Back In The Saddle: UFC 68

Columbus, OH - Randy Couture proved Saturday night that age is just a number.

As Aerosmith's "Back in the Saddle" rocked 19,000 fans at the Nationwide Arena, Couture entered the octagon in his UFC heavyweight title shot as a 3-1 underdog against the younger, taller, and heavier Tim Sylvia.

The forty-three year old Couture didn't waste time coming out of retirement when in the opening seconds of his fight, he caught Sylvia with a punch that sent the champion reeling toward the canvas. Sylvia never recovered. Five rounds later , a battered and bruised Sylvia had to give up his UFC belt to Couture.

Couture did what Jeff Monson couldn't do, bring Sylvia to the mat. The quicker Couture dominated Sylvia while on the ground where Sylvia's reach and height advantage was nullified. Bobbing and weaving, Couture also beat Sylvia in the striking department. It was a classic match of Brain vs. Brawn, the smarter, craftier and wiser Couture showing why he has won five MMA titles with the UFC.

Sylvia didn't help himself in the fan department. He was repeatedly booed this weekend, during the weigh-in and the fight. And after his loss, he attributed his defeat to a back injury. He was fighting one of the most popular fighter's in MMA history and gathered no support or sympathy from the crowd, getting another round of boos in the post-fight interview.

Couture may have been called a "freak of nature" by UFC president Dana White, but that is not going to be enough when he faces Mirko "Crop Cop" Filipovic in his next bout. He will have to be able to withstand the onslaught of kicks that the Croatian fighter is know for. I'm sure Couture will be watching carefully Filipovic's next fight in Manchester, England.

Baseball player Ken Griffey, Jr. watched UFC 68 from his octagonside seat, instead of training with his team in Florida. Ironically, the reason why he was at the fight was because of his broken hand, which he sustained wrestling with his kids. Maybe he got some pointers.

UFC 68 pre-fight weigh-in

Columbus, OH- I took the Delta red-eye from LAX to Columbus with Joe Rogan. Rogan was in first class, I in coach. We both are here in Columbus for UFC 68, the so-called "The Uprising".

Why Columbus? The UFC has a tie-in with the body-building show this week, "The Arnold", and is hoping to give mid-westerners a up, close view of their brand of mixed martial arts. It turned out to be a good decision. The Friday weigh-in at the Nationwide Arena was open to the public and over 2,000 people showed up. Saturday's event is sold out and it will be the highest grossing event at the Nationwide Arena, even topping a Rolling Stones concert, according to the local paper, the Columbus Dispatch.

The fight everyone wants to see is the main event, Randy Couture vs. Tim Sylvia. The last time Sylvia defended his title, he wasn't to impressive trying to avoid the mat with Jeff Monson in UFC 65. Sylvia was greeted by boos at the weigh-in. Couture probably watched that fight and decided that he could come out of retirement and regain his title.

Whatever happens in the Couture-Sylvia bout, the winner will have to face Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic. Even though Mirko will be considered a challenger, he will be the odds on-favorite. But let's just enjoy Saturday first.

Oscar Wrap-up

This year's Academy Awards was the return of Old-Skool.

It was the anti-American Idol. The public doesn't vote, the clubby Academy votes. Instead of trying to get any younger viewers, it went straight for the middle-aged core audience. And the big winner was the sixty-four year old Martin Scorsese. The only bright spot was American Idol cast-off Jennifer Hudson, who looked very out of place.

The Red Carpet, as usual was chaos. The big problem was that some of Hollywood's biggest stars didn't bother walking the Red Carpet because of the danger of bumping into an old flame. Ben Affleck didn't want to be seen in any photos with Jennifer Lopez. Tom Cruise wanted to avoid Penelope Cruz and Nicole Kidman. Publicists had to make sure that Jennifer Biel and Cameron Diaz, both who dated Justin Timberlake, didn't have a cat fight. Kidman walked the red carpet with a pregnant Naomi Watts, shedding their significant others.

