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|| SportsShooter.com: Member Message Board
--Day in the life of-- Sports Photography
Michael Cullen, Photographer
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Wexford Town | 0000 | Ireland | Posted: 5:56 PM on 08.31.07 |
->> SPORTS IMAGES:- Do you look at your pics when you take your images, I need to stop looking at my images when I'm at a game. I take 1,000 to 1,200 images per Hurling game (70 mins) –I NEED to keep my head down, and keep taking GOOD images-
I find when you are editing your images (PS), adding names of the players sometimes can be very hard, as most games you don’t have a program of the players names/pics!. I don’t know how you can get around this, when you are under presser in the press room to submit pics asap.
After a game I am exhausted! ----
Mike |
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David A. Cantor, Photo Editor, Photographer
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Toledo | OH | USA | Posted: 11:11 PM on 08.31.07 |
| ->> Shouldn't everyone keep their heads down when they're hurling......? |
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Alan Look, Photographer
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Bloomington | IL | United States | Posted: 11:46 PM on 08.31.07 |
| ->> Take stills instead of video. It's easier to caption. |
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Brian Shirk, Photographer
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McCall | ID | US | Posted: 3:04 AM on 09.01.07 |
->> If you aren't using Photo Mechanic, use it - it's at camerabits.com... I regularly go through 2000-3000 photos per hour with it.
Get there early and find the teams beforehand; take headshots and record their names.
Take 5 and watch it rather than shooting nonstop, both looking through the viewfinder and just watching/moving around - giving yourself time to think will help. |
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Shaun Ward, Photographer
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Perth | Tayside | Scotland UK | Posted: 6:18 AM on 09.01.07 |
->> As far as getting names - pro games will provide a photographer with a list. Any other game I tend to speak to the referee and get a quick copy of the names from him/her. Never had any ref refuse this.
I would also agree with getting there early when the players are warming up get shot to check names but also for stock. |
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Shelley Cryan, Photographer
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Southport | CT | USA | Posted: 8:51 AM on 09.01.07 |
->> Michael, dealing with that sheer volume of photos per game has got to be tough. It may be hard to get out of the habit, but try to be more selective when you shoot. Maybe it would help to spend some time with your entire take from an earlier game,and see what the keepers have in common (I don't know hurling, so I can't give you specifics here). Then next time you go out, try to isolate your shooting to those types of shots. You may find you'll look at the LCD less, too, because you'll know when you press the shutter if you've shot what you wanted.
As for getting the names, if there's not an official program, you'll need to work around that. I usually take the time during the game (usually during a break in the action) to go over to the scorer's table and ask for a lineup (with jersey numbers). Often they don't have a spare, so I just ask to photograph their scorebook. Sometimes they've asked me to wait as they fill in the jersey numbers or something, but nobody's ever said no. If there is no scorer's table -- say if it's a scrimmage or something -- there's always someone from each team walking around with a clipboard that has a list of the players.
Another issue I can see from your photos is that the hurlers don't have jersey #s on the front or sides of their jerseys -- just the back. So it's tough IDing the players without a number. What I do in that case is when I know I've got a good pic of a play, immediately after, I wait for the players involved to turn around so I can photograph their jersey #s. That's not always possible, so I also try, during other parts of the game, to get full-body photos of the players with their jersey #s showing. Then I can go back and compare cleats, socks, gloves, etc. to get a proper ID.
Hope this helps.
Shelley
www.shelleycryan.com |
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Corey Perrine, Photographer
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Hudson | NH | USA | Posted: 9:27 AM on 09.01.07 |
->> Michael,
You might also want to consider keeping your frame count down a bit. I can imagine editing 1,000-1,200 images after a 70 minute period under deadline would be taxing. |
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Jody Gomez, Photographer
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Murrieta | CA | USA | Posted: 12:06 PM on 09.01.07 |
->> Michael, I second using Photo Mechanic for your ingest/caption work. If you can get a roster before hand with player's names/numbers, then you can make a text document of each team and then use PM's code replacement feature to insert the team and player's name in the caption. So instead of typing this (for example) "Wexford Town Hurling Team's centre Joe Blow #2", you could type /wt00/ /wt2/ and it would insert the words for you. It's a great feature and I use it all the time.
Jody |
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Paul Hollands, Photographer
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Chester | UK | United Kingdom | Posted: 12:26 PM on 09.01.07 |
->> Shelley has hit the nail on the head there for me - "shoot backs" if needs be and cross reference these shots. Smaller events are a nightmare sometimes......although its not always restricted to smaller events, even at top level sports events, if it is a team you don't cover often, you still have the "who on earth is that?!" moments!
Also cross reference your shots - if you have a shot of the back of a player (so you can see his/her number), look to see if there is anything distinctive - do they have particular boots on; is their strapping a particular colour or done in a particular way? Once you have this way of Id'ing people, captioning becomes very much quicker.
My other piece of advice is shoot less. I only shoot 1000-1200 shots at big finals etc and that is where typically the brief is "shoot anything that moves"! On a typical match, I'll shoot around 400-500 images, maybe slightly more if I am shooting stock too.
However even if you do shoot that many, there is no reason why your workflow can't cope with this. Last week at the Challenge Cup final I shot probably around 1000 frames. This didn't stop me from having wired around 15 shots by half time and a further 20 during the 2nd half.....before then sending the final 10 shots within 30 mins of the final whistle.
