll post trailers here and what not in the coming weeks.

Hitting The Target Audience

This video I shot last summer had marginal success when I posted it on Kansas.com

A month ago, I got a request from Outdoorlife.com for permission to post the video on their site. Between plays that we can count on our video player, and the number of times it's been ripped and reposted on the internet without our permission (break.com, etc), I suspect the video is nearing a half-million plays.

Not bad.

I'll take it.

Twenty Years

Moments of introspection are not usually covered in this blog, so don't go getting used to it.

The girl in the photo above is my mom. Not sure how old the photo is, but I'm guessing late 1940's or early 1950's. Long before I knew who she was. Not until I was in my 30's did I discover this photo. It's actually the only photo I have of her. Even though I didn't know her then, for some reason, it's how I like to think of her.

On September 11, 1989, she died. I guess it should be no different than any other year between then and now. Maybe It feels like a generation has now passed. Maybe I'm just overly-sentimental these days. Whatever the reason, I've found myself thinking about her more on this anniversary than any of the previous 19.

It goes without saying that it sent my life on a different trajectory. Hard telling how life would have turned out had she not died. As hard as it is to admit to myself though, I suspect life actually turned out better for me than it might have otherwise. The reasons are too numerous to name, but suffice to say, I grew up pretty fast.

Sometimes I think I'm supposed to be bitter that I only had 15 years of her guidance and nurturing. Our mother's are our best teachers. She was certainly that. But as I've gotten older, I guess I looked at it this way: Her death taught me some tough life lessons that she couldn't have taught me if she were still alive. Don't get me wrong... I'd rather it hadn't been that way. But there's no changing what happened.

The first lesson is that tomorrow is not guaranteed. Sounds cliché I realize. I think if there's a lesson that I fail at the most frequently, it's this one. I could do a better job of living life to it's fullest potential. "Drive it like you stole it," is what my friend Len Vaughn-Lahman would have said.

The second lesson is that it's your choice on how you want to let a loss affect you. Whether it's death or something else, you're either going to make it and survive, or you're not. It sure felt like the end of life as I knew it when it happened. As it turned out, it was only the beginning. I need to be reminded of that from time to time and maybe that's why I'm thinking about her more than ever.

I miss her, and I hope I've made her proud.

I forget more and more things about her all the time. I can't even remember the sound of her voice anymore. I remember enough about her though to know that no matter what, she would be proud. And I know that's true for Kelly, Craig and Kim as well.

When Photojournalists Go Camping

Spent a lovely August weekend on the banks of the Niobrara River in northern Nebraska with three college buddies. Matt Miller, Lane Hickenbottom, Ryan Soderlin and me were all photographers for the Daily Nebraskan in the 1990's.

The weather was perfect for late August. Even surprisingly cool. I hadn't had a real vacation yet this year.

If you're under impression that Nebraska is nothing more than never-ending fields of corn, you've not been to the Niobrara. It's beautiful.

We're photographers. That makes us resourceful. Coffee courtesy of the truck battery. Ryan fills his air mattress the same way. Turns out the air mattress had a hole, making Ryan's resourcefulness questionable.

A flock of turkey's joined our campsite every morning and evening. It was though we were in the way.

With headlamp, Ryan bothers Lane while Lane tries to stay warm in front of the campfire. Matt, in typical fashion, was already in bed.

When you go to the Niobrara, here's what you do: Rent a few tubes to sit on, plus one to sit your beer cooler on, and float down the river all day. This was the scene from our camp.

When Matt first told me about the trip, I asked him what it entailed. His response: "Basically you just lie on your back while floating down the river and drink beer all day."

Sounded good to me.

He wasn't kidding.

Lane was the beer drinking champion on day 1. No one even finished a close second.

The end of the second day of floating brought us to Rocky Ford. We unhitched the tubes from one another and Lane and I decided to run the rapids. This is what is commonly referred to as a Six Beer Decision.

Lane. Professional goofball.

Matt light's a cigar late Saturday night.

Soderlin and I were there to capture it. This is what happens when four photographers go camping.

Lane shot this fire-lit photo from our campsite. Awesome time.

Wichita To The Rockies in 3.5 Minutes

Don't you wish you were this fast?

Wichita to the Rockies in 3.5 minutes from Travis Heying on Vimeo.

Have been meaning to try a long-distance time lapse for a while now. What better place to try it out than the most boring strip of concrete ever paved: I-70 across western Kansas.

Mounted a Canon 30d to my passenger seat and a remote timer fired the camera every 10 seconds, all the way to Longmont, Colorado.

Before any of you hit the comment button and pour it on about the iPhone, keep in mind, it's also my iPod.

Fields Of Gold

Was out in central Kansas Thursday working on a harvest story.

Being out in a wheat field when it's 100 degrees out, swatting mosquitos and chasing after some nice light reminded me of the summer of 1995. Back then I was shooting pictures in the wheat fields of Kansas as an intern for the Wichita Eagle. One of the best summers ever.

Hard to believe it's been that long.

A Grape Catch For The World Record

Every now and then, an assignment comes across the desk and you just know it's gonna turn out good. This was one of those assignments.

A Grape Catch for the World Record from Travis Heying on Vimeo.

Summer Solstice Garden Party

Saturday was the annual Summer Solstice Party at Bartlett Arboretum in Belle Plaine, Ks. Step through the gate at the arb's east border, and you essentially step into another time and place. It's pretty magical. Nothing artificial about it.

A dinner of fried chicken is probably the highlight. At least it is for me.

We're talkin' classy here, people. White attire is requested (required) and it looks like you're at a garden party in the year 1929, not 2009.

There's a croquet tournament. I played. Didn't bring my "A" game.

My co-worker Jaime serves as official photographer and and every year shoots the big group portrait. Before that though, we had a camera duel.

Draw!

Croquet. Gin-spiked lemonade. Fried Chicken. A beautiful summer evening. Even girls dressed in white riding around on horses. Hard not to enjoy an evening like that. I keep going to events like this and I'll have to change the name of my blog to Indoor Dog.

Webster County, Nebraska

"Trees were so rare in that country, and they had to make such a hard fight to grow, that we used to feel anxious about them, and visit them as if they were persons. It must have been the scarcity of detail in that tawny landscape that made detail so precious."

Willa Cather - My Ántonia

Spent my weekend in Webster County, Nebraska. The home of Willa Cather and the landscapes that inspired many of her writings. It's also the hometown of my college bud Jeff Haller, who was making a visit home this past weekend. The photo above is from the Willa Cather Memorial Prairie that sits along the Kansas-Nebraska border. It had just been burned recently, and with recent rains, it could not have been greener.

Red Cloud, the county seat, is where Willa Cather grew up. Jeff returned to Red Cloud a couple of years ago to work on a project about small town America for his master degree at Ohio University. I encourage you to check it out. Jeff's got a great passion for his hometown.

This trip was all business for him. He was shooting photos in Red Cloud, and nearby Guide Rock, for a website to promote the towns. I tagged along and made a few photos myself.

Realized over the weekend just how little I get the still camera out these days because of my duties working on video for Kansas.com. It felt good to just focus on photographs again.

As Jeff well knows, there are fewer photo subject as interesting as small town America. I think there's a part in all of us that yearns for the lifestyle you see in photos from places like Red Cloud. Simple, honest and safe.

Poor dog.

Poor bird.

Trust me, this photo disturbs me as much as I'm sure it does you. But I couldn't resist posting it. Jeff was shooting photos of this kid's sister riding her bike down the middle of the street. The kid pulled a BB gun out of his mothers car, took aim at this robin and plunked it right out of a tree. It was horrifying, but he was obviously pretty proud.

Trust me, when the two of us get together, it's never all work and no play. (Though Jeff works pretty damned hard and that makes playing difficult)

We threw a few back at The Palace Steakhouse. They make some pretty stiff drinks there.

I was reading through some Willa Cather quotes tonight. I came across this one and found it fitting for Jeff.

"When we look back, the only things we cherish are those which in some way met our original want; the desire which formed in us in early youth, undirected, and of its own accord."

Willa Cather - The Song of the Lark

It's That Time Of Year (Updated)

I used to define a successful night of storm chasing by coming home with a photograph of a tornado. Guess I'm getting old and wiser. Or maybe just slower.


Had some nice lookin' storms come into the Wichita area Friday night and for a little while it was looking like it might be tornado city.

No funnels, but I felt pretty good about the image above. A perfect, rotating thunderstorm that just couldn't get its act together.

After it was all said and done, Wichita was awash in a beautiful orange sky for a brief moment. Ran to the top of a parking garage to snag this snap(s). Check out my friend Jaime's take on it.

You Want Ketchup Or Mustard With That?

The winner of this funnel cake eating contest received a free skybox party during a semi-pro baseball game. Hardly worth the trouble, I'd say. 

Suspect this guy doesn't even like baseball. 

Funnel Cake Eating Contest from Travis Heying on Vimeo.

Greensburg 360

Made a return trip to Greensburg two years after it was leveled by a tornado.

Every now and again, I try to make a 360 panorama of the town's park. Basically, I shoot a series of vertical photos, turning in a circle as I do it. Using Adobe Bridge's Photomerge tool, they're stitched together into a panorama. Additional software, in this case a program called "MakeCubic" turns it into a QuickTime VR movie. You can grab the photo and spin around in a circle. You can also click on the +,- buttons on the bottom to zoom in on certain details.

Here's the stitched photo laid out flat.

My Old Basement

This mountain, not to be mistaken with Cornejo Mountain, has been steadily growing for over a month. Old carpet, drywall, rotted wood, trim... it's all there.

There's a carpet guy making a bunch of racket beneath me right now; the final phase of this project is nearly complete. I have a few other things to do, such as remove this trash mountain, in the next 36 hours.

Shoot Me Now

I've done a number of do-it-yourself projects around the house over the last decade. They all pale in comparison to this one. The mess you see behind me has to be finished by the 21st of the month. That's the day the carpet guy comes to do his part. All of it has to be completed by April 25. Pressure's on.

Problem is, I don't know when and where to stop. What was supposed to be a simple carpet removal job turned into a complete gutting and redo.

That's 10.5 gallons of sheet rock mud. It's messy, and it never seems to do what I want it to. Putting this stuff on correctly is a lot like pottery, and I'm no artist.

Here's the back corner. The place where sheet rock scraps go to die.

Any good handyman will tell you that in order to do a job correctly, you've got to have the right tools. Here are two essentials.