Thursday, October 8, 2009

Captain Sabine - Toronto Island Ferries


This is a photo story of a woman named Sabine Quast, currently the only female captain on the Toronto Island Ferries. In fact, Sabine was the first woman ever hired by the Toronto Island Ferries, back in 1986 when she began as a deckhand and soon worked her way up to Captain. Over the years there were other captains who were women, and other women who worked on the boats, but she's the only one who stuck around.

I spent the last three days at a phenomenal workshop at the Toronto Star that was taught by Robb Montgomery, through an amazing organization called Visual Editors. On day 2 I had the chance to shoot a photo story and wound up being invited onboard the ferry to Center Island by Capt. Frank Corbin. He lead me up a ladder to the top floor, and suddenly I found myself in the captain's booth meeting Capt. Sabine. I soon found out her story and decided to focus my visual story on her. I am grateful to Frank and Sabine for giving me this glimpse into their daily lives - for them nothing special, but for me, it was fascinating. They're great people and I also enjoyed the chance to get to know them a bit

I returned the next day and shot some video where I interviewed Sabine (video posting to follow). Your next assignment in TGJ 2O1 will be to photograph a visual story about something or someone in the Lakeshore area. You will also set up a flickr account where you can begin to post photos. More to follow on this soon!

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