North Carolina

On Saturday, December 7th, I got up early and took a cold drive down to Pea Island NWR on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. It was 19°F when I left and my heat was not working too good in my Jeep. I definitely need to take that in and get it looked at! In fact, it was still about 26°F when I started crossing the Wright Memorial Bridge to get over to the Outer Banks. But once I crossed, it was 36°F on the island and my heat started pumping a little more hot air.

It was doubleheader night at Currituck County High School as both the girls and boys took on Hickory High School. The gym lighting had not been updated to LEDs so it was a bit of a throwback to the past. Both games were very competitive, which makes for better opportunities for shooting.

I brought my new telescopic stool but noticed that some of the pegs on it were already broke. It still worked mostly so my back was thankful. I brought my Nikon Z9 body and Nikkor Z 70-200 f/2.8 S lens. I hadn’t used this lens for basketball in a while, so I wanted to use it here. It’s the standard go to lens for basketball, but I think I still prefer a prime lens.

I traveled 30 miles south into North Carolina on Friday night to photograph the football game between the visiting John A. Holmes Aces of Edenton and the home team Currituck County Knights.

It was a very competitive game and Holmes took a 21-12 lead into the half. However, Currituck County came out on fire in the 3rd quarter and outscored Holmes 21-7 in the quarter. They added one more touchdown in the 4th quarter and won the game 40-28.

I shot my first high school football game of the season on August 29th. The game featured the home team Deep Creek Hornets of Chesapeake, Virginia and the visiting Currituck County Knights of Barco, North Carolina.

Having just received my “new” Nikon 400mm f/2.8G ED VR lens a day earlier, I was eager to try it out and since it was Labor Day Weekend coming up, most of the high school football games would be played on Thursday. Deep Creek High is not too far from my house, so I decided to go there and shoot. Did I mention I shoot for MaxPreps too? The gallery from this game is on both MaxPreps and my own site.

As my film journey progresses, I absolutely love the simplicity of shooting with my Nikon FM2n and Yashica Electro 35 GSN. But I have been thinking about getting into medium format at some point. I’ve really had my eye on finding another Yashica. Especially the Mat 124G. But then I was watching Youtube and and I saw Kai’s video on using the Nikon F6.

Watching his video got me thinking. I have the Nikon FM2n. The perfect, most simplistic 35mm SLR made by Nikon. It doesn’t even need a battery to function. But what if I paired it up with the most advanced 35mm SLR Nikon ever made? That would be an awesome complement to the FM2n.