Of your hundreds of thousands of paintball photos you ’ ve taken , do you have a favorite ?
Let ’ s start with a current one , taken from the tower on the beach during the Invasion of Normandy at Skirmish , an event that can be called the Woodstock of Paintball , held every July . Two thousand players on the American side pour out of five landing craft into a hail of pellets from 2000 Germans , who are waiting in the woods . It ’ s a huge adrenaline rush to play , and an amazing spectacle to watch .
The second photo was taken at the 2001 Campaign Cup in London . The event was held at the Crystal Palace , a professional soccer stadium , in the early days of inflatable bunkers . The day ’ s games were over and we were having a beer with the refs at the onsite pub . We told the refs we would take a group photo for them , and they asked if we could take it naked . So we did . I don ’ t remember the name of the group , I do remember they were from Sweden .
The third photo exists only in my memory . It was taken at the World Cup in Orlando in the 90s , back when tournaments were still played in the woods . The original fields were changed in the middle of the event because of the presence of highly venomous cottonmouth
and coral snakes , but apparently they weren ’ t changed enough .
Bob Long was the captain of the Ironmen , a powerhouse California team that was in contention to win the event . He slid into his bunker and noticed he was sharing it with a coral snake . He turned his gun on the snake and shot its head off , then continued playing the game . The Ironmen won , and Bob marched off the field with a winner ’ s smile and the dead Coral Snake draped over his gun barrel .
I have been taking paintball pictures since 1983 . As Dan Colby once said , find me something more interesting to do , and I ’ ll do it .
058 paintball . media magazine