Zach Tarrant - Houston Texans team photographer

Welcome to Resiprocity Podcast, where we discuss the backstories and strategies of photo journalists, sports photographers, documentary filmmakers and photo editors. Now here's your host, Brett Kalsen. So today we have a pretty cool one. As you guys might know, I cover the NFL, but I cover the NFL as an editorial photographer meaning that I work for a news company covering photographer, covering football. A lot of people cover it from the other side of the fence and those people work for the team themselves. They're not employed by the NFL. They're actually employed locally by each one of the approximately 30 NFL teams. So today we have Zach from the Houston Texan, Zach, how you doing, man? Brett, doing great, man. It's a pleasure to talk to you. This is a fun treat during a sort of a slow, increasingly boring time. So I'm excited to chop it up with you a little bit, man. Yeah, so this, for people who are listening to these, in the back catalog, hopefully when we're all rich and famous driving Bentley's, right now we are all quarantined thanks to coronavirus. It's right. I guess, you know, it's an elephant in the room. So let's just real quick. You know, what are you guys doing? What are you, how are you dealing with this? Yeah, man. Our offices are closed. We are working from home unless you have to be at the stadium. I do not have to be at the stadium right now. So I've been working from home all week, getting a little bit done here and there, but I've got two little ones here at home. So it's kind of, you know, I'm juggling the family and the work responsibilities. And also it's like when you're a photographer, you got to be in the place to take the picture of the thing. And there's no NFL anything happening in my house. So safe to say I'm not photographing anything right now. I always think this is really funny because I think people like think that because I cover NFL, like I know NFL players are like, has to kind of in and effectively I'm just one steep closer than the closest van. But for you, you mentioned that your office is in the stadium. What's a normal day of work like for you? Not all teams have their offices in the stadium. We do. I kind of like it. You know, you walk by that field every day. You walk into the stadium every day. Makes you feel like you're a part of it. Makes you feel like you're in the belly of the beast. I kind of like that. Normal day of work for me during the season is either shooting all day, editing all day or doing digital asset management all day or some combination of those three. Those are the three big things that take up the majority of my time during the season. And there's not much time to do much else. So you're part of the, you know, you're part of the team. You're close. I guess what we'll get into this later actually. Let's back up. Let's back up a little bit. What's your past like? Where did you come from? What do you, you know, how'd you get into this? Like what? Let's give that story. Everybody, all the young kids seem to really want to know about like, well, how the hell did you get up there? Man, I've been a journey man. This is the first period of my life that I'm not a journey man. And I got to say so far it agrees with me. And I think, I think I'm going to stay here in Houston by golly. I'm tired of moving. So I grew up just east of Kansas City on the Missouri side. Grow up playing music. Never did any visual art. Anything in high school growing up. It was just like a small town, small high school, you know, not the kind of place you learn about art. Thought I wanted to write. Thought I was good at writing. Went to college. Found out I was wrong about that. And they needed a photographer for the school newspaper that I was working at at Oklahoma State. I had a passing interest in photography. I had a camera. Had a little body of work. And I mean, the fact that they took me tells me they would have taken literally anybody. At that point. But it was so fun. Photography and I hit it off right off the bat. And I was shooting stuff all the time for that that newspaper is called the daily occlusion. The the O calli and I was working there. O 40506 around that time. And I wanted to transfer. I wanted to be a photographer. I needed to go somewhere where the photography was happening. It was just so much fun. I just had no interest in staying in Stowe Water, Oklahoma. I had no interest in getting into green journalism anymore. So I ended up going to Savannah College of Art and Design in Savannah, Georgia and lived there three straight years. You know, I was a super senior. Had to do that 50 year because I transferred but that was okay by me because I liked going to scared and I liked living in Savannah. So that was that was the best time of my life, man. We were having a blast. And it was cool because I got to help my friends with things that I didn't know about, you know, my friends were making movies. My friends were painting paintings. There's all kinds of cool stuff going on. So I got this sort of secondary education in Savannah. There was super fun that didn't have anything to do with taking pictures. So yeah, that's that was kind of the education part after I graduated bounced around a little bit. I took pictures of vacuums for an online retailer. All right. Did that for a few months? I don't know how you love that. Honestly, man, I wasn't making that much but at the time, if I felt like a millionaire. I mean, I just had never made any money. So the fact that I was making some money, taking pictures, I was like, holy shit, this my work, man. This my this my work out. We got something here. This is go. Yeah, we're cooking with gas now. They're paying me to take pictures of these vacuums. Then I went up to New York and I did an internship pretty soon after graduation just because that just seemed like what my classmates were doing. They seemed like what everybody was doing. So it's like, I guess that's what I'm supposed to do. I was clueless. I, you know, I meet kids on Instagram now. People that apply to our internships. These kids have it together way more than I ever, ever did. Oh, same. Same. And people, people that are like 10th place in my internship applications would have crushed me at my at that age, you know, so the overall landscape is elevating and getting better. But I was just kind of wandering around. I was trying to figure it out. Went to New York, interned with Joel Meyerwitz on the upper west side and his, his in his studio and it was cool. But, you know, I was learning how to be a studio assistant and that was cool, but that's not, I sort of figured like, this is not what I want to be doing. I want to be taking pictures. I want to be out in the world. That's like my interest in this whole thing, right? It's an excuse to be out in the world. It's a passport to go to wherever you want to go to, go to the things that you want to go to. So I had to, had to get out of that office life, went down to Marfa, Texas, interned at Ballroom Marfa, lived in a little guest house and a dude's backyard and worked at an art gallery. And that was, I loved Marfa, man. It had always been a place for me. I was obsessed with Donald Judd during my time at SCAD. So he, I mean, that's his town. That whole town is a monument to Donald Judd, met a lot of cool people, a lot of other interns and other art institutions there in Marfa. And honestly, if I hadn't been with my now wife during that time period, I probably would have stayed there. I don't know what I would have done. I probably would have become a dishwasher and a townie, but I always have a blast in Marfa. It is just a really special place. It has a sense of community that I hadn't found before or since. It's just such a small towner, but it gets to know each other and there's nothing to do other than get to know each other. And then I did some other stuff. You know, I was, you know, like a portrait studio photographer for a while. That was cool. Then I worked for the