Richland’s Kyle Carter recently had the opportunity to assist the Missouri Highway Patrol in making their job easier and more efficient. Though Carter is known for his photography skills, they were only a part of the project.
Carter was asked to help the Missouri Highway Patrol in using their Tuff Book computers to photograph crime scenes and accident scenes more effectively.
“Pre COVID, before COVID I taught a photo class on crash reconstruction in Southeast Missouri,” said Carter. “There are guys with the Highway Patrol that are specifically crash reconstructions. They got some new cameras and were wanting to know how to better use them, so I taught a class for them.”
Carter said the Highway Patrol was getting the new Tuff Book and the investigators were asked to take pictures with the Tuff Books rather than a cell phone. One reason for this is in court the photos can be shown off the computer rather than go through a cell phone. The screen of the Tuff Book separates from the keyboard, thus becoming a tablet.
Carter was asked to make this task easier for the Highway Patrol. Carter made three videos in addition to teaching classes for the patrol. Carter said he had some other items he wanted to address so he made a fourth video. He said it is his understanding that the videos, which are 3 to 4 minutes long, will be distributed one at a time to the troopers every couple of weeks.
Carter specializes in still photography. Though he has dabbled in video work he knew he needed help on this project. So he called in Richland’s history teacher Paul Arnold. Arnold helped Carter do the video work. Carter said he could explain how to use the camera application but knew he needed help with the video work.
Over the 4th of July weekend he received a Tuff Book on loan from the highway patrol. He and Arnold then set to work making the videos showing the troopers how to use the Tuff Book for photos. He showed them low lighting techniques. He said when they are on a accident scene at 1 a.m. they would need to know how to use the flash on the computer or their headlights to better capture the scene.
He made another request of the highway patrol. Carter asked for a patrol car. The highway patrol did not hesitate, they loaned him not one but two cars.
“I got to thinking about it for one of the videos and I thought Ok these guys are going to have to use this thing at night with lights flashing and all that kind of stuff,” said Carter. “So I thought, I am going to need a squad car.”
“That is the best way I can think of to recreate this is to do it under the actual squad car lights. I don’t know how many teachers can say they requested a squad car from the state patrol but I had two that night it was really cool.”
Carter said he was loaned a white car and a black car. He then was able to show what the red and blue lights on the car do to photographs taken under that lighting. With the video he was able to show the proper adjustments needed with the camera to take the best photos under those conditions.
“It was really cool to be able to do that just to be able to see it,” laughed Carter. “other than it was 94 degrees out here on the parking lot and we had mosquitoes. You don’t see that in the video but the mosquitoes in Southeast Missouri certainly made their presence felt.”
Carter said he did text the superintendent and principal to let them know there would be patrol cars at the school so they would not be alarmed.
Carter called in even more help for this project. He was seeking people to appear in the videos but was turned down. He then went to two people he knew would not turn him down, his son Ryan and daughter Kylee. His son is featured on one video and his daughter in another. Carter said this was a good thing because if something should happen every trooper in Missouri will know what his kids look like.
“If it (the video) was during school I would have my students hop in and go here is this, how do we do this,” said Carter. “Doing it in the middle of summer has been good for me. It has given me something else to do, something creative, something different.”
His first challenge was learning how to use the Tuff Book computer. He said he had never touched one so he had to familiarize himself with it. The computer separates and the monitor becomes a tablet and then can become mobile to take photos. Carter said it was its own complete camera setup with flash, shutter speed, F Stop, etc.
Carter said he was given pretty much free reign on the videos. He could use whatever objects he needed to demonstrate the camera. He said he used different objects in different settings to show how to use the computer as a camera. The level of lighting was a big focus.
He said he did not know the level of understanding everyone watching the videos would have of the technology. So he made videos understandable to his 10 year old son. He explained that he did not want them to be to complicated.
He continued to conduct photography classes for the officers that were available for each session. Some would be on duty therefore the officers would attend different sessions. During these sessions Carter said he was presented with challenges he had not considered. He said he asks in every photo class what they want to shoot (photograph). One example was an officer asking him how they could take a detailed photo of the filament inside the bulb. The officer said he needed to know when he pulled the headlight of a car following a crash if it had burnt out or been damaged in the crash.
“Ok, that’s a new challenge, I was down for that,” said Carter. “There were times I had to go through and recreate what they were talking about before I could teach them how to do it. This was pretty neat because if I get to learn something in photography I am tottaly into it.”.
“Honestly it is an honor to me, to help the highway patrol,” said Carter. “It’s pretty neat, I get to help the highway patrol, you don’t get to do that every day, not every teacher gets to do that.”