I assume you use Photomechanic? Tag the images you want to submit in camera (yes, I know this involves chimping, but hey, I like feeling at one with my ancestors ;o) ) and then, once you have ingested your images you can go directly to these. It speeds things up massively. I can't comment on the Irish market, however in the UK, speed of submission is one of the key things for covering sports. One large agency I know of expects an image after 5 mins of a soccer match. On other occasions simple logistics demand you send quickly - 8pm kickoffs for matches for example - picture desks need images fast so they can put their pages to bed in time to be printed.
I hope this helps, as I said, I think Shelley's advice is spot on with regards to identifying and captioning. |
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George Bridges, Photographer, Photo Editor
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Washington | DC | USA | Posted: 12:33 PM on 09.01.07 |
->> If you feel you are shooting too much and chimping too much there are easy remedies.
Cover the monitor so you can't chimp and start by putting your motor on the slow setting and work your way down to the single-shot setting to train yourself to shoot the peak action rather than just firing away like crazy. |
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Michael Cullen, Photographer
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Wexford Town | 0000 | Ireland | Posted: 4:24 PM on 09.02.07 |
->> Photo Mechanic, I have download this software, many thanks Jody Gomez, its very easy and fast to use. I need some time how to use the keywords etc.
Paul:-
Yes I think you are right 400-500 pics for non-finals should get you over the line. Getting photos back to newspapers in 5 mins does NOT give you allot of time to get pics off. I am taking pics of two EURO 2008 Group D Qualifiers in Dublin in Oct, and I need to get pics off within 15 mins of the game.
Thanks for your views, info, and help
Michael |
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Paul Hollands, Photographer
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Chester | UK | United Kingdom | Posted: 7:11 PM on 09.02.07 |
->> "Getting photos back to newspapers in 5 mins does NOT give you allot of time to get pics off. I am taking pics of two EURO 2008 Group D Qualifiers in Dublin in Oct, and I need to get pics off within 15 mins of the game"
I should clarify that its an agency and they only want the 1st picture within the first 5 mins......you should, typically be able to get off 1 good frame within that time!
Make sure your workflow is absolutely watertight - 15 mins might not sound too bad, but realistically it only gives you 10 mins shooting time and then 5 mins to caption, edit and send. If you don't hit that deadline there will be another 20-30 togs who will have done.
Good luck, should be some cracking games in Oct for those qualifiers! |
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Dave Kennedy, Photographer
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Danbury | CT | US | Posted: 8:24 PM on 09.02.07 |
->> Do the caption ahead of time. Fill out everything like the date, name of championship, name of field and name of both teams, filled out except the names of the specific players shown in the photo and the "action", and save it in the IPTC field "stationary" in PhotoMechanic.
When you "ingest" the photos from the disk click "apply IPTC stationary pad to photos" which is on the ingest screen.
So when you're done at the end of the game and you sit down to actually do the caption everything is down except filling in "Frank Smith" and "scores a goal in the first half".
If you get in the habit of doing this for every sporting event I've found that it helps speed things up. Never try to actually write a caption unless you have to when you can do most of the work ahead of time.
Forgive me if this is too basic...
DaveK |
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Michael Cullen, Photographer
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Wexford Town | 0000 | Ireland | Posted: 4:14 PM on 09.05.07 |
->> I'll do that, before the game. I have a game on this weekend, and hope I get the name right!!
Thanks SP
Mike |
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Lindy Dugger, Student/Intern, Photographer
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Athens | Ga | | Posted: 5:31 PM on 09.05.07 |
->> Michael-
Another vote for PhotoMechanic. It's a very useful piece of software, and if you're an NPPA member you can get it discounted. I know other people who use iViewPro, you might also want to consider that.
As a student I'm fairly new to shooting sports myself, I've found that after a big play, taking images of peoples jersey numbers or other identifying marks helps for later on (especially if its something like football or rugby where there are piles of people). I also often take images of the scoreboard to help me keep up with whats going on. Some cameras have an audio note function that will attach a short audio note to the last image shot. Mine doesn't, so sometimes I'll keep an little digital voice recorder and make audio notes because it's easier than jotting them down on paper while shooting.
I think you mentioned up there that you're doing too much chimping... it'll get easier once you're more confident shooting sports, I think (not to suggest you're not a confident photographer - I think I remember seeing another of your posts and you said you'd just started shooting sports recently). I've found now once I get my exposure set properly I rarely look at my screen unless the game play has stopped or it's right after a very big play and I think I might have got a good shot. If you're shooting for a newspaper, remember even with online, they're more than likely not going run a huge heap of images, so you shouldn't worry so much if you've got the shot of every single play. Just relax, get in "the zone" and enjoy yourself. Concentrate on shooting well, and for the most part don't worry just after the play if you've got the shot or not, because right then there isn't anything you can do about it if you didn't. Like said, if you relax a bit and enjoy yourself, you'll more than likely find that later when you're reviewing images before you transmit that you'll have a lot of good images. And, you haven't stressed yourself out as much.
Cheers,
Lindy |
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Michael Cullen, Photographer
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Wexford Town | 0000 | Ireland | Posted: 4:53 PM on 09.06.07 |
->> Yes I have downloaded this software, PhotoMechanic, and its my new god. I must buy this software over the weekend.
many thanks
m |
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