chiefs and then the Vikings before I got here to the, the text were you on staff at those other teams or were you an intern? I started as an intern with the chiefs. Their team photographers, man named Steve Sanders, he's been in the league for a long time, widely respected, widely revered. He has taught a lot of people in my position around the NFL. I mean, he's one of the main photography teachers of the NFL. So I was lucky to get to hear what he had to say during my internship and then they kept me on as a contractor and then the Vikings hired me in a position called archive coordinator, which basically meant a photographer, digital asset manager dealt with historic, you know, team artifacts, old jerseys and pants and helmets. And that was, that was an interesting fun side path of my career. I didn't want to make it my main path. And but it was, it was a fun adventure. And now I'm spending all my time doing what I feel like I'm best at. And that makes me feel pretty lucky. So it sounds like, I mean, I had a different path. Everyone has a different path. But I also was like an art dude. Like I was like, I wanted to go to school to take large format pictures of plants or something. I don't know what I was thinking, but I didn't really have, I never would have thought in, even as I was graduating college, I never would have thought that I'd be photographing sports. And I still don't consider myself a sports photographer yet. I go to like 20 NFL games a year, which is about as many as you do. My math is about the same number that I do. Yeah. So it's like, so I would have never thought that. So like, how did you find that transition going from, you know, I mean, vacuums and portraits and you literally working at art galleries to then, you know, be in the rain and the muck in the, in the, you know, athletic world, which is pretty, pretty far departure. That's a good, I think that's a really good question, man. Very stooped. This is my answer. The art world is so personally and emotionally taxing. (laughs) If you're working in the fine art paradigm, you are reckoning with yourself, not easy, not for everybody, found out it wasn't for me. And so when I discover that I can tell somebody else's story instead of telling my own story, it was freeing. I can still do this craft that I enjoy, but I don't have to dig deep down into the recesses of the deep archive of my brain and reckon with stuff and try to visually tell my story. I can tell somebody else's story and I might be good at that and that might be just as valuable and just as worth my time. So I liked the structure of it. When I got to the chiefs, I liked how my photo day fit into this little box. You get to the stadium, you go shoot some tailgates, maybe you shoot a wide picture of the stadium. You had these parameters where in fine art, it's scat and some of this other stuff I was doing, there was no parameters in that lack of restriction. I felt just very challenging for myself personally that I wasn't getting any traction, I guess. I go through some of that old work back in those days. I'm shooting a lot of film, like you were talking about, I'm shooting some large format, shooting some Polaroid, scanning a bunch of stuff, doing a bunch of inkjet prints and there's some interesting ideas there when I go back through it. You know, I think I abandoned some good ideas. You know, I look at some of that stuff, I'm like, man, I was kind of halfway there. I might have been a third of the way there. So maybe I've punted on it too early, but that's what happened. You know, you got to make some money, got to live a life. - We can't all be, you know, the Carolina Panthers and go for it on fourth. - That's right. That's right. That's right. - There's like 30% of the audience that got that joke. - I think that's really interesting, because that's an interesting way of looking at it, 'cause I've never thought of it that way actually. I went to school and I went to school for engineering. I effectively flunked out. I passed my history of Nazi Germany class. That was the only class I passed my first semester. And I was actually at Penn State. I think I went to one football game at Penn State when I was there. I was a nerd. And so I sat in my dorm room and I played Battlefield 1942. And I thought art was cool. And I wanted to be an artist. And then I bounced around and long story short. I ended up running into a professor that said, "You want to do fine art?" And I said, "Yeah, I want to do fine art." He's like, "Who's your favorite fine artist?" And I was like, "Oh, like Nan Golden." She's really great. And he goes, "Nan Golden's a photojournalist." And I was like, "What?" (laughing) She takes pictures of real life. She's a photojournal. And I was like, "No, this son of a bitch." She was, he messed up my whole gourd. And so anyways, I switched programs. - Thank God for those teachers, right? - Yeah, no, totally because right now I'd be like delivering pizzas or something and like having a large format camera around, which I still have a large format camera around. I just don't deliver pizzas. - That puts some joy in my heart, man. I'm glad that you do. - Yeah, I'm all one. I need one. - Dude, I just got it. I wanted one for years. - That's cool. - I had a medium format and I had 35 millimeter behind shot large formats since college. So now I'm chomping at the bit. I gotta get it repaired and get going on it. But I got the air lactar even, this 2.5. - That's the real deal, right there. - That's, yeah. So 2020 NFL season, if it happens, will be real weird from my perspective. - That's awesome, man. - So yeah, so I think it's really interesting though that you like took this, you know, I think everybody takes these weird paths and I think like one of the reasons starting this podcast was like that everyone doesn't take these routes and I met a younger photographer this summer and I was shooting a sports event. They were, they were clearly not into sports and we kind of two days working together. He was my runner, great guy. But I think the first day he was kind of like, oh, this is like some sports dude. And then he like realized I knew some people in like the Reportage world and I think like, I think like a barrier broke down. And he's like, wait a second. This dude, this dude, this dude knows what's going on. Like this dude, not just a sports person, you know, or whatever. So what do you find like day to day? It sounds like I would think you kind of drawn a lot of experiences, not just the action photography when it comes to your job currently and also the things you've done getting up to this point. You mentioned digital acid management. Those are skill sets that I think most people probably wouldn't really think about. Like what are some of the things you guys are doing outside of those action pictures? So we cover everything, right? We do the photo shoot days. We do the cheerleaders. We do, you know, so like I have to have this sort of well-rounded, you know, gotta be a studio lighting guy a few days out of the year. And I don't get to play with and practice that stuff as much as I would like because when I do have to use it, it is very important that I get it right. There's a certain part of the job because this is a corporate entity. So there's a certain part of the job that is being corporate office Zach, right? Meeting Zach, email Zach, Microsoft Outlook Zach. And I've gotten better at that throughout the years. You just have noxious email tones that I don't have to deal with. Yeah, man, like, outlook email sounds just sounds like sadness to me. It kind of is. I know everybody has some of that administrative stuff that they have to deal with no matter what, right? If I was a freelancer and I was out there trying to drum up business, I'd have to be doing similar things. You know, I'd have to be, you know, I'd have spreadsheets open all the time to keep track of my expenditures if I'm a freelancer. So there's this stuff I've sort of realized whether I'm in an office outside of an