A number of great photos by by friend Erling Larson.

The senior Contemporaries are accompanied at their final performance at Wharton Field House during half time of the Moline / Rocky Basketball game. Click through for photos of Basketball, Dancing, and Basketball player, cheerleader and contemporaries senior pictures.

Another great MLK weekend basketball tournament. Moline really pulled off the last game with a come from behind win. Way to go Maroons. Check out some photos from today.

Here’s the final match of Short Hills’ season long Member / Member match tournament. I couldn’t be happier since these are the buddies that I golf with every Wednesday and Saturday. This final match went the entire 18 ... and ... an extra hole before it was final. It the end, Mark Parkinson and Greg Ricke came from behind to beat Marty Davis and Pat Brorby on the 19th hole. Then ... we went straight to the 19th hole to celebrate! :-) Check out these photos from the back nine during this hard fought match.

It was a blustery day and the girls played tough. I stopped by Moline High School and grabbed a few photos of Sectional Tennis. Even though the title says “Moline”, there are some photos of girls from Geneseo, Alleman, and Galesburg. Take a look!

Quite the brisk night and Moline got off to a slow start falling behind 49-0 at the half. They did come back and scored 28 unanswered points in the second half. Made it a good showing .... great character. Here are a few photos of the game and photos of the homecoming court.

I finally made it to a Moline Volleyball game. This was a hard fought meet and Moline was in the first game at the end and way ahead in the second game. Unfortunately they lost both :-(. Take a look at some of the photos I captured.

It was a beautiful day for the annual Quad City Marathon. I always enjoy shooting this event as it is such an accomplishment for everyone that finishes. Thanks go out to Ken Arevalo for including me on the photographer team. I shot some pictures of the start, went to downtown rock island to shoot a few with the Centennial Bridge in the background, then back to the finish line for the leaders and the rest. Here are a couple hundred of my “picks” of the day.

Did a little road trip to St. Louis for the Cowboys / RAMS game. Only had a little camera, but still had to capture a few photos.

It was a heartbreaker for Moline. They dominated Alleman for most of the game, but somehow let them escape at the end. Check out the photos I captured.

It was a beautiful day for a very successful Color the Quads 5k race! A big thank you goes out to Mel Foster and race director Sarah Johnson for bringing this great event to our area. As you can see from my photos, this is all out fun for the participants.

It was a great morning for the kids races at the Bandshell in Bettendorf for Color The Quads. As you can easily see from my photos, they had a great time! What a great event!

A slightly abstract photo of the Moline High School Girls Basketball team charging down the court on a fast break. They played a hard game and came back from behind to almost pull it out in the end. Good game girls!!

I used the game to try out some new lighting and a remote camera. I now have four Strobelights (Canon 580EX), one at each corner of the field house, with extra battery packs, and triggered with Radiopopper PX’s. My main camera is a Canon 1DmkIV and I’m using a 50mm f1.4 lens for most shots. I’m typically shooting at 1/500th of a second shutter speed, f/2.8 aperture, ISO 1600 and using ETTL for the fill in flash. This game I also used Radiopopper JrX’s to remote fire a camera on the baseline. That is my new “travel camera”, a Canon SL1 that I set up with a 16mm lens on the floor under the basket. It uses the same 4 flashes as well and I was shooting at f/4 for a little more depth of field. There are a few good photos from here, but the flashes didn’t fire all the time ... still a few kinks to work out.

Take a look.

I recently traveled “Down Under” and had the opportunity to take in one of their premium horse races, the “Cox Plate”. This is a legendary horse race in Melbourne, Australia that has been running since 1922. As you may imagine, it has a lot of the “pomp and circumstance” of the Kentucky Derby with a little bit of a “down under” flair. Here are a few photos of the horses, the race action, the people and the fashion.

Stopped by Wharton Field House this morning to grab a few photos of Moline Volleyball. Take a look.

Lots of excitement at Moline’s Homecoming game Friday night. It was an exciting, up and down, drawn out, hard fought football game against UTHS. And it was so much more … what a great day of celebration:
See my photos for shots of:

• Football
• Homecoming Court
• Superfans
• M-Men
• Contemporaries
• Cheerleaders
• and the Band.

I hope you like them.

I had the opportunity to shoot the Quad City Marathon again this year. It was a blast! The theme that I’d say was predominant this year was “EMOTIONAL”! I spent a lot of time at the finish line shooting finishers. The Relay Teams were excited and full of energy. The marathoners were different. A number came in completely spent and exhausted. Some had some left and had a kick to the end. The thing that got to me the most was the emotion of the first time marathoners when they came across the finish line. After all, they’ve been training for this moment for most of a year and a number of them just broke down. It was really touching and I really felt proud for every one of them. It’s so great to be close to the action. I tried to capture a little of it in photos.

It was a beautiful night in Augustana’s new stadium as Moline took on Alleman. Or should I say Alleman took it to Moline? I did get a few photos … check ‘em out.