This was supposedly a "green" awards show. I did not see any evidence of that. No carpeting made of recycled materials. The limos burnt gas. No solar powered Klieg ligts. If anything it only pushed the stereotype of Hollywood being an out-of-touch radical left-wing crazed cabal.
You had the openly gay Ellen DeGeneres hosting the show. The "married" Melissa Etheridge winning the best song. Vice-President Al Gore got the loudest applause when an "Inconvenient Truth" won best documentary. Prius driving Leonardo DiCarprio, Cameron Diaz and Larry David were in full force, not to mention the king of conservation, Ed Begley Jr. You come to an Awards Show and the Democratic National Convention broke out.

Hey, I'm a liberal who grew up in New York, but do we really have to wear our politics on our tuxs? Let's save it for the Global Green Awards party.

It's always fun when to watch what Hollywood actors, most of whom live inside a bubble of yes people, think of what to wear to basically the ultimate fashion show, the Oscars. I think some people come to the Oscars just so they can get their photograph into a magazine's worst dressed list. Sally Kirkland wears the most hideous things every year. Jennifer Hudson got Vogue magazine editor-at-large Leon Talley to pick out a dress. Big mistake on the weird Star Trek inspired shrug. Meryl Streep and Faye Dunaway have let their subscriptions to fashion magazines lapse. I'm no fashion expert, using instead as my rule of thumb "the what were they thinking" acid test.

For any photographer covering the Oscars, it truly a day that never ends.

I got up at around 9:00 a.m. at the Roosevelt Hotel. I went through an equipment check, made a few phone calls to my editors, and then walked down to the Kodak Theater to check the strobes in the press room. From 11:00 a.m. to 2 p.m. the press room is closed for a security sweep, so if you want to check your lights you have to be there at around 10:30 a.m. After the lighting check I went to meet my runners who would be walking my digital cards from my spot on the red carpet to the hotel room where an editor was stationed.

I gave them a tour of the complex and told them the ground rules. Runners can't take photos, can't loiter and watch, and had to stay within a marked path. They do have a pass that give them access to all the regular media areas, which is great.

Around noon I walked a couple of blocks to get a quick lunch at a local fast food joint and then back to the Red Carpet where I tried to make a few feature photos before the big event. That lasts until about 2 p.m. From 2 until 5:30 the stars walk the red carpet. The last hour is non-stop shooting. I burnt up one flash, which I quickly replaced with a back-up, and went through a couple of Turbo batteries. After about 2,000 shots and 10 digital cards with a half-dozen trips by a messenger to an editor, the Red Carpet was done.

Part 2 was the Awards Room, where the winners and some presenters go back and get their photo taken. They changed things this year and only announced the big winners in the last hour of the show. That meant waiting around and shooting meaningless photos of obscure categories winners for 3 hours until someone the magazines cared about showed up.

Around 10 p.m. I started packing up all my equipment and headed back to the hotel for some editing. My editor pumped out around 300 photos while I was shooting. I then spent the next nine hours pushing out another 500 or so photos. I was up for 23 hours, slept for 3 hours and then drove home. Until next September, Awards Season is officially over.

Getty Buys Wireimage: An Analysis

Today, Getty Images announced that they are buying the celebrity photo agency Wireimage for $202 million.

The rumors about Wireimage selling out has been around for a while. Mediavast, the parent company of Wireimage, is made up investors who raised many rounds of venture capital to create a large entertainment and sports photo agency. The conventional thinking was that the investors would finally realize a profit by cashing in.

How much profit will the founders of Wireimage get? $202 million sounds like a lot of money to split up 8-10 ways. But first they have to pay off the money they borrowed to get the company off the ground.

There was talk of Wireimage filing for chapter 11 bankruptcy. Was that the motivation for Wireimage to finally sell out to their rival? And if Wireimage was doing so well in the business why would they sell?

The Wireimage photo credit and its sister service, Film Magic, dominate magazines. The only problem is that doesn't mean you are making money. Wireimage had a very high overhead. Over 200 employees, offices in New York, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Atlanta, Miami, London, Sydney, Tokyo, Germany, Spain, The Netherlands and even Shanghai. Add to that expensive band-width and computer server costs.