office, Tant, you know, can't avoid it. But the good part of doing that office part of the job, every team I've ever been with, chiefs, Vikings, Texans, cool people. Buildings are full of cool people everywhere I've been. And I think it's because everybody, you know, a lot of people want to work for an NFL team. So it attracts these sort of talented, interesting people. And every NFL team is kind of like its own little village, right? You know, we have our police officer. We have our doctor, you know, we have a team doctor. So you're getting to meet and really sit at lunch with people that I probably wouldn't get to hang out with. Otherwise, our lawyer, the Texans, this guy named Greg, I think everybody that's listening to this, if you work for the Texans would agree with me when I say, "Greg's hilarious. Greg is a cool dude to hang out with and have lunch with." And the perspective he's coming from, you know, it broadens your scope of the world. I feel like that stuff is what makes us, you know, normal people, well-rounded people. And I love, so I love that part of it. I love being in the organization and getting to know these interesting, cool people. So the email, like the digital asset management, that's the, that's the Eat in Your Vegetables part of the gig, right? I could, I could really geek out on some damn talk right now. Oh, dude, but, but I don't know if you guys want that. Shane, with Shane List-Bug, check out the Patreon podcast, everyone where Zach and I will talk about DAM real quick. Let's go, let's go. Yeah, I can do that. Okay. So yeah, so I think, I think that's really interesting because like, I think, I think people forget how much is behind the scenes and the crowd team. And I think of any big entity. I think like, I've done work for corporate jobs where they have a corporate photographer and they still hire me because it's like, they have so much stuff. Yes. And it's just like, you can't understand how much goes into these big, large corporations. Yeah. Obviously, like you said, there is some downfalls of like the bureaucracy of that. However, I think, I think there's like, there's gotta be some superpowers to this though of like, you have, you must have a lot less psychological stress day to day working for, the NFL is not going anywhere. That must be pretty cool to have that stability. And also, it affords you probably some opportunities that someone like myself do not have. What are some of those opportunities or some of those cool moments that you're just like, whoa, like I am in a blessed position right now. And whether that be at the Texans or maybe at the other teams. Yeah. Yeah, you're totally right. There's a lot of stuff that I know you freelance guys have to deal with that I don't. And I definitely recognize how lucky I am that I don't have to deal with some of those like day to day stressors. What's the next gig that stuff? I don't have to deal with that. I'm thankful for it. This works out great for me, 'cause I'm a family man. Got a couple little ones, have a wife. This fits great for sort of the life that I wanted to live. I've got some of my editorial buddies. There's a guy Cooper Neal that lives up in Dallas that I've gotten to know pretty well. Yeah, he's a great guy, right? And I think he's, I'll just use him as an example to tell this story like, I look at his Instagram, he's traveling around, he's shooting lots of different stuff. He is having adventures all day every day. He's on the plane, he's at the UFC fight, he's at the football game, he's, you know, this guy's out there doing it. I think a lot of people would love to have Cooper's career. And sometimes I sit there and I'm like, man, I want Cooper's career. I want to do this, right? I'm like, this looks really, really fun. But when I really think about it, there's, you know, there's no way I could, there's no way I could make that work. That's, it's not, it's not for me. And, and honestly, I find that encouraging because that tells me there's enough to go around for everyone. There's enough out there, there's enough demand. If you can do the job, if you know how to do the job, there's gonna be something out there for you. It might take a minute to catch on. But if you can do it, there's enough work out there for everybody, there's enough little niches and you just find your niche. And I'm at the point right now, I kind of found my little niche. And, and I'm, I'm cozying up after, after about 10 years of sort of spinning out, going different spots. It's, it's kind of hard to describe. I think a lot of photographers, they might agree with me when, you know, I say something like, the good pictures are hiding. You're just looking, you're like, you're just so zoomed in. You're just always looking through that lens and the, these like special cool moments, they're hiding, they're hiding. And you feel like maybe one is about to reveal itself that maybe you're lucky enough to. to capture it. And so when you're looking, looking, looking all the time, you notice a lot of stuff people don't notice. And you know, I remember last training camp. We had a training camp wide receiver guy named Chad Hanson. And he was kind of one of those bubble guys. Maybe he'll make the roster. Maybe he won't. He was on the practice squad. Then they cut him. Then they brought him back. I remember him catching a touchdown during training camp. And man, he was fired up. And I was so fired up for him because you see him working so hard every day. And then he kind of gets that moment. It gets a little bit of that shine. And you can see just that genuine happiness and excitement. And when they brought him back after cutting him, and I saw him in the hallway, I'm like, Hey, welcome back, man. And you could tell that he was just like genuinely happy and excited about that. I think that's the cool part of my job is my close attention is rewarded with little moments that I get to observe just just because like I'm looking and paying attention. Yeah. And I think you hit on a great point about covering something like the NFL. I think to anyone who doesn't cover sports or I mean, sports, but I think like, you know, I have friends who cover politics. And like you have to look between the big plays to find the really great pictures or between the big moments yesterday. Javen Botsford posted. He posted a picture yesterday of like a note on the president's desk. And like that's such like a thing out of context that like whatever. But he knew that like that was the story of the day. And he looked for it and he found it and you just like, Oh, damn, like that is so that's the job right there. That's the job. And I think like when it comes to the NFL, like I have, I'm not allowed to interact with the players. You know, right. Our credentials forbid it. And I'm sure yours to some degree probably have a border or a wall for you guys. But I think like you forget that a lot of guys on this team are not superstars. Like a lot of the guys are going to work. Their work is paying more money in a few years. But over the course of a career, they are not billionaires. They're not millionaires even in most cases. And I think like they appreciate so deeply the fact that someone is following their journey. And the limited interactions I've had, you know, I'm friends with one or two of the guys. But like other than that, I don't know them that well. But you can tell that they are out there. They are at work on Sundays. They're at work Monday through Saturday too. I think it's so cool to hear you talk about like, Okay, this dude's in the practice squad. And for those that aren't big NFL people, basically the practice squad is a set of players that are on the team that as the name implies, only really participate in practice. And they are basically like the fourth place on the roster. And I think their pay is like what, like 60 grand a year or something like that. Maybe I don't they're not rich. Yeah. I forget the practice squad rate. I think it's a little bit higher than that. But yeah, you're