Baseball senior portraits with Jackson

This is Episode II of Jackson’s senior portraits, as the second part of the shoot was a completely different story. If anyone is familiar with Disney’s Fantasia, the story line to Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony depicts the first three movements with idyllic, playful scenes of mythological creatures in the country. The fourth movement, however, is a thunderstorm that sends all the creatures diving for cover or doing their best to brave the winds and tempest. That was pretty much our group, arriving at the baseball field as it started to rain and dragging the lighting equipment to the mercifully covered dugout. The temperature must have dropped ten degrees from the time that we left downtown and arrived at the ball field.

We took a few shots from the dugout, which was fairly dry away from the opening.

But as soon as the rain slowed to a drizzle, we ventured forth and took our chances on the field. My assistant and I set up the lights while Jackson and his mom took the tarp off the pitcher’s mound. (He obtained permission to use the field ahead of time, in case anyone is worried.)

The clouds looked great, and Jackson’s pitching form was as graceful as ever, but he only had two baseballs and no one to catch (both my assistant and his mom were hanging on to the strip soft boxes in the wind), so he had to retrieve everything he threw against the backstop. So he didn’t last too long.

The batter’s box was too muddy to use, despite the tarp, so we tried having him swing the bat elsewhere on the field, but it didn’t look right. And by then, Jackson was freezing and wet, so we gave it up before he tore a muscle or something.

He was a good sport, though, and agreed to come out the next weekend when it was drier and a bit warmer. This time, he brought his dad to toss balls and catch for him, so things were improved all around. He looks a lot like his dad in some of the pictures.

Then we got to redo some pitching pictures against a much more tranquil-appearing sky. This is the part in Fantasia where the night goddess sweeps the cloak of night over the countryside.

Even though it’s not an action shot, below is one of my favorite pictures of him for the evening. It was his idea to just get a simple standing pose, and I’m glad he suggested it.

This time, we had the luxury of stopping when the sun set, and not because the weather forced us to quit. It was windy on the field, but the rain didn’t start until we were in our cars on the way out about twenty minutes later.

Thank you to Jackson and both his parents for coming out a second time, and to his mom for the cookies and the orchid! And I’m glad that we finished ahead of the rain this time!