Bob Strempka has become one of the most popular names in sports photography not only around the Region but around the state of Indiana. Yet, sports photography was not his original intention when picking up the camera.
After graduating from Ball State University with a degree in accounting, Strempka spent 28 years working in the corporate world at NIPSCO and then a consulting firm. During that time, photography was simply a hobby he enjoyed during his free time.
“I was always a racing fan, but once I graduated from college, I became a regular at the Indy 500 Speedway,” Strempka said. “I got my first camera in 1980, and that was the first year that I took it to the Speedway. I was hooked on sports photography after that.”
He began his sports photography career in the Region while his daughter, Jennifer, was in grade school playing basketball. He would bring his camera to her games and take photos to share with his family, and this quickly became a regular thing.
“At the time, my father-in-law was ill, and I used to send him the pictures that I would take of Jennifer with funny, silly articles attached to let the family know how she was doing,” Strempka said. “When she went to high school, I started taking pictures for Crown Point High School's sports.”
During that time, Strempka’s neighbor in the Lakes of the Four Seasons, Jackie Webster, combined his photography with her girls’ basketball recruiting website, and they created posters for the girls on the basketball team to be displayed at their end-of-season banquet.
“Jackie encouraged me to sell my photography, so in 2000, she allowed me to use part of her recruiting website’s domain to sell my photos online. It surprised me how people became so familiar with my work from then on,” Strempka said.
Since then, Strempka has grown his brand all across the area, but he has mainly focused his efforts in Crown Point because it became too difficult for one person to work for a number of high schools. For the past four years, he has photographed the individual sports and team portraits for the Crown Point yearbook, which takes many weeks to complete.
Strempka’s original interest in photography involved wildlife so that he could sketch his photos as artwork. It was harder for Strempka to keep up with photographing and sketching wildlife due to the time demands it imposed, so he took some time away from it to be with his family and work on his professional career. Currently, he is back at it, and Strempka is devoting full days to working on his submission in the Federal Duck Stamp Contest, a national art competition with the winning design earning a spot on the federal duck stamp that is affixed to each waterfowl hunting license.
“It is a really highly touted national art competition,” Strempka said. “It is a goal of mine to try to win at some point in my life. I have entered twice before, but I’m really optimistic about my design and execution for this year’s competition. I am self taught in both photography and artistry, which I take pride in, but it took me a while to learn the craft and execute a design properly.”
Strempka is heavily involved with his alma mater in a number of ways. He is a season ticket holder for football, regularly donates to Ball State’s athletic and academic programs and was named an honorary captain of the women’s field hockey team last year. His passion for sports isn’t only through the lens of his camera.
“I probably put about 33,000 miles on my car each year driving back and forth to Muncie,” Strempka said. “A friend introduced me to the football tailgating world, and I began tailgating before Ball State games. I became engaged with the sports teams, and now I donate pictures that I take back to the university. A woman I went to high school with asked me to take photos of her niece on the field hockey team, and that got me connected with the team and fostered a tremendous relationship.”
Strempka graduated from Hammond Gavit High School and has lived in the Region his whole life apart from the four years at Ball State. He is currently serving on the Career and Technical Education Advisory Board for Crown Point High School. He enjoys spending time with his two grandchildren, who live in Indianapolis. As someone who was raised by the Region community, he is grateful for just that - the community.
“My friends are here. I laid roots here. I enjoy sticking with the Region and being familiar with it, and I have never really left the interest of following the sports teams here,” Strempka said.