Courtside tickets? Free! Just one catch: there was work to be done.

Saturday marked my first time at a Stanford basketball game. It also marked my first acquisition of a significant media credential. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

There I was, sitting at the baseline, with a photographer from the San Jose Mercury News at my left and a photographer for the AP at my right, taking photos of the game. In all, there were about seven of us shooting.

Things started off badly for me. My timing was off, and my frustration was leading to AF misses. After a half-hour or so, I got into the groove, and my images showed significant improvement.

Two fun highlights from the game:  First, I got to kick away a basketball as it was flying towards me.  Second, I took three photos during the game that were blown out by the house strobes, which were controlled by the AP photog.  That means that my shutter was open at the exact moment that the strobes were triggered, which is unlikely when you consider my 1/400 second shutter speed.

I haven’t decided exactly which photos I’m going to submit to the paper. I’ve narrowed it down to about seven options, but I’d like to limit my submission to the best four or five. Even then, there are no guarantees that any of them will run.

Even if none of my photos see print, I’m glad I had the opportunity to be at the game: I had fun.

The options are currently on Flickr with the basketball tag.