Event and Sports Photography - Running and Superbowl Sunday (sort of)

Started Sunday with a half marathon event. Posted at the finish so a pretty straight forward task.  Luckily the 40° weather didn't include the rain they were predicting.  They reserve that for New Hampshire marathons.  Saw a couple of old friends and someone from the home state, which is always nice.

Betsy Grunden from college

Tina Wang from the old neighborhood in Lincoln

From the home state

Then is was off to the Superbowl, flag football Superbowl, for 3-5th graders.  Close game and good lighting, plus my team won, which always makes it better.  Last year they lost and the other team cheated the whole time (according to the players). This year, as winners, there was no mention of cheating.  Funny how that works.

 

Sports Photography - Basketball and Soccer

Saturday was a double header with Men's Soccer NCAA at 5 and then a sprint to the gym for a 7pm basketball game.  The soccer was a bit of a blow out, 3-0, and very one sided.  And had to be played at night, in the cold, instead of during the day when it was 60.  

Basketball was also somewhat of a blowout, the winning team was about double the score of the losing team, but was pretty energetic the whole time.

Sports Photography - Basketball

Friday night light, but not the usual kind.  A women's basketball game as the Winter season gets underway.  Low lights, that cycle, and vary across the court. How much better can it get than that.  For a while the underdog was actually leading the game, but the favored team pulled ahead and went on to a comfortable win.

 

Sports Photography - Volleyball

Most Fall sports are finishing up, but volleyball always goes longer.  This one was frustrating as I went to the wrong gym, then got bad directions to the right gym, couldn't find the gym on the campus map, couldn't find the gym online, but finally was able to ask someone where it was.  It was the building I was next to, the one with no visible sign.

Pretty straight forward game, but I will say that the level of play was higher than usual. A lot more emotion on this one as well, which is nice to capture.  Adds energy to the photos.

Sports Photography - Ice Hockey

It has definitely been a rough month with all of the house building going on. Only able to get out to a couple of volleyball games and a few kid games.  Friday, though, I was able to get to a ice hockey game. Yes, Winter sports are here. The fall sports are still in the tournaments, with volleyball going later than the others, but since most of my teams didn't make the tournaments it is on to Winter.
A good game overall, but my enjoyment of a game, and shooting the game, is always inversely proportional to how well the photographs turn out.  Since I had fun shooting, the pictures were mediocre at best.

Event Photography - Marathon

Last Sunday was another marathon. This one was much more pleasant than the last, sunny, although a little cold. But after putting on a t-shirt, sweatshirt, fleece vest, and jacket I was almost warm.  I got assigned to the finish line, which I find to be the most boring spot to shoot from.  You get some better reactions than other places, but the background is pretty much fixed.

Sports Photography - Cross Country

Last cross country meet of the season and I am barely more competent than I was at the start.  There were definitely some good positions, but I always feel like I missed more than I got.  Part of the problem, I think, is that the race is for such a short time, typically 1/2 hour, and you really only have 3-4 chances to get the runners since you are not going to out run them on the course.

I also tried some more artistic approaches, but fear of not getting anything combined with a lack of talent precluded me from walking aware with anything more than straightforward shots.

Sports Photography - Volleyball

After such a hectic month of September I am trying to relax the shooting this month so I can some other things, like finish building my house, as well as get ready for November, which is the start of Winter sports as well as conference / NCAA tournaments for Fall sports.  

However, I am finding myself getting very restless anyways.  Yesterday was just a couple of volleyball games. No lights allowed because now the team is good.  But don't worry, the lighting is much better than it was, ISO 10,000.

Event Photographer - Marathon

So let's review the glorious life of event photography.
I get up at 5 AM so I can get to the race by 7 AM, and the start at 8.  After shooting four waves of starters I run over to another section of road and shoot four mobs running down the street as things have not broken up yet.

Then I move to another location and wait about an hour for the finishers of the 1/2 marathon to start coming through. 

For the next five hours I am standing in one spot, photographing runner after runner, which my hands cramping up, my legs and back cramping up, and my neck cramping up since I don't have time to move for most of the time.  This also means no bathroom breaks, no food breaks, no nothing.  After the first hour of shooting, i.e. looking through a pinhole, my eyesight is so blurry I just put the focus square over some blurry form of a runner and hope that AF does its job.
 
Now add to this that it is 55° and the wind is blowing into me the whole time.  And it is raining, which means the front of my lens is getting coated in rain.  I can wipe it clean, but this lasts about 30 seconds before it starts to cloud up again.  So I resort to wiping the front of the lens with my hand so that the mist forms drops and falls to the bottom of the front of the lens, repeating this every few minutes or so.  The mist also throws off the AF, so I am hoping that much harder.
After 9,500 photographs I can call it a day and go home.  Luckily I don't have to edit.

Of course some people should probably pay more attention to the race instead of the technology they are carrying.