2004 Annual Sports Shooter Contest winners announced

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|| SportsShooter.com: News Item: Posted 2005-04-14

2004 Annual Sports Shooter Contest winners announced
By Robert Hanashiro, Sports Shooter

Photo by Max Morse

Contest judges Peter Read Miller, left, and Wally Skalij have a spirited discussion during the open judging at Nikon as Brooks student Jeff Botarri (far left) looks on.

Stan Liu's photograph of a San Diego State football player frozen in midair as he is being shoved out of bounds was named the "Photo of the Year" in the Annual Sports Shooter Contest.

"I've shot in that spot and all I can say is that Stan must have big balls to have taken that photo," said Southern California freelance photographer Matt Brown, "You have a wall two, maybe three feet behind you and I know Stan (who's not a big guy at all) must have been hammered after that photo. To stay cool and make the shot was not easy."

Wally Skalij, a staff photographer with the Los Angeles Times added, "I picked the wide-angle end zone photo of the football player trying to make a touchdown catch because the photographer was prepared. He gave us a different look at football and gave the feeling to the reader of being right there."

Liu wins a digital camera courtesy of Nikon for his winning entry.

"It's the shot everybody prays for at a game, BUT they NEVER get it this tight or right," said Nikon's Ronal Taniwaki of Liu's winning photo.

Taniwaki was a member of the judging panel along with Skalij, Brown and Sports Illustrated's Peter Read Miller.

Max Morse, of Brooks Institute of Photography, for the second consecutive year won the student category with an image of a golfer leaping in the air after missing a putt.

Morse will also receive a digital camera courtesy of Nikon for his winning entry.

Personally I was very happy to see a high - impact action photograph win the Sports Shooter Contest POY and the winning entry in the student category was something you never see when covering golf, no matter what level.

In all, we had over 1,800 photographs entered into this year's Annual Sports Shooter Contest in five categories. The categories were: Best Sports Action Photograph; Best No Pro No College Photograph; Best Student Photograph; Best Olympic Photograph; Best No Ball. The Photo of the Year was selected from the winners of the 5 categories.

See the winning images: http://www.sportsshooter.com/2004_contest_winners/index.html

Judges pared each of the five categories down to 20 - 30 photographs for the evening's final round, which was open to the public. Over 35 people attended the open judging session held at Nikon's Torrance office.

Trends are always big in contests --- what wins the previous year always gets more entries the next year and the Sports Shooter Contest was no different. Following Al Bello's 2nd place winner last year of a boxer getting his face crushed we saw a significant number of boxing entries this year. While none were selected winners this year, most of these boxing photos were quite good and most with the glove crushing the opponent's face.

Photo by Max Morse

Robert Hanashiro runs the contest juding at Nikon.

In past years judges had not recognized a motor sports photo, but not this year, bucking a trend. Second and 3rd place in the Action category were motor sports photos. (Note Liu's winning photo was selected from the Action category, moving up each of the other winners one spot.)

I think most of the judges felt what separated these two motor sports winners from the rest was they were photographs of people and not just of vehicles. One image was of a member of a pit crew being flipped up side down after being struck by a car while the other was a motorcycle driver captured in mid air after being thrown from his bike. What these two photographs had in common was high-impact, on many levels.

Judges noted, as in previous years, that cropping and framing were issues with many of the entries. Numerous photos had hands, fingers, feet, toes and even tops of heads chopped off for no apparent reason, other than the photographers was trying to keep the auto-focus spot centered.

This was a topic that I went off on a rant during the open judging session, because there are so many "button pushers" out there using auto-focus as their only "talent" making composition a secondary element.

Auto-focus has become such a huge crutch in sports photography that provocative composition --- or for that matter just keeping the entire subject in the frame --- no longer matters to most photographers.

Is "tight right"? The judges often didn't think so, especially when a receiver had part of his foot missing as he leaped for the ball or a baseball player had a lobotomy sometime after rounding third base and before sliding across home plate.

Those that attended the open judging session were treated to some very lively debate among the judging panel, highlighted by Wally Skalij hammering home a point about content being very important in an image while Peter Read Miller was adamant in that a photograph should be judged as a ... photograph. I think this discussion really showed the differences in style and the differences in what a magazine wants verses what a daily newspaper wants.

