As a professional photographer/artist "they" say it's important to have a creative outlet. In photography school teachers always used to tell me to treat each assignment - whether I liked the assignment or not - as a way to be creative. It's the "shoot one for the client and one for yourself" philosophy. This is supposed to keep your creative juices flowing and make every job exciting. Most of the time this is pretty easy to do. For example, we take all the "traditional" pictures the clients want and then say "Just for fun, lets try...." Most of the time the clients don't buy it, but we have fun doing it and the photographs make great samples to show off just how creative we can be :o)
Every now and then though, a "job" arises that allows for complete creativity. Many of you may not be aware of this fact, but I, Christy, am actually a member of the Waxhaw Volunteer Fire Department. Impressive right? Not really because I do not run into burning buildings or rescue people. My membership consists of being on the auxiliary team. Technically, our role is to support the fire fighters when they get really big calls, etc. My role so far has been to take pictures :o) I got involved with the department about a year ago when Dave's oldest son invited me to come photograph one of their training fires. From there I photographed another one a few months later and slowly I became the unofficial photographer (or at least that's what I claim!) for the department. Eventually this lead to me actually joining the department in order to be better informed.
On June 7, I had one of those purely creative opportunities with the department. They were burning down another house - more like mansion - for training purposes. Because the house was so large they invited other departments in the area to come join them. Once again I got the chance to photograph the event. If you've never experienced a fire that large (which for your sake I hope you never get the chance unless it's one of these types of situations!) just imagine a bonfire multiplied by about 100 if not more! The heat that comes off of a burning building is amazing! I remember last year when they first started the fire and it began to pour out the windows. I was actually frightened even though I was surrounded by fire fighters who had not only started the fire but were monitoring it from every angle.
The most recent training fire was once again amazing. I was able to get creative and photograph the event the way I wanted. There was no one telling me what to shoot or how to shoot it. I didn't have to pose anyone. I just got to walk around and take pictures which is what I love. I also experienced probably the most exciting thing I've ever done before: being inside a burning building! Part way through the morning, the chief allowed me to be escorted inside the house to photograph the fire from the inside. Don't worry, I wasn't in any real danger. As smoke poured out of the room to my right I admit I was a little nervous, but it was more of an adrenaline rush nervous rather than an afraid nervous. It was incredible!!
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