John Leekley on the web

On April 22 WC athletics and the Echo Hill Outdoor School hosted the “Kick Film Festival”, which is designed to promote “the intersection of life with the body with the positive mind”.

I spent Easter Sunday morning (April 15) in DC shooting what I hoped would be a worthwhile “short” for the festival.  Working with Capital Rowing Club, who I rowed with for about 5 years, I was set up with a great story about a woman named Margaret who lost her leg when she was 18 in a motorcycle accident.  Margaret was headed to Maryland to play basketball, but had those dreams ended after the accident.  She has a great story though, and talks about that during the shoot.  It was a lot of fun to shoot and to meet Margaret, as it brought together two things that have played big roles in my life for a while now, that being rowing and videos or film making.

I learned a tremendous amount about shooting a video and how it can turn into a long and tiring day for all involved.  I did a lot of it just on the fly, and took whatever shots I got without going back and watching them to see what it looked like.  I didn’t want to stop, watch, and redo anything, as everyone involved got up very early on a Sunday to help me out, and I’m not trying to burn any bridges in case I want to come back and do this again.

I got there early to get some sunrise shots, and, using a slider that I made myself in the boathouse, took some shots along the dock of the still water at dawn.  I didn’t have a real plan as far as what I wanted to see or shoot, just took things as they happened and made the best of them.  Looking back at the raw video that I have, I kind of wish that I had done a few things differently, such as get a few different shots of Margaret when she was talking, as well as maybe “stage” some shots better, but I do like having the “real” video, and just following along as we went.

I haven’t finished editing, and obviously didn’t get it done for the festival, but now that summer is here and the season’s over I am hopeful to have a finished product in the next few weeks.

Washington College Rowing hosted the Maryland State High School Rowing championships on April 29.  This brought over a dozen high school rowing teams to Chestertown on (thankfully) a really nice day that provided great water for the event.  It was an insane amount of work but totally worth every bit of it, as we got rave reviews from the parents and coaches at each team.

I took a handful of pictures and threw them together to highlight the scenes from the day, but most of these don’t do it justice.  We had our small boatyard filled with trailers and boats, and it all managed to fit really well.  I think its a great event not only for the college but the town and most importantly the sport.  Growth is important, at least the appropriate kind of growth, and this regatta at this site is a great thing for everyone.  It definitely makes me feel like I’m contributing something to the bigger picture.

Next year I have an idea for stakeboats (small sailboats) and some other improvements that I think will enhance the regatta some, such as better buoys.  I also need to make a better plan as far as raising money at the event and marketing my summer camp, which I tried but didn’t do as well as I thought I might.

Always fun to christen a new boat. I stepped behind the camera for this one (not my boat) to capture the event for the family who donated the boat, as well as the college and the team. The girls who will race in it were over the moon excited, and there was a lot of buzz surrounding the whole event. I think this is a good example of how video can allow anyone to be a part of the event, whether they were in the room or not.

This past Saturday I had the opportunity to speak at RowingTalks, a conference for high school rowing coaches. I talked about using video to coach coxswains, rowers, and even yourself as a coach, as well as how video could enhance the experience for the athletes on your team.

I was pretty embarrassed though when the batteries in my GoPro died because I didn’t charge it, and the website that I wanted to demonstrate didn’t work because the browser on the computer hadn’t been updated.

All in all I think it went pretty well, and I’m hoping to do it again somewhere.

This Saturday (1/28/12) I’m presenting at a coaches clinic called RowingTalks about how to use video in your coaching.  The clinic will be live at www.Ustream.com/usrowing, and in addition to the live stream I’m going to broadcast live on Qik in between presentations and during any breaks. I’ve posted what I hope will be the live video below. I’ll be on Twitter throughout the day as well. Some great speakers lined up, including several national team guys.

I’m running a training sessions “camp” on Sundays this winter, with work on the ergs, strength training and in the indoor rowing tanks that we have. Each week I’m trying to get as much footage of the athletes rowing as I can and use it a few different ways. A highlight video of week two is below, and I’ve been using sprongo.com to analyze their technique and email them the video.

This month starts a one year celebration marking 100 years of basketball at Washington College. I put together this video as the introduction piece to the whole year. As always, the music makes the project really good, but some of these old tapes and pictures are pretty amazing, especially worked in with the more current images.