It was both entertaining and educational to witness this discussion unfold. For me it was one of the highlights of the evening ... because I tried to stay out of the middle of it and I could listen and learn.

The Annual Sports Shooter Contest was made possible by the generous support of: Nikon, Think Tank Photo, Lowerpro, Lightware, Samy's Camera and AquaTech.

Photo by Max Morse

Contest judges Matt A. Brown, left, and Ronal Taniwaki joke around during a break in the judging at Nikon.

JUDGES COMMENTS:

Overall comments:
Wally Skalij: "To start off, the overall entries continue to be outstanding. In the four years I have been judging this contest, photographers seem to be taking note on what makes a great sports photo. Cropping seemed to be the only persistent problem but much improved over last year. There is a fine line in cropping and a learning process which photographers need to grasp."

Matt Brown: "What makes a good sports photo? A photo that tells a story. I don't want to have to read the caption to decide if it is an award winner ... or not. Tell me in the photo. What doesn't make a good photo? One that is cropped BADLY, with no focus point. We can't say it enough, you don't have to shoot pros to be a pro. I saw better photos during the contest from non-pro events. We saw a t-ball photo that was fresh and 50 photos of receivers catching or dropping balls."

Ronal Taniwaki: " WOW, the quality of the entries this year were 1000% better overall. I am truly amazed with the diversity of sports that we saw in the NO PRO NO COLLEGE category. I liked that we saw more rodeo this time BUT even though the action was good, the technical quality was poor."

Worst category:
Skalij: "The weakest category and huge disappointment was the Olympic category. There was lots of basic jubilation photos and not much creativity with the exception of a few. With so many photo opportunities at such a big event I expected to see the more unusual photos and not the cliche athlete screaming after winning an event. A few of the entries were very dramatic but lacked content and we needed to read the caption to figure what was happening."

Brown: "Was there a really weak category? Bert, you said "disappointing" I say IT SUCKED!!! If you go for two weeks to cover a huge event like an Olympics and can't make a photo, don't come back. I saw one moving photograph from the Olympic category. Two weeks and just one."

Best category:
Brown: "What particular category that stood out? The student category hands down! More sports to look at. Better overall feel, not just action, action and more action. "

Photo by Max Morse

The judges for the 2004 Sports Shooter Annual Contest gather outside the Nikon headquarters in Torrance, Calif. Left to right: Matt A. Brown, Robert Hanashiro, Wally Skalij, Ronal Taniwaki and Peter Read Miller.

Skalij: "The best category was the No Pro No College. What most professionals preach everyday is that a photographer can get more compelling photos from a high school or even small college event. Having to shoot pro sports all the time it reminded me of the good old days when I had full access to the gym or field and how the athletes were still unspoiled ... it showed in the entries. A football player walking off the field by himself during a rainstorm with the scoreboard in the background is a great example. If that was a professional player you would have a television crew, reporters and event staff ruining the photo."

Parting Shots:
Taniwaki: "Too much depth of field made for jumbled backgrounds. That's why we shoot f2.8 lenses. Another trend that's been going on for too many years is the "bulls-eye" composition: Way too much dependency on the center point AF. Eyes are NOT sharp, but the jersey is. The cameras have other AF points, USE THEM! Ooops, sorry I forgot the Canons don't have AF points in the corners.

Skalij: "On a final note: When cropping photos make sure you cut out the unnecessary backgrounds or body parts. It's ok to crop above a waist and give the photo much more of an impact. My philosophy is to shoot tight and crop tight BUT to keep it loose if the players have beautiful body language. Take chances on cropping and see what it looks like and if it doesn't work at least you are training yourself and seeing the possibilities."

Brown: "My overall thoughts about the contest are that the work is getting better. I would grade it a "B". Some stuff was really good and others needed an edit, especially a crop. I would like to see MORE portraits! I want more crying and more cheering, cut back on the same old action. Thank you for letting me see your work!"

(Note: The No Pro No College category was for entries involving non-professional sports and non-major college athletics; the Olympic category could be any photograph made during an Olympic qualify event or at the Olympic Games in Athens; The No Ball category was for features, intended for photographs without a ball - or puck - as the primary focus.)

Related Links:

2004 Contest Winning Images