right. Like people don't realize there are a lot of guys on the team that are not rich or famous. Yeah. Something to keep in mind. Yeah. Just regular guys that are really good at playing football. When you started to make this transition, you know, you're working at our galleries, you're working for Joe Meyer with like, how did you fall into that first position and what were some of the steep learning curves you ran into? I had a friend from school that had done a similar gig and he was kind of the one that basically like explained to me like, here's the deal. Okay, you're going to go up there. You're going to do XYZ. You know, I think I fell into it. I feel like I'm pretty good at applying to that thing. That's something that I'm good at. I'm good at doing an interview. I'm good at doing a phone interview. I'm good at putting that resume together. I'm good at putting that portfolio together. And that's just because I've really worked on it. You know, I've really, you know, I've really tried very hard to make that be something that I'm good at. So it's just, you know, research trial and error. But when I got to Joel's studio man, I wasn't ready at all. They were really nice and gracious and impatient with me. You know, those poor people, they ended up with this sort of like 22 year old dude that's like, how did, like, they must have just been like, how did this guy even manage to get up here? You know, how did he, like, it's a miracle that he even like showed up on the doorstep from Savannah. How do you figure out the stuff? Yeah. How did he, yeah, how did he figure out the 10 steps that he needed to do to even like end up? So they were awesome, man. I mean, and I think my biggest takeaway was just like, how to be a professional, how to work in a professional working environment. I've always known how to work hard, right? And so I sort of realized that very quickly. It's like everywhere really appreciates people that just grind it out. And that's something. Yeah. And that's something that I guess I've, I've had that for sure. It's just like that grinded out thing. And I saw a lot of people at school and a lot of people work since they don't have that thing. And it goes a long way. You know, if any young people are listening to this, I guess I, I just think your willingness and ability to make yourself miserable and just work really, really hard just will do wonders for you. You know, if you can do that, you're going to be okay. I think that's a huge takeaway that, like, that is something I learned as well very quickly. I remember my, I only had one internship. I messed up everything. I would, I'm going to ask you about your tips for applying to things because I am horrible at it. But I got one internship. And I remember like one of the first days I went to like an assignment. It was at a newspaper and they were like, I was like, Oh, yeah, man, like nothing was happening. Like the thing didn't happen. Whatever it was. And I remember my boss just being like, uh, well, I can't run that in the paper. So shoot a picture or like, you know, just quit. And I was like, what? Right. Like more or less. He was just like, uh, yeah, like, I can't, I can't run those words that the thing didn't happen. Like there's a picture of the fact the event got canceled. And we can run that if we need to, but we can't run the event didn't happen. Here's a picture of the building from four years ago. But you still remember that? Like you remember that there was like a big moment learning moment for you. You talking about right now? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Those those, those are the moments like when you internalize that screw up experience, that's where grownups come from, from right there. That's where grownups come from is those moments. Either you're going to internalize it or you're a child for the rest of your life. Oh, yeah. That is, that is, yeah. That is where grownups come from. That is, that is the clip I'm using for the Instagram post. That is, no, it's so true though. And I think that's the thing that I joke with my friends. When we were graduating college, every job was basically like needs five years experience, need five or three years experience. It was all like three to five years experience for anything. Yeah. I remember saying to all my friends, we all said over like, what will I know three years from now that I don't know now. Like I got this big fancy BFA dude. I know what's going on. I got a photo mechanic down pat like, you know, but things have it happened to you. Oh my God. No, they have me. Things have to happen to you to turn you into a worker. Yeah. Right. Oh, yeah. The work ethic is that comes with pain. Yeah. So I would love to hear because I think it applies to anyone in the career, whether that be a internship application, a job application, or maybe a grant application. What are some of those tips you have for applying to things or things that you've kind of developed that you think are some quick tips people could get into. Yeah. Yeah. So first off, I just like disclaimer, like this is just one man's two cents, like take it with a grain of salt. You know, it's, it's, it's, this is, I'm just speaking from my experience and I'm just talking about the way I look at it. So the way I look at it, you apply to something, they don't know you. You are your question mark, your big question mark. And it's almost like who's this guy I think he is to send us an application, right? So your number one goal with everything you give them is help them get to know you as a person as a worker. Everything is answering that question. Who is this guy? In each little piece has to tell a different part of the story. There is zero point in your cover letter saying the same thing as your resume. There's zero point in your resume saying the same thing as your portfolio. It all has to be efficient because you don't know how long they're going to spend on your stuff. You got to get their attention right off the bat, right? So when they click on your website, first thing they see is your best work you have ever made. First thing, no welcome click here. None of that. Just the straight dope right off the bat. Set the hook. Yeah. And then given put enough in there that if they're interested, there's more to see, right? As a photographer, what I'm really looking for in another photographer's portfolio is a degree of efficiency and storytelling tells me they know how to edit down a body of work. You know, it's just organized. It just makes sense. A good about me section doesn't have to be anything crazy. Just answers that question. Who's this person that I'm thinking about right now? What are they about? What experiences have they had? Like what has happened to this person? You know, if I've seen that they're, they've gone to a big state school and they've shot baseball and football and softball and track and field and some stuff for the newspapers like, okay, I know, I know what this person has done. I know it's what they've gone through. I can sort of like envision that. So you need to convey that idea. Help me understand what you've been through and what you've accomplished. And I think the other big thing is just like less is more only the best stuff. Only the stuff that you think is like five star. That's it. That's it. We don't need two versions of the same picture. And I don't blame anybody in school for doing that because that just tells me nobody's ever told them that before. Like it's not their fault that nobody's ever told them that. So you know, you just got to ask those questions and I get cold emails and messages all the time. I'm sure you do. I'm sure everybody does. I do my best to answer them. You don't never know where people are going to end up. And my biggest fear is just like, oh man, they're zacked. 10 years ago, he big timed me for the blah blah blah or whatever. You know, so I try to, you know, I try not to, like during the season, and stuff gets buried or whatever. But yeah, so just really tell a clear professional story, decide what your professional story is, and just convey it is clearly and concisely as possible, because think you're not gonna tell your whole story in that application, okay? If they like what they see, they're gonna call you and they're gonna get to know more. So you don't have to tell the entire novel, you know? Give me that teaser, this is the trailer version of your movie, right? - Yeah. - So I think that's a good way to think about it. - No, I think that is awesome advice. And I do, again, learning a lot today. (laughing) Yeah, maybe I'll have a staff job by fall. (laughing) - If I can do it, anybody can do it. - Yeah, yeah. - That's real talk. - No, I think that's interesting though, 'cause I think that was, this is the kind of knowledge that I did not have in college. And I think I probably got bits and pieces of it, but it's nice to hear someone who's had success on the other side. So going back to your position now, to your job role isn't photographer at the Houston Texans. It's the, what, photography manager, right? - Manager of photography and team photographer. So two titles, one man. And I think, you know, it's more indicative of the way that we're organized and structured more than anything. - Okay. - You know, basically it just means, I'm a, you know, internal team photographer that lets people know, I'm the dude taking the pictures. You just see that title around the league. It's just a job that people have around the league. And so when you see that, everybody knows what that means. And then the manager of photography talks about, doing all the digital asset management, hiring the freelance team, managing the freelance team, you know, taking care of the intern, you know, hiring them, giving them their workload. And then, you know, you're the person that photography questions, internal and external photography questions are directed to. So you're the one fielding, hey, we wanna make this print. Hey, we wanna, you know, whatever the project is. People know, okay, this is the person that I talk to for these things. - So I think one of the things that's really interesting to me as someone who covers the NFL, and I'm not associated with the team, is that how different every team is in their approach to covering said team. - Yeah. - So I cover the Buffalo Bills extremely heavily. I've covered them for almost, I think, six seasons now. - Okay. - And now I've covered some Titans games now that I've been living in Nashville, but I'm still doing the Buffalo Bills. And even those two teams are different. But then in addition to that, you see these other teams come in. I've been on trips and things to photograph at other stadiums every, I mean, down to like the way they file, to the way they organize, to everything is different. Do you see that as like something that is, is this from like lack of experience? That this is like a newer concept, or is this just that like, I think, like I guess where does, where do you think that comes from? And like, what do you see as standing maybe some of the challenges and successes on that front? - I think the answer to that question, it's, I think it's kind of a hard question. I think a lot of it just has to do with how teams are organized. What department is the photography operation under? Who are the big stakeholders? What's most important to them? Those are all the questions that like shape the way the photo, the photo operation manifests itself. Right? Like, so it's just different for everybody. And I don't necessarily think it's right or wrong, right? Like, just like any gig, you are shooting for the client. Just because you are employed by the team, the idea of shooting for the client is actually different from team to team, right? Like, some places might only care about game action. They're like, Zach, listen, you're here to shoot game action. That's all we want from you at the end. And I would say, okay, that sounds great. The way it is with the Texans, we have presented it to the organization as this is a resource for every department. Ticket sales, sweet sales, marketing, football, coaches, everybody, we are a resource here for you. You let us know what you want shot on game day and we'll get it done for you. So I get shot lists from every department. I have a spreadsheet. I divide it up to different freelancers according to, you know, what their strengths are. I try to put them in positions to be successful. Yeah. And, you know, they shoot that shot list. And for the most part, I'm not making projects for us as a photo operation. I'm not saying like, this is what I want. This is what I'm going to go do. I am trying to shape it in terms of what I think the stakeholders want and what's going to be useful to them. And what we need to have in our library and catalog. You know, I'm trying to anticipate, okay, this person's going to search for this. We got to have this imagery. We have to, we have to add metadata like this because this is what they're going to type in. So you're doing a little bit of guesswork, but that's the way that I approach it. Like, I'm trying to, I'm trying to give the people what they want. I think that's interesting because I think everybody thinks of things as like news, social media, maybe, you know, I think some teams kind of approach it like a news entity that obviously like what you're saying is new to me to hear that like every client is different. Everybody has their own needs, but your approach and a few other of the approaches seem to make more sense to me as someone who does commercial work as well is that like, I know they're going to need assets for all these different things on different platforms. And even the fact that anyone could look at news photos, so to speak, on a lot of different sites, but like if I come to the team, I want that insider look like, you know what I mean? And I feel like a lot of the team photographers seem to get that and then some of the other ones do not. And I'm always, and that's that there's anything wrong with that. It's just always interesting when you see the differences in approaches. And there's different rules to, you know, there's different rules regarding access, different places. You know, you ask 10 people to have my job. You're probably going to get 10 different answers regarding that stuff. But yeah, like I'm buddies with our newspaper photographer, Brett Kumer, he's a great photographer. He's awesome. He and I are not shooting for the same thing during the game. Yeah. We are not looking to tell the same story most of the time. Yeah. It's kind of fun to like look at the paper and stuff and be like, oh, that's that's where you guys were at. That's what that's what you guys were thinking. And it's it's usually not where I was at what I was thinking. Yeah, no, I feel the same way whenever I see, yeah, even the other editorial clients, but then also like the team people, it's like there's such a difference in your approach and where you're going and what you're trying to get. Because I have a different goal. Like I like regardless of what happens on the field, like if we get destroyed, right, that's what the headlines going to be. And there's going to be a picture of one of our players sad. The text is it we're never going to, I'm never going to show that we're not going to, that's not the job, you know, like I want to make us look like a million bucks no matter what happens. I, you know, I care what happens on the field, but when lose or draw, I want us, I want you to look through our best pictures and I'm telling the story of the show, that all these people that I work with are working together to put on. That's what I want to do because I know how hard everybody works. I want to do that justice, right? I know that story is there. And the news, you know, and other, other places aren't trying to, nobody, the headlines never going to be Texans put on a great game day experience for all their fans, right? That's never going to be the story. That's the story that I care