Seems like we’re coming up with all kinds of excuses to party. Here’s another one. The “Glow Run” in downtown Moline. The race started fairly informally with three waves of runners. Wave 1 - “Runners”. Wave 2 - “Walkers”, and Wave 3 - “Partiers”. I was surprised that anyone started in wave 1 or 2 since they all seemed to be “Partiers”. Check out a few photos of the evening.

It’s fall, the nights are starting to get cool, and it’s time for Moline High School Sports! This year I had the privilege of designing the cover for the Booster’s Sports Program. Hope you like it.

I plan to get out to a number of games again this year. Come back here to see photos of your favorite Moline High School stars.

If you have a special request, drop me a note from the contact link above or direct to my email at JRHowell@me.com.

You can always click on the MHS “Category” to get a list of all the Moline High School events I’ve photographed. I hope you enjoy them.

And … the committee was generous enough to publish an advertisement for me in the program.


See you at the game … I’ll be the one with the big camera ;-)

Congratulations to Justin Rumey and the teams of Derrick Stabler & Will Wallace and Jed Wood & Puri Pranav for advancing to State. I was fortunate enough to capture some photos of their matches at sectionals. Check ‘em out.

A great header save as the Moline girls take on the Normal Wildcats. Please browse photos of the Varsity contest here.

And … I have a few photos of the Junior Varsity game as well.

Congratulations to the Moline High School Basketball Seniors celebrating their season this evening.

• Drew Owens
• Bryan Brinker
• Vashaun Newman
• Jake Viaene
• Josh Larsen
• DeCarlos Flores
• Devin Struble
• Derrick Stabler
• Jed Wood

I am proud to have produced the “posters” for their banquet this evening.

Here are the Moline games I shot this year:

• 27Feb2013 - Regional Playoffs versus Rocky
• 25Feb2013 - Regional Playoffs versus UTHS
• 22Feb2013 - Home versus UTHS
• 15Feb2013 - Home versus Rocky
• 1Feb2013 - Home versus Alleman
• 21Jan2013 - MLK Tournament
• 19Jan2013 - MLK Tournament
• 11Jan2013 - Away at Rocky
• 7Jan2013 - Freshman Basketball

Congratulations to the Moline members of the Boys Metro Basketball All Stars:

• Tyler Boscontine - Sophomore Guard
• Drew Owens - Senior Guard
• Brandon Vice - Junior Forward
• Jed Wood - Senior Guard
• Derrick Stabler - Honorable Mention

This year I had the pleasure of shooting at a few Moline Basketball Games:

• 27Feb2013 - Regional Playoffs versus Rocky
• 25Feb2013 - Regional Playoffs versus UTHS
• 22Feb2013 - Home versus UTHS
• 15Feb2013 - Home versus Rocky
• 1Feb2013 - Home versus Alleman
• 21Jan2013 - MLK Tournament
• 19Jan2013 - MLK Tournament
• 11Jan2013 - Away at Rocky
• 7Jan2013 - Freshman Basketball

and … I am proud to have produced the senior posters.

Moline advanced to the second round of the Regional Playoffs to meet Big 6 Champion Rocky. As you can tell from the photo above, it was a pretty physical game. Here are a few photos of the evening.

The scoreboard is a little confusing as Moline is the home team and UTHS are the visitors in this first Regional Playoff game. So … as the cheerleaders and students celebrate the score is 50 to 47 Moline over UTHS with 20.1 seconds left to play. Moline came out victorious in this very competitive, exciting game. As a result Moline advances to play Big 6 champion Rocky next … now postponed to 2/27/2013. Here are a few photos of the Moline / UTHS battle.

It was Senior Night at Wharton Field House for the Moline vs UTHS Basketball game. And … ofllowing the theme, it was “Senior Citizens” Night for the SuperFans!

Browse through my photos of the game, cheerleaders, and seniors and their parents.

The Moline Maroons take the floor of Wharton Field House to take on Rocky. Moline was dominating for most of the game although they somehow let Rocky tie it up in regulation and go on to win it in overtime. It was a heartbreaker for the Moline crowd, but it was a great game. Here are a few photos.

One of my favorite basketball photos of the year …
Moline takes on Alleman at Wharton Field House. I also captured a few shots of the Dance performance at half time and a few cheerleaders. I hope you enjoy these.

Moline is hosting the Martin Luther King Tournament this weekend at Wharton Field House. Here are a few photos of Saturday’s games. And … a few photos of Monday’s games.

Friday Night Basketball in the Quad Cities. Moline takes on Rocky at Rock Island. The Sophomore game was a great game with many lead changes and was decided by a basket as Rocky came out ahead. Rocky dominated the Varsity game. Still, a fun evening and an opportunity for a few action shots. Check ‘em out.

My friend Ricky is coaching the Moline High School freshman Basketball team, so I thought I’d stop out and take some photos of tonight’s game. They pretty much dominated the game and I came home with a few keepers … I think. Here’s a few shots of the evening.

