As Bon Jovi’s tour photographer, I’ve been on the road for most of the year. We’re currently on a two-month stadium run across Europe.

You’ve got to love a place where the “golden hour” often lasts until 9:30 pm or later.

(Nikon D3, 24-70 at 24mm, ISO 320, 1/500, f/5.6)

If you’d like to see new tour pictures as they’re posted, join my TourPhotographer.com page on Facebook. My personal profile is DavidBergmanPhoto.

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Sports Illustrated did something this week that they’ve never done before.

I covered the Jets big playoff win over the Patriots in Foxboro and made a photo of QB Tom Brady getting sacked and losing the ball. The image ran on the cover, my ninth for SI (10th if you count the Auburn commemorative in 2005).

@2shear on Twitter said that it looks like Brady is watching someone steal his car.

Since there were four playoff games, it had already been decided there would be two regional covers with different teams on each. SI’s director of photography wanted my photo to be seen in all copies of the magazine, so they published the full-frame horizontal version as a Leading Off in the other edition (John Biever’s photo of Chicago QB Jay Cutler is on the cover).

(Nikon D3, 200-400 at 360mm, 1/800, f/4, ISO 4000)

It’s the first time that a photo has been published as both a cover and a Leading Off in different versions of the same week’s issue.

I also covered last week’s Packers - Eagles playoff game and had a two-page photo of Philly LB Ernie Sims trying to bring down FB Quinn Johnson.

(Nikon D3, 600mm, 1/1000, f/4, ISO 3200)

I suppose I should blog about Sports Illustrated’s Leading Off more often.

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Want to hang out with me and bunch of other photographers in New York City? There are two events in the next 7 days that I’ll be attending.

First, I’m speaking at the Pictage User Group (PUG) meeting next Wednesday, Jan 12th at 6pm. I know plenty of wedding and event photographers who use Pictage, and the NYC PUG is run by my good friend Brian Friedman.

It’ll be a casual evening of pizza and wine. I’ll show some images and take as many questions as you can throw at me. The event is FREE and open to all professional photographers (you don’t have to be a Pictage member to attend).

Click here to RSVP on Facebook and get location info.

I’ll also be attending an Fstoppers party this weekend on Saturday, January 8th. Fstoppers founders Lee Morris and Patrick Hall, the the cool dudes who made my Bon Jovi behind-the-scenes video, are both in town this week so they thought it would be fun to gather for drinks. Everyone is invited so come on out and say hello.

More info is on the Fstoppers site.

See you soon.

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With the first decade of the 21st century coming to a close, all I can say is…

Thank you.

Maybe you’re a client who hired me for a photo or video shoot. Maybe you’re a fan of one of the bands I work with and you bought my photos from TourPhotographer.com. Or maybe you’re just a fan of my work.

Whatever it is that brings you here, I thank you. Your continued support makes this job even more fun than it already is.

Here’s a brief look back at 2010. What a year it was.

The highlight for me was working with Bon Jovi. The entire organization - including the band, management, and crew - is a joy to work with. Over the summer, fstoppers.com made a cool video showing my work behind-the-scenes at one of the band’s stadium shows in New Jersey.

(If you subscribe to my blog via email or RSS feed and don’t see the embedded video above, click the title of this post to open it in your browser.)

This year I also continued my work with Sports Illustrated and had the Super Bowl cover. The Saints and Drew Brees were the sports story of the year.

2010 was filled with some other great jobs like making World Series GigaPans, Lilith Fair tour photography, working again with Barenaked Ladies, producing a music video with a DSLR camera, and leading a couple of lighting workshops.

Next year promises to be just as exciting and I hope to have a few surprises up my sleeve.

Thanks again for joining me. See you in 2011.

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The fall is my busy season for sports, with much of my work coming from Sports Illustrated magazine. At the front of every issue, they have a section called “Leading Off,” where they pick the best three images from the week and run each one across two full pages.

Having a photo published in the section is, in some ways, tougher than getting a Sports Illustrated cover. You’re competing against every sports image shot that week whether it’s from an SI staffer, a freelancer, or any of the wire services around the world. Jimmy Colton, the man who is tasked with finding images for the section, looks through 100,000 photos each week. He can only publish three.

I’ve been fortunate to have a few of my images in the section this fall.

This photo from the Steelers-Ravens game was just named one of Sports Illustrated’s Pictures of the Year. I shot it with the Nikon 200-400 on a D3 body and the exposure was 1/3200 f/4 at ISO 400.

This Colts interception, right in front of Washington coach Mike Shanahan, put an end to a Redskins comeback. This was the 600mm lens on a D3 and exposure was 1/800 f/4 at ISO 4000.

As soon as they announced that the Notre Dame - Army football game was going to take place at Yankee Stadium, I imagined this photo in my head. I went up in the first half and shot with the 14-24 on a D700. Exposure was 1/160 f/5.6 at ISO 1600.

This image is from the Eagles’ amazing come-from-behind win over the Giants last week. As DeSean Jackson ran the game-winning punt return, I switched from my 600mm to my 24-70 on a D700 to show the entire scene including the scoreboard. Exposure was 1/1250 f/4 at ISO 2000.

I got lucky that Jackson ran right towards me. I guess he wanted to be in “Leading Off” too.

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Former Barenaked Ladies singer Steven Page recently released his first solo album post-BNL. Not only is Page One filled with great tunes (my favorite is “She’s Trying to Save Me”), but he used one of my photos on the cover.

I shot the image during a portrait session with Steven last year in Syracuse. You can read how I made the photo and see other images from the session on the original blog post. Yes, you can shoot an album cover image using only small Nikon flashes.

The coolest part is that a couple of people commented at the time that they could see the photo being used on the cover of Steven’s next album.

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