about. I want you to go through my 10 best and be like, boom, there's a touchdown, there's a happy fan, there's a cheerleader, there's a interesting vantage point, there's an interesting black and white picture. Oh, the light in that one is cool. And you just flip through those and you're like, man, that was 10 different interesting pictures. Say that I am obviously not there to say. What a great job the team did. I'm there to say, look at this dude's bloody forehead from when he hit or whatever. I'm there to tell the story of the game. Do you ever feel like, I don't know if the way, if your hands are tied, but like, do you ever feel like there's pictures you can't take or maybe not, maybe not can't take is that not so literally, but you know what I mean? Again, it's like different, different places. But yeah, at this point after having done this for a little bit, I definitely know when to be smart. I guess like, there's moments, it is for me, I know when it's life or death and I know certain moments is like, this is not, this moment is not for me. This moment has nothing to do with me. I am 100% okay with that because I understand like, that's what the job is. Like I just want to do my job. Just like anybody, somebody shooting for the newspaper, there's a certain moment that they're like, that's where I'm making my money today. Is that moment? So I have a different moment where I'm making my money for that day. And that's, and that's okay. So, yeah, I think a big part of doing, being good at this job is just getting a sense of, you know, when to be smart and when to know what your role is in certain moments. Let's get down to the brass tax of actually shooting football. What are some of your approaches that I will now steal? That you do. Like what is your approach? I don't want to get into the gear per se, but maybe a little bit of like, what's your thought process? Where are you trying to be? And what are some of the goals you have while you're on the field? Again, I don't think my answer for this is necessarily right. I really enjoy, you know, talking about those parameters a game day. It blows my mind to see what different creative people can do with those parameters. There are so many other editorial and team photographers. You see their work on Instagram. You're like, man, I never, I never thought about that. I never thought about doing that. And that's, that's pretty cool. I mean, let's, it just goes to show how much talent there is out there. Oh, yeah. The thing, so I just, I just kind of shoot for what my photographic concerns are. I really like emotion and reactions. And all these things I'm about to list off are the reason that I love wrestling, because all of this stuff is in wrestling. Oh, yeah. So, you know, facial emotions and reactions. I love color. I love excitement. I love pageantry. So anything that has to do with those things that convey those. ideas, I find myself being drawn to those are the things that that draw me in and when I can combine those different elements of emotion and page entry and color. That's that's kind of the stuff that I find myself, you know, point my lens to. So try to get close, try to get far away, try to move up in the stadium, try to move down like, you know, I know some people shooting our games. Number one, I'm not sure why they're down there to begin with. I don't know who they're shooting for. I don't know what I don't know why they're down there. Oh, man, it's got a whole podcast me complaining about the credentialing system of any kind of I don't want to complain about. I don't want to complain about the I'm not going to play about the credentials, but it's like it's it's just there's a certain kind of photographer that's just like very content to stay put and they're going to get the same picture every game lower half green upper half fans and then just different things happening in the middle and there's definitely a place for those pictures. I'm taking those pictures. I got to take those pictures. But I do not want to take that picture 100% of the time while I'm in the stadium on game day and and and there are certain people that that's what they want to do and that's fine, you know, that's that's their prerogative. But like I would put that is the exact opposite of what my approach is on game day. I'm not I'm not trying to take this same 3,000 pictures every week for 10 years. I've no interest in doing that. What's the point of doing that? There's there's no point in doing that to me. You know, move your ass, move up in the stands, lay on the ground. We all know there's a million things you can do. Why not do them, right? Why not? Why do you have to lose? There's nothing to lose in like doing something weird. You do something weird. It doesn't work out. You're like, okay, failed experiment. Can I fix it? I think it's okay to have a looser approach. I think there's moments to be conservative. I can't miss this. This is, you know, game winning playoff touchdown. Can't miss that. Yeah. Right. But then there's moments like you can be a little looser with it and it's going to be fine. Like if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. It's try some stuff. Earlier you were saying about how you was you have a lot of pre-production into your games, including staffing their games. And I think this would be a pretty good asset for some of the younger listeners that are interested in this. What does that look like as far as how you're staffing them in addition to yourself? And also then we can merge that into what is your internship process? Look like. So this past season was the best season we've ever had in terms of our freelance game day staff went just one notch above sort of like minimum bandwidth. So now I had a little bit of extra to play with on deciding where people go. And I've really enjoyed that because it let my group have a little more wiggle room. I could get a little more creative. You know, I could, you know, just do things I hadn't done previously. And man, that was that was like a revelation. I was like, why didn't I do this sooner? Just having that like one or two extra people that one extra card runner that one extra editor game changer, you know, and it took it took a minute to get to that spot. You know, it was my second season here. But being able to do that. And I, you know, I got to thank my bosses for letting us do that. But like having those few extras, I mean, it made a huge, huge difference. So I just, I like to, you know, for home games, I have every advantage. So why shouldn't I have somebody in every corner of the field? Why shouldn't I have somebody up in the stands? Why shouldn't I have somebody on the catwalk? I have every opportunity to do that. So why, you know, why not do that? Of course. So that's, yeah, that's kind of my approach. Like my biggest fear for a long time is like, there's a pick six and it goes the other direction. I don't have somebody in that corner. So yeah, that's all right. Now, yeah. So the way it's set up now, the way it should work is that if that happens, we will have pictures of that pick six. There will be somebody in any part of the field, no matter where the action goes to. And then our intern, my approach with the internship is like, I view this as somebody that's up and coming that's, you know, at the right point of their career, because you don't want to get an intern that's overqualified, right? Yeah, because they take your job. Well, take your job or I just view it as like they stand to get less out of it. You know, you're going to have to do a bunch of digital asset management. You're going to have to shoot a bunch of community, community events. There's a certain kind of photographer that they're really going to stand to gain a lot from that experience. So I want to get somebody that could gain a lot from that experience. So they can walk away from the internship with some really interesting things to talk about on their resume and a nice beefy portfolio, you know, and I want to like be a