KCRA – Del Paso Blvd. Flooding

Unlike most news stories I post here, I did not one-man report this story but worked on it as the cameraman*-editor in collaboration with KCRA reporter Mallory Hoff.

Working on the night shift a few weeks ago on June 28, 2011, during a highly unusual summer storm. Historically, the rains come to an end in February or March here in the northern California Central Valley. Mallory and I had already completed shooting our story for the evening when we were called to a “breaker” (breaking news). A water main had broken and erupted, flooding a couple of blocks of businesses on Del Paso Boulevard in Sacramento. Very unfortunate for the businesses, but everyone was glad to have the news there with our cameras to show what had happened to them.

We weren’t far away and arrived on the scene of a street transformed into rushing stream of foot-deep water. A good day to already have on rain boots.

On a story like this, you can’t have too many low-angle shots.

[*"Cameraman" - most TV news cameramen refer to themselves as "photographers." When I hear "photographer" I always think of still photographers running around with Nikon or Canon cameras. So I prefer to refer to myself as a "cameraman."
Although, one time when one of our assignment desk managers was trying to reach me put out over the building's P.A. system, "Calling all cinematographers!"]