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Evan Farrell carries his camera equipment at a football game this season. The recent Warren Central graduates has been selected as one of 20 young photographers nationwide to shoot photos at the College Football Playoff national championship game, as part of the CFP's media intern program. (Photo courtesy of Evan Farrell)

Vicksburg resident Evan Farrell walks the sideline while shooting photos at Ole Miss' Vaught-Hemingway Stadium this season. (Photo courtesy of Evan Farrell)

Warren Central football players and coaches pose for a photo together after the May 2024 premiere of the documentary "11 Brothers: The Movie," which chronicles Warren Central's 2023 football season. Evan Farrell, a Warren Central student, shot, produced and edited the film as a school project. (Ernest Bowker/The Vicksburg Post)

This photo by Vicksburg native Evan Farrell shows two Warren Central baseball players celebrating during a game last season. Farrell, a recent Warren Central graduate, was selected by the College Football Playoff to photograph its national championship game as part of its media interns program. (Photo courtesy of Evan Farrell)

This photo by Vicksburg native Evan Farrell captures the scene following Ole Miss' victory over Georgia at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium in November. (Photo courtesy of Evan Farrell)

This photo by Evan Farrell captures the scene following Ole Miss' victory over Georgia at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium in November. (Photo courtesy of Evan Farrell)

By Paul Ingram
Special to The Vicksburg Post

By Paul Ingram
Special to The Vicksburg Post

Evan Farrell believes in taking shots.

Lots of shots.

And on Jan. 20, he will maneuver all over Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta as one of 20 media interns selected nationwide by the College Football Playoff to cover the National Championship Game with his photography.

Evan, a 17-year-old Vicksburg native and the son of Matt and Alley Farrell, is a 2024 fall-semester graduate of Warren Central High School. He’ll start classes at Ole Miss this winter as a journalism major, which will only be part of a busy January.

Having been a student at Vicksburg Catholic School, Evan’s journey into the world of sports photography began after he transferred to the Vicksburg Warren School District and was working on making new friends.

COVID in the spring of 2020 made remote learning the rule and hampered his ability to meet classmates. So he approached his freshman year at Warren Central with redoubled efforts to make new friends by joining the golf team and, while taking a media class, claimed “I can take photos” — despite having never before touched a professional grade camera.

This resulted in a media pass for the Warren Central-Brandon football game, where, with his mom’s Nikon D-3000 and a zoom lens, he covered the game, then posted the images to TikTok to “see what would happen.”
What happened was three million “views” and 700,000 “likes.”

He took that as a sign. After similar reaction to posted photos of the remaining games, he acquired his own camera and lenses.

In February 2023, Evan decided to shoot an Ole Miss-LSU basketball game. Without press credentials or connections, he spirited his camera into the arena wrapped in pom-poms, with a cover story of being a high school sports photographer (true) doing a follow-up shoot of a student now playing for Ole Miss (mostly true).

He was allowed access, shooting from the court ends, and meeting staff and professional photographers. This started his relationship with Ole Miss Athletics.

“Those photos put me on the map as a sports photographer,” Evan recalls.

In the fall of 2023, Evan was credentialed for three Ole Miss football games, furthering his relationship with Ole Miss student athletes. They started following him on social media, posting and sharing his work.

While this was satisfying, Evan wanted to explore other options and began studying ESPN and NFL sports documentaries.

With his own documentary in mind, he started filming Warren Central football, advancing his skills as the season progressed, learning how to set his camera, where to be on the field and what moments needed to be captured.

The result was more than 500 hours of video, plus follow-up of player interviews. The film editing process required gathering and sorting his image files, plus game films, interviews, and radio broadcast audio, all loaded onto his work station’s 20-terabyte hard drive and edited with movie-making software.

Matching a particular play’s image files with corresponding broadcast audio and player interviews was tedious and time consuming. For three months in the spring of 2024 Evan edited his film, often into the wee hours of the morning — all while in school and on the golf team.

“I had set a deadline of May 21 for the presentation, but I had more games to edit. It was a panic, but we got it done,” Farrell said.

His film, titled “11 Brothers: The Movie,” is a celebration of Warren Central football. It premiered with great fanfare on the school stadium’s giant video screen to an audience of around 500, with coverage by WLBT-TV and The Vicksburg Post.

“I was hoping the scope of this would inspire the next generation of high school students to be creators,” Farrell said. “And now, there may be eight kids on the sidelines photographing, so that’s good.”

This fall, Evan photographed three Ole Miss home games. Eyeing the LSU game at Death Valley, he submitted to LSU for credentials and was shocked to get approved.

“It was all the big names in sports photography, like the AP, Getty Images. And me. I think they accidentally confused the process and I got my credentials before they realized it was a mistake,” Farrell said. “I had a great time. The fans rushed the field! Friends told me later, ‘But Ole Miss lost.’ Hey! I got to go to a night game at Death Valley and photograph it. Nothing could be better!”

This year as the Ole Miss vs. Georgia game in Oxford was approaching, Evan wanted to shoot it.

“MSScoreboard, a sports media company based in Jackson, had reached out to me to do some freelance work,” Farrell said. “I offered to shoot the Georgia game for them, and because one of them had a conflict, I got credentialed. It was amazing. I learned what not to do when a field gets stormed! I headed to the center of the field for the coaches’ handshake. Big mistake. It was like a mosh pit, it was raining, it was a mess, and I was stuck.”

That game started Evan’s relationship with MSScoreboard, for whom he’s covered other statewide events such as the MAIS football championship — again, all while a student at Warren Central.

Wanting to advance further, this past fall Evan made a pitch to NFL teams for credentials, but his age (as a minor at 17), and likely a bit of league bureaucracy resulted in rejections. While licking his wounds from that, he had a surprise call from the College Football Playoff people saying they admired his work from his effective online presence.

Farrell was invited to cover the upcoming national championship game in Atlanta on Jan. 20 as part of a select group of 20 young photographers, writers, graphic designers and videographers from across the United States.

“It’s an honor not only to represent Vicksburg, but pretty much the state of Mississippi, at such an awesome event,” Farrell said.

He’s likely one of the youngest ever included in the group of 20, and expects his work at that game to open other doors.

To prepare for the National Championship game, Evan has studied plans and models of Mercedes-Benz Stadium to determine vantage points and routes. Unlike most college games where photographers have designated areas to work, he will have access to the entire stadium.

Starting classes at Ole Miss in a couple of weeks, Evan is not yet sure how he’s going to fit into the university’s sports photography program, but hopes his body of work will soon give access to venues where he can work to his full potential.

He will also keep shooting for MSScoreboard covering college and high school games in north Mississippi.
And his unrealized NFL goal?

“Mark my words: 2025 is my year to shoot a professional football game,” he said. “I don’t know how to get credentialed yet. I’m stubborn. I’ll figure out a way.”

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