The Quad Cities Marathon started at 7:30 AM this morning and 2 hours and 19 minutes later the winner crosses the finish line. More photos later …

That’s how I started off the blog entry this morning …

After hanging out at the finish line watching all the marathoners, 1/2 marathons, and relay teams come in … I discovered that the story today isn’t about the winner, the women’s winner, or even the finishers. Today’s story is really about Joe Moreno. I haven’t been around this event much before, but I had a blast today. There is just a whole lot of energy and feeling of accomplishment here. And the energy seems to flow from Race Director, Joe Moreno. This photo shows him congratulating and cheering on the women’s winner. He did this for every single finisher … and he seemed to know everyone by name. Every finisher got a personal “high five” and “great job” from Joe. You can tell he just has great passion for this event and is really, really enjoying himself today.

Great event Joe! Thank YOU for all of your passion, energy, and hard work that made this such a successful, and truly enjoyable event.

And … a few photos of the day …

Jared Requet makes a good gain early in the Moline High School Homecoming Football game Friday night. Moline scored on their opening drive and then had some challenges until late in the game. They almost pulled it out. Here are some photos of the evening.

The Moline Maroons took on the Dunbar Mighty Men and dominated in both the Sophomore and Varsity contests. While the Sophomores had the offense going from the beginning, the Varsity turned a 1st half defensive struggle into a second half offensive display. Unfortunately the reporter from channel 4 missed all the action as he had to leave to make deadline by 9:10 PM.

The highlight of the evening were the Superfans … they were Off The Hook.

Here are a few photos of the evening.

It was quite the dog fight. Clay Lee and Adam White battled it down to the final hole of a 36 hole match to determine the winner. In the end Adam White was victorious as our Short Hills Country Club Champion … now two years running.

The match was tied “all square” after the first 18 holes. Then in the second 18 holes Adam White built a commanding lead to be three up with five to play. Clay had a few great holes and battled back to one down with one to play, but ran into some tree issues on 18.

All the while our Club Pro was tweeting the status of the match. At least a tweet a hole. This made it very easy to follow and the current status was always clear. Nice addition this year Brian,

Congratulations to Adam White, our 2012 Short Hills Country Club Champion. Here are a few photos of the Championship Match.

Congratulations also go to our other flight winners:

Championship B Flight – Will Wallace
Directors Flight – Robert Wunder
Professionals Flight – Pat Brorby
Superintendents Flight – Ron Williams
Managers Flight – Dean Bull
Women’s Flight – Patti Lee

132 of the nation’s best junior’s golfers came to Short Hills for a week full of golf. It was pretty humbling to see these kids with the grooved swing throwing darts at our greens. I loved the buzz. Here are a few photos of the second round.

Short Hills Country Club’s Sunday Team posing with the Velie Cup. They started the day six strokes ahead and finished with a resounding 21 stroke victory. Congratulations! Feel free to peruse the photos of the day.

The Sunday Mueller cup team gets ready to tee off at Davenport Country Club. It was a challenging course for coach Lewis’ first outing. Here are a variety of photos from the day.

I recently had the opportunity to attend the Peter Reed Miller Sports Photography Workshop. There were some great photographers in the workshop and of course we had some great instructors. One of images (above right) was described as a potential “Sports Illustrated Cover”. I was honored …

This past weekend I noticed the USA Today Sports Section had a very similar photo on the front page. I know it’s not humble to say, but I think my photo is even better.

The John Deere Classic is now just 56 days away. I thought I’d stop out at the golf course and grab a few photos of the clubhouse and course. Take a look.

I had the great pleasure of attending the Peter Read Miller Workshop on Sports Photography this past week. This was a full 7 days of presentations, critiques, shooting, and editing. As part of this workshop I shot 10 different sports, thousands of frames, and had 62 images critiqued. Needless to say I put in a lot of time and effort and was really rewarded as I learned a lot, met a bunch of very talented individuals, and greatly improved my photos. While I learned of lot, the single most important thing was what makes a great sports photo. This shot of the baseman running drew great praise as Peter suggested it could be a Sport Illustrated magazine cover. He should know as he has more than 200 covers to his credit!

One of the photographers sharing instruction duty with Peter was Grant Leighton who specializes in Portrait Photography. I took the opportunity to have him review some of my Portraits and he generously gave me a number of suggestions for improvement. I can’t wait to put them to use.

I shot somewhere between 500 and 1,000 frames of each sport. The motor drive on my camera was humming right along … I reduced this to my favorite 5-10 for each sport for the critique session. Take a look:

Mountain Biking
Roller Derby
Softball
LaCrosse
Tennis
Baseball
Basketball
Football
Track & Field
Boxing

The Augustana women celebrate their win at the buzzer.

It was an evening of up and downs as the Augustana Vikings took on the North Central Cardinals at home in Carver Center. First, the women put in a 3 pointer as time expired to pull out a 66-65 squeaker. Unfortunately the men could keep their winning ways alive and fell 67-62 in only their second loss of the season.

I had my Radiopoppers with me and two Speedlites to try to get a little better light here. This allowed me to shoot at 1600 iso, 1/250th, and f2.8 for most of these photos. I put the strobes on the balcony railing and they provided mostly fill in light. Here are a few photos of the evening.