Tor Tee Photography

Documenting Life moments

[torteephotography-blog]

So with the personal life things going on, it shows in my work that I havent been shooting. I had some stories, but "lost" them. I got a new job. And family stuff has been going nuts. Don't want to go into details, just giving a quick explanation to anyone looking for some new pictures or stories. I don't have any right now. I'm sorry. I MAY soon. But not right now. Keep checking in case the soon becomes very soon.

[torteephotography-blog]

Patriots Vs. Falcons at The Palace of Auburn Hills

----------- School Patriots play ----------- Falcons February 4 2017 at the Palace of Auburn Hills. It was an intense game with multiple overtimes, ending with a one point loss for the Patriots.

February 4th of 2017, the day before the Super Bowl when the New England Patriots played the Atlanta Falcons, two high school basketball teams had the opportunity to play at the Detroit Pistons’ Palace, and ironically their team names were the Patriots and Falcons.

The Patriots hail from my old school, and since I have relatives still attending there, I was permitted to attend the game and the school’s photographers stated they would “claim” me so I could shoot ON THE COURT!

I had the amazing privilege and opportunity to shoot as an actual photographer and photojournalist for my old school at a court I grew up hearing as a stage for professional teams. It was such an amazing experience and I took plenty of pictures- over 2,000! I think that’s a new record for me.

*For privacy and safety purposes, the hyphens are filling in for the full name of the schools.*

[torteephotography-blog]

Yes, I'm Christian. No, I'm not Catholic.

I do not agree with Catholicism, however during our weekly walk through Detroit, on January 21st 2017, my friend and I were permitted to go in and shoot some photos in a nearby church. No matter the differences in beliefs, there is just something about Catholic churches that seem beautiful to me.

Typically this will be the type of post I will likely do. A few pictures from whatever shoot I may have done, whether impromptu, wandering, or scheduled, and perhaps a few words about them, or a story about the focus picture.

At the moment I am on a break from the weekly outings in Detroit with my friend, but I do hope to start again in the near future. I thoroughly enjoy the company, and the regular shooting has been good for me as a photographer, an aspiring photojournalist, and a human being. Spending time around someone with a "like" mind is very refreshing, and also having that person be someone you share a previous foundation for a friendship with makes for an entertaining walk through the streets of Detroit. I have had many kinds of experiences since I started shooting with this friend, and have made many memories believe it or not. Every Saturday was an adventure, I dearly hope to have more.

[torteephotography-blog]

[torteephotography-blog]

Over a Month Late...Oops

I am referring to the fact that I had started this for the New Year. I meant to crank out my first post New Years Day, however I could not come up with a good enough story, with any of the pictures from the day before, that was worth my first entry. So instead of wasting it, I kept waiting for one. Now I have one, and I realize I should have at the very least started with an explanation of the purpose of this “blog”.

I am in no means one who likes blogs, quite frankly they annoy me. However, someone that I had been spending a lot of time with kept pushing and saying I should start one. Now typically I do not comply with someone like that, or with any one who tries to push me to do something I do not want to do, but thinking about it I realized it could be a good idea, and I will explain why.

Most everyone goes through periods of their life where they are trying to decide what they want to pursue as a career or passion or both. Being no different, even after my gap year I still had no idea what I wanted to do except I had a few ideas of directions that I wanted to look into. I knew I loved photography, but never thought of it as a focus career, but I still took a class to see if it could be a side job. Talking to counselors, I would tell them how I wanted to start something like a “haven” and so they would suggest social work. They suggested a sociology class to assist with an idea of areas that path could send me. I took a psychology class thinking I wanted to be a psychologist. I took a law enforcement class for juvenile delinquents, thinking perhaps that would be a direction I wanted to go. I even got letter and emails from the financial and counseling departments at Harvard, and I discussed certain things with them to decide if perhaps pursuing a law degree would be what I wanted. I knew that I wanted to incite emotion in such a way that it would drive people to action. I liked the idea of myself being there and recruiting others, however with each of these classes (excluding photography) I came to realize that I could not handle those occupations. Emotionally and mentally I would not be able to thrive; I have a deep respect for the men and women in each of those occupations, however I have no idea how they can do it. Having hit a “dead end”, knowing that the Lord (yep, that’s right- I’m a CHRISTIAN) was calling me to do something great and planned to use the way I see things and the world for that, I became disappointed. I couldn’t figure out what I was supposed to do, and then realizing that I was losing myself in the process of getting to know a guy, along with many other stresses, I managed to fall into a “funk”. I was not myself, and was completely stuck in my head for almost a full year. Before hitting the year mark, things worked out that I could go back to school and finish my degree but I needed to know what classes. So while looking into careers and thinking about the things that I loved to do, I knew that photography may have a bigger role than I originally thought. And funny thing is, it was a movie that got me to thinking about the career choice I have now landed on.

This is my blog, which essentially means I have the right to give my own disclaimers and opinions here and there; I don’t plan to, but in this instance I feel like I need to. So let me say this: I do not like Angelina Jolie. I became more okay with her because I found she and I could possibly be on the same political side-so perhaps she has SOME sense, but I do not want to support any woman who steals another’s husband and then laughs about it. That being said, I enjoy action/adventure movies and nothing was on one night except Laura Croft Tomb Raider. While watching the movie, I noticed something that I never understood before. Yes, it is a fictional movie, however a tomb raider had the cover of a photojournalist. My mind went to looking up how that could be possible. So I started doing research on photojournalism. She would get to travel and see amazing things and her cover was she was doing these things and taking pictures. When looking up what photojournalist do, the point of their job is to use pictures to create emotion and invoke people to action. Realizing this, I decided one of the classes I needed to find would be one that could give me a better and more personal insight on photojournalism.

Having done so, I have decided to pursue photojournalism. I really enjoyed the class, and it will undoubtedly be a rough profession, however it is intended to do exactly what I want to do. I want to travel and see the world. I want to take pictures of the world, but I know I can’t just do what I want. I believe we each have our passions and things we are drawn to because the Lord puts them there. If we let Him, He will use those things for His greater purpose. I believe that He can use my talents for His will by trying my hand in photojournalism. Now He may change it, because I could be wrong and it wouldn’t be the first time, but as of right now photojournalism seems to be what my heart is chasing.

Photojournalism isn’t just newspapers, it can also be magazines. Or even a blog.

As much as I hate to admit it, he had a point. I should start a blog. At the very least it could be good practice. Hopefully I can make it more than that though.

Mind you, I have no idea what direction I want to take the feel of it. It will likely go back and forth between resembling a newspaper or magazine, or some days maybe even a full on blog resemblance. Some days I may only post a few pictures, and others may have stories accompanying them. I could post once a week, or maybe even consecutive days, depending on what I find to shoot or the stories that I find. **So don’t forget to check back regularly!** In the end however, it will be worth your time.