Wireimage was known to gain market share by heavily discounting the price of photos. You have to sell a lot of photos at discount prices to recoup the high overhead. All in a time period where publications are retrenching, not expanding.

With all the focus on celebrity magazines, the irony is that the celebrity photo business is very fragile. There are many forces that are putting pressure on photo agencies. First and foremost is the internet. Why wait around for your favorite magazine to publish when you can read about it online today? Photo prices for the web are half to one-third of print prices. And that's if people actually download and pay for the photos, most celebrity bloggers are stealing photos.

Wireimage core business was shooting celebrities at official red carpet events that are star-friendly. The public likes those photos but has even a greater appetite for street photography of celebs, which the paparazzi have fulfilled. More and more of celebrity driven magazines and even mainstream media are using photos from the paparazzi. Which photo will drive more newsstand sales, Britney Spears shaving her head or Britney on the red carpet? The public votes everyday with web traffic.

What is Getty getting out of the deal? The elimination of their largest competitor, like Microsoft buying Apple. Wireimage has been a thorn in Getty's side for the past few years as they both bid on league contracts for major sports like the NFL and PGA Golf tours. Now they can own that market.

Getty has similar problems as Wireimage. They too have a high overhead and the added pressure of being a publicly traded company who shareholders demand profits. Most of their profits have come from licensing commercial images for advertising use. Their editorial side of things has a lot of prestige but doesn't generate the same revenue. Editorial prices for images have been on a downward spiral. Buying Wireimage, which is basically an editorial service, is an attempt to shore up Getty's weakness.

I don't think Getty really will increase their market share significantly to make up for the price they paid. Magazines like to have an array of photos from different agencies. They are not going to put out a publication full of photos from one agency, otherwise they lose any exclusivity factor. Why buy People when US Weekly has the same photos?

Most photo agencies will look at this buyout as an opportunity to fill a large void that Wireimage has left. The only problem is that for now, it will be Getty and a lot of niche players.

Rolling out the Red Carpet

Los Angeles - When the Academy rolls out their Red Carpet, it's the big one.

Hollywood Blvd. is shut down this week in preparation for Sunday's Oscars. It takes a year of planning and at least a week just to set-up the stage for the stars for their long walk to the Kodak Theater.

Wednesday for photographers is the "walk-through" day when the Academy gives us the details on what to expect. You don't just show up on Sunday.

There is numerous credentials to get, different ones allowing you access to different areas on Sunday. I'm cleared for the very important arrivals area, the so-called Red Carpet where the celebs show off one of a kind fashions to the world. The second area I'm shooting on Sunday is the Press Room, a little room packed with photographers where the Oscar winners pose with their trophy.

The photography is the easy part. The hard part is after the shutter is depressed. What makes a successful day of shooting is how much play your photos get, or in layman's terms, who many photos are published in newspapers, magazines and website throughout the world. My digital card will be picked up my a messenger who will bring it to the Hotel Roosevelt where an editor will pick out and transmit the photos to clients around the world. How fast, and how relevant the photos will be are crucial factors on its usage.

The Academy does provide you with an option of transmitting on site at the Renaissance Hotel, but you are limited to the room's use until two hours after the show is over. I plan an all night editing and transmitting session, hence the need for a hotel room close by.

How many photos will I take? How many photos will I transmit? As many I can pump out. The needs of photo editors for Oscar photos are vast. You never know what they need or want. So you shoot everything. And I mean everything. Full-length. Check. Head shot. Check. Waist up. Check. Close-up of shoes. Check. Close-up of jewelery. Check. Actor with spouse, or "two-shot". Check. Singles of each. Check. The list is endless.
Add in the factor of shots of the celeb looking left, right, center, and even from behind, and you have greatly increased your workload.

Why? You might ask? Because readers want to see all the details. That strange tattoo. That backless dress. That diamond encrusted necklace and earrings. The latest hair style. The plunging necklines. "Who are you wearing?" will be the most asked question on Sunday.

Hey, America doesn't have a Royal Family, but we sure got our celebs. And Sunday will be our version of a coronation.