Project allows for free range over campus, city, county

Student and alumni photographers met in Taylor Hall last night to plan for the 24-hour shoot-out event taking place from midnight yesterday to midnight today in Kent. The eight-page photo spread will be published in the Daily Kent Stater in three weeks.

Credit: Jason Hall

Portage County is going to be swamped with Kent State photojournalists all day today as the university begins its first ever 24-hour shoot-out.

From midnight yesterday through midnight today, photojournalism students from the School of Journalism and Mass Communication and some Kent State alumni will be taking pictures all over Portage County in an effort to represent a day in the life of a Kent resident.

“It’s the first time we’re doing something like this,” said Stephanie Smith, photo editor of the Daily Kent Stater. “We can represent our community and show what happens in 24 hours.”

The idea originated after a similar photo shoot in Lima where photo students were invited to document a 24-hour day. It has since become a nationwide phenomenon.

Teresa Hernandez, assistant photojournalism professor, said the idea of the 24-hour shoot is to see if people are motivated to spend a full day shooting pictures.

“It’s a good thing for students to learn to put on an event like this,” Hernandez said.

She said if the response to the photo shoot is good and yields additional funding, the shoot might become an annual event.

Photojournalism student Samantha Rainwater is one of the many photographers planning to shoot all day long.

“I’ll just get in my car and look for feature shots,” Rainwater said.

One of her goals is to show what goes on during a typical Thursday night around campus. “Everyone knows what Thursday nights are like around here. We’re just going to show them things they might not have known before.”

The Stater will run the pictures in a special edition eight-page spread, Smith said.

Hernandez said the ultimate goal of the shoot-out isn’t to get published, but to find an outlet or gallery to show as much as they can get.

About 30 to 35 photojournalists will be involved in the shooting and editing, with alumni working as mentors to go over the photos, Smith said. Photographers will have free range over the whole campus, city and county to find their own shots and representations of daily life in the community.

“We’ve been talking to businesses around town to stop by and find out when some good times to shoot are,” Smith said. “We can show what people do.”

The shoot-out will be open to anyone who wishes to shoot, not exclusively to photojournalism students.

“I’m really excited about it,” Rainwater said. “It should turn out to be a really good project.”

Contact College of Communication and Information and campus media reporter Kenny Peris at [email protected].