resource for them too. You know, if I bring somebody in, it's like, I don't need to listen to anything this guy has to say, he's not saying anything that I don't already know, you know, that's fine. There's people out there like that, but I want to be useful to somebody. You know, you're going to give me all this work. You're going to work your butt off from me. I want you to get something out of it too. I'm literally going to when we get done or interview for the Patreon, but we keep mentioning digital asset management and metadata. And I just super briefly, I don't want to go into it too much, but like, yeah, that has to be one of the things that seems to not happen with other teams for my quick observance of like knowing what they do. And it has to be like, I think something that the photojournalist community would be like appalled by because we are so anal about having metadata on everything. So anyone 20 years from now could open it up into, you know, whatever the program is and get it. But that must be such a, that must be such a big thing that your boss is love that you do. Yeah, I sort of recognize early on. This is a thing that these teams are looking for answers for. I need to turn myself into the kind of person that can provide those answers. So just a supplementary skill set gave myself a little Google PhD on digital asset management and metadata back in my times during the chiefs and have sort of continued to do so. I've been to a few really good digital asset management conferences that I've learned a lot about. Those are cool because you get to talk to real digital asset managers. You get to talk to people with degrees in library science. You get to talk to people that actually know what they're doing when it comes to this kind of stuff. So anybody out there doing digital asset management that's even like slightly curious. I really recommend going to a to a conference because it's a great complimentary skill set. I think part of the reason that papers and news institutions have more sophisticated digital asset management operations is because they have had photography in their institution for dang near 100 years if you're an old institution, right? So they've been in the photography game for a long time. So they're just a lot further down the road. Somebody like the Kansas City chiefs, they were among one of the first teams to hire an internal like full-time permanent staff member photographer. I want to say that was probably like 09 or 10 when they when they you know and Steve had been a freelancer for them for a long time. But still that's like relatively late, right? And the chiefs were doing that. They were among the first to do it. So pretty much widespread across the league. They've just been in the internal photo game for less time, right? And so the first step is like the organization has to identify this is a need. This is a problem that we need to solve for. Yeah. Some places haven't even maybe asked the right question yet. Yeah. It's not fun. It's brutal. But there is sort of like a sense of like geeky like satisfaction to doing it well and getting done. Yeah. It's way easier to do it front than it is later. We'll get into that. Yeah. Oh man. We'll get it. We'll get it. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm obviously this podcast is new. If you're listening to this, I don't know which order I'm going to put these out. But this is only the second recording. So you are the silver medal winner. Let's go. But I got I got I got three questions that I will probably mess up because I didn't actually go and double check what the three questions were I asked in the first interview. But I think I got them right. So I can answer them anyway. Yeah. Exactly. So these questions, it's kind of like it's kind of like a sign off that we know before we say our goodbyes and wrap things up. I'm just going to ask them and you give me your answer and the idea is that we get this little database of these sort of things. So the first one is what is something that you wish you learned a lot earlier in your career? I wish I would have understood the amount of work required to be successful. And not that I wasn't a hard worker, but it's just I wish I could have recalibrated that internal sense of what is necessary. I just I just had no clue. You know, so I wish I would have known and like a 1b to that answer is I wish I would have known to shoot more earlier on. I wasn't shooting enough earlier on. And that's something that I touch on a lot when people send me cold emails and stuff. However much you're shooting, double it, triple it, whatever. I mean, you honestly, you can't get enough when you're young. It's the perfect time to just shoot your butt off because you have these expendable hours that you don't have later on in your life. There's a reason that people learn to play their instrument at a young age, right? Because you can just dump eight hours into being in your room, noodling on the guitar. You can dump eight hours into running around town, taking pictures. And after you're an adult with other responsibilities, you can't do that anymore. So shoot as much as you can earlier on. To go back to those learning moments. I had a professor who was I kind of think of him as like the Yoda of photography. I want to actually do a documentary that's just like a four hour conversation with him. And I don't care if three people watch it. Those three people will be better for it. Anyways, this call I'll watch him in. Yeah, like 10 of us will watch it will be stoked. But this guy had the mindset of, you know, he's very old school and he said to us like the one one of our first assignments was like to shoot 10 rolls of film in I don't know if it was one day, one weekend or one week, but whatever number it was, and we did it digitally, of course. So we just shot 360 pictures. And I remember like all of our jaws dropped. Like you want us to shoot 300? I think it must've been one day, 'cause we were just like, and then he was like not possible. And he's like no motor drive, no nothing. Like you're making pictures for 300. And we were like, what? Like those mind-blowing. And I'm glad that was one of my first classes, not one of my last classes. - Right. - Perfect assignment. That's awesome. - Yeah. So the second question is, what is one thing or piece of gear that you would not leave without? Or what's like the one thing that like, you know, it's just like a gotta have it? - I mean, I've tried to do this on like family trips before, you know, with the kids and stuff. You can't always take the whole backpack full. And I've gone on trips before where I'm like, I'm just taking the 24 and just like, you know, when lose your drive, that's all, I've got one lens. And that's been good. Like I've liked that, you know, you take just a 24 on the trip and you're gonna get your landscapes, you're gonna get your poor trips, you're gonna get, you know, and so that's worked for me. That's not like a wild, cool answer. But, you know, I would challenge anybody to maybe do that. You know, you go on a trip and just, I'm just taking this one thing and, you know, necessities, the mother of all invention. I think that's an interesting exercise. Recently I've been trying to like mess with some point in shoots. Maybe like, hey, I'm gonna take a point in shoot on a trip. And man, I just haven't liked them. Yeah. So I've kind of like abandoned that idea of that expensive thousand dollar point in shoot. I thought I was really clever by thinking that, but I was wrong. I think like a 5D and a 24, 35 is like way more satisfying. And I don't. I don't. Man, I struggle with that as well. Yeah. So we don't really know the demographic of this audience right now. We don't, I don't have a firm lock on who's listening to this, but I got a pretty good guess. And I would love for you to make your own guess. And tell these people, what is something you'd want all of them to hear or a takeaway or a lesson learned or something that, you know, young photographers, old photographers, editors, like what's something that your nugget of knowledge that you're like, man, I just wish everyone knew this. True. Man, you're asking the best questions. I'm so glad I decided to do this. This is like so fun. 