Brenna Crabtree (3) scores a point.

When I send photos to the local newspaper I like to make sure they are accurately captioned. By the time I download the photos after a volleyball match, with some rare exceptions, I can’t look at a photo and remember which actions resulted in a point and which didn’t. So I make notes on a 3×5 card. Right after I take a photo of an important moment in the match, I write down the photo number, what happened, and who did it. Take the above photo for example. You can see the ball crossing the net but you can’t tell from this still photo whether or not the other team returned the ball or not. That is where my notes come in.

The home town Graceland University team is in the dark jerseys. The photo above is #0428.

Volleyball notes, October 31, 2023.

A quick look at the 3×5 card tells me player #3 scored a point. I checked the team roster and the player’s name is Brenna Crabtree. So I had my photo caption when I sent this photo to the local newspaper.

Brenna’s jersey number doesn’t happen to be visible in this photo. Right after I took this photo, I watched her to get her jersey number after she scored the point. Plus I have other photos of her when her jersey number is visible.

The check marks to the left and the letters “opt” on the right were added when I processed the photos. After I downloaded the photos, I would add information to the metadata in the photos. For this photo I added “Score #3, Brenna Crabtree” to the metadata. Then I put a check mark next to 428 on the card.  “opt” stands for optimized. I optimize each photo before I send it to the paper. I check the color balance and exposure, crop the photo if necessary, convert the photo to an easily printable JPEG file, and resize it for publication. After the photo has been optimized, I write opt next to the description.  I did this because I did not process the photos in the order they are listed on the card.

More photos are at the link below.

Link

Graceland University Yellowjackets Volleyball, October 21, 2023