Photographer Ravell Call is one of those guys you hate to have guarding you during a basketball game. He is very talented, has endless energy and always gives 100 percent. All you can do is hope that in next game he is on your team.

Fortunately, he is on our team here at the Deseret News.Call isn't content to float through the midstream of life; he is always somewhere on the edge. If, for example, you saw him skiing, you might initially think he was out of control. After watching longer, you would realize that this is an incredibly talented skier who is simply not satisfied unless he is testing himself at every bump and turn. There is nothing subtle about Call's style; because of this, his friends at work have nicknamed him "Flash."

"Ravell is probably one of the most consistent and reliable photographers I've ever known. He always gets it done," said shooter Kristan Jacobsen. "He always keeps us on our toes - looking for better angles, always trying to do something different. His drive helps challenge us all to be better photographers."

Call has been a perennial winner in photography contests for over 15 years, including taking the Society of Professional Journalists' top prize for General Excellence twice. Still, breaking into the profession wasn't easy.

While on a chemical engineering scholarship at Brigham Young University, Call re-evaluated his first year in school and thought, "If I'm going to do something all my life, I want it to be something fun." With this in mind he changed his major to communications and later, under the direction of professor Nelson Wadsworth, focused on photojournalism.

After graduating he found it almost impossible to find a job. "I can remember going down to Job Service looking for anything that was photo-related. It was really depressing," reflected Call. He almost gave up - especially when he found out he could make twice as much money driving a truck for his father back home in Afton, Wyo.

After taking one load of belongings back to Afton, his mentor Wadsworth telephoned him and told Call to take the second load down to Price, where he had landed a job at the Sun-Advocate. A year at the Advocate, four years at the Salt Lake Tribune and over a decade a the Deseret News have made Call one of the most respected photojournalists in the state.

Traveling to El Salvador to cover the earthquake in the late 1980s was one of the most unusual assignments Call has had at the Deseret News, but his favorites are self-generated photo essays. Docu-menting the one-room schoolhouse in Callao, life in a Marine boot camp and a story about an emergency room trauma unit are among those he remembers best. Call also loves to shoot sports, he said, because there is a natural excitement built into each game that presents a challenge for a photographer to anticipate and capture.

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While many aspects of photography have remained pretty much the same since Call began his career, the computer age has radically changed the way images are handled at the paper. Prints, for instance, are no longer made in a darkroom but are electronically scanned into a computer. While some have been slow to get a grasp on the electronic age, Call claims to have dreamed for years about images he could create on the computer.

"The speed and quality of photos are truly amazing," he said. "It is such an exciting creative process, bringing new tools and new ideas. I get such an adrenaline rush trying to make deadline and beat the competition."

A extra "rush" is something that his co-workers and presumably his wife, Colette, can testify that Call doesn't need. When he isn't working full throttle at the paper he is either backpacking Wyoming's Wind River range, mountain biking southeastern Utah's White Rim or following one of his five children's soccer games.

With energy like that, you just have to be thankful he is on your team.

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