'Cause yeah, that's a great question. The thing that I talked to a couple of my good photo buddies about a lot and the way I all word it is just get on your own trip. Don't get on somebody else's trip. Just get on your own trip. And that is everything. 'Cause as soon as you start playing, somebody else's game when it comes to photography, you're gonna be miserable. And so like what's even the point? There are a billion jobs that you can do in the world, a billion hobbies that you can have and be miserable. So if you're gonna do this, if you're gonna work harder and make less money, you might as well have a little more fun and do make the pictures that you wanna make a little bit. Just figure out what you're about. Don't let somebody else tell you what you're about. Do the real work. The real work is figuring out what you're about. And then just do that thing and just worrying about what other people doing is just nonsense. And I'm guilty of it. I think everybody's guilty of it. - Oh, really? - I'm preaching to the choir right now. So yeah, that's my one thing. Get on your own trip. - No, I love that. I love that. I get so caught up in FOMO and social media, especially during the season. I mean, 'cause we're all shooting the same sport and we're all kind of more or less in the same place and you get someone's got that ringer and you're just like that man. How did I miss what? Ears you got. - Yeah. So real quick, we'll wrap this up. Kind of, you know, is there anything I missed or anything we kind of need to touch on? - Something I've been thinking about a lot lately. And this honestly, like it might just be a plug. I don't know if you want to do a plug, but like, I did the, my buddy and I, we did the Magnum Learn, Alex Sof class recently. We did it together. Man, I got a lot out of that. It was like a hundred bucks. It's like 20 videos or something. It's like five hours and they've got these workbooks and it was just so refreshing to hear this dude that's at the top of the mountain as far as I'm concerned. - Yeah. - Magnum photographer, awesome portfolio, awesome career. Just speak truth to power. - Yeah. - And I just like him as a guy. You know, he just keeps it real regular dude. I just love the way that he talked about photography and it just like, it just opened things up man. Like being able to do this with my buddy Andy and talk to him about it. It was like the best thing I could have done this offseason, the best thing. It was awesome. I would have paid $1,000 for it. Like it was worth every penny. - I struggle as a mid career person. I've said this for a few years now. I struggle with the fact that there's not a lot of resources for us to gain knowledge and experience or training. There's a lot of stuff when you're coming out of school. There's a lot of stuff while you're in school. And there's a lot of stuff when you get to a point in your career where you have to shift and recalibrate, which are also probably most of the same resources as people who are coming out of school. It's just here now 20, 30 years from them. So it's interesting who you talk about that because that was another reason for this podcast, hoping that it leads to something else maybe down the road. But I think that's a really hard thing for young people to hear because they think, well, that person's just got it all figured out. And I think we're all struggling to figure out some aspect of this, whether that be finances, whether that be making new and creative work. If we do have a reliable position or it's just techniques and skills, you know, because there's a chance that in five to 10 years you might be asked to do something new or different, whether that be needing an MBA or whether that be doing video or who knows what, you know. I told our intern that the other day, it's like, you're trying to figure it out right now. What you're going through right now is what it is. Like this is what it always will be. It doesn't matter what point you're at. And if you're not trying to figure it out, what's the fun in that, right? Like you're always like that's what this whole photo thing is is you're just tackling the new thing. You're always going to want to take that next step. You're never, you're never like, "Whoop, I did it. I'm there. I'm done." That just like doesn't happen. Yeah, no, I feel the same way. I struggle. Yeah, I struggled so much. I heard Ed Cashy one time, Ed Cache, I don't know how his last name, he was at a conference and he was just like, "Yeah, I'm still worried about where the next job is going to come from." And I was like, "No, why did he say that?" "No, he's done everything." "How can he be figuring it out?" Darth Vader Giff. Yeah, exactly. I'm just in there with the lava around me. I don't know arms and legs. Wrap it up. I want a really quick touch on, when are you looking for interns? How do they get a whole of you? What are we doing with that? Because I know maybe not right now, but in the future you'll need one and maybe someone will find this later on. Yeah, our internship is going to be, it's up still, I think, but I think it'll be down pretty soon. We're kind of wrapping up that process. But there's one website called Teamwork Online that a lot of sports jobs are posted to. Not all of them, but a huge chunk of them are on there. So if you're, if you're just go to TeamworkOnline.com, type in "Fotographer" or "Fotography" and just check it all the time because a lot of them aren't up for very long at all. So the perfect one for you, the one that's the perfect fit, it might only be up for a second. So just check it often, early and often. That's where ours is posted. And I'd say just like a really great portfolio and just a clear professional message, professional story that you want to tell, I think. And bonus skill sets don't hurt anybody, right? So if you're good at design, tell me that. If you're good at damn, tell me that. Whatever those extra little tidbits are, that doesn't hurt anybody either. One last part on that. What is, what is like the number one don't do? What's the thing that you'll just be like, "Oh, I'm throwing this one out." Yeah, I mean, the quickest way to get thrown out is just not have a portfolio. There's a field where you can link your portfolio. And if you don't have one, there's too many people that do. There's too much knowledge out there. I'm not gonna send you an email like, "Hey, can you send me some work?" If anybody's doing that, that person, the tiring, is probably pretty desperate. So you're probably looking pretty good, honestly. If you get that email asking for work from the hire email, that resume. (laughing) Right, yeah, you did something, right? Awesome. So real quick, where can people find you? How can they follow along? Like, what's the best ways to connect with you? At the ZT on Instagram, THE, ZEE, TEE. That's where you can follow along with what I'm up to. And then my website, portfolioisaccaryterrent.com. Thank you so much for doing this. This was a really great experience, man. I'm learning a lot and I love this. Cool. If you are not a subscriber, please go tell your friends. This is how this whole world spreads and grows. If you thought this was awesome and you want to support more interviews with people like that, go follow along on Patreon. Just a couple bucks a month. It will really help me offset the cost of doing this whole process. So yeah, thanks for listening and check you guys out in the next one. Thanks again, Zach. Thanks, man. Appreciate it. Thanks for listening to Resurpricity Podcast. Please take a moment to subscribe and rate us five stars on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. If you found value in this podcast and want to learn even more, head over to patreon.com/resurpricitypodcast to support the show.