3 ms·

The running pictures are awesome work. For a lot of families your pictures might be the only pictures they have of the runners running. My comment was about ho

The running pictures are awesome work. For a lot of families your pictures might be the only pictures they have of the runners running. My comment was about how NBA “press pool” level photographs are made (and big time college hoops). They use flash but the flashes are big, wireless and up in the rafters (i.e. indirect). Basically, the press pool has access to studio lighting and can shoot at low iso and narrow apertures…and of course they have access to great shooting positions. Luck is always a factor…the photographer in Liefer’s iconic photo is just looking at the backside of Ali’s big white trunks… https://neilleifer.com/collections/muhammad-ali?srsltid=AfmBOor7qdKNqwwDZMOreS6HwACq5J9XVPDY2S7u6mTbqXAQbnAT0l3T https://neilleifer.com/collections/muhammad-ali?srsltid=AfmB... But for what it is worth, when I was shooting a lot of high school soccer, better action shots came from “skating to where the puck is going.” And turning off spray and pray because there’s only one best moment to click the shutter and mechanical sympathy is the best way to get close. And fewer photos meant less grunt work later…modulo pleasing an editor or the mother of the bride. It was a pure hobby, not a jobby. When that phase of my life passed, I shifted toward tilt-shifts and movements and doubled down on one shot at a time.

dylan604 2y ago
> when I was shooting a lot of high school soccer, better action shots came from “skating to where the puck is going.” way to mix sports metaphors. /s to get better action shots, it really helps to understand the nuance of the sport itself. being able to anticipate off the ball movement while being able to anticipate a play developing will all help you improve your luck to be pointing your lens in the right place. I followed a specific NCAA football team for a season, and got to the point of anticipating plays and recognizing formations even though I'm not really a throwball fan. I'm much more of a proper football fan, and can do much better than skating to a puck metaphor as I know tactics much better and see how off the ball players are moving and why they are doing it. This definitely allowed for better action shots of players with the ball. As anything, someone with specific knowledge of their subject will improve their luck over someone just there for some shots.
- brudgers 2y ago
  At the time I was refereeing a fair amount and so I was on the field anticipating player behavior and ball movement “in anger.” And for a bit of cash. It informed my photography.
mysteria 2y ago
But for what it is worth, when I was shooting a lot of high school soccer, better action shots came from “skating to where the puck is going.” And turning off spray and pray because there’s only one best moment to click the shutter and mechanical sympathy is the best way to get close. I unfortunately don't have a source but I remember hearing about some action photographers trying out 4K60 cameras set to a high shutter speed and basically shooting video clips instead of stills. They would emphasize proper framing, exposure, and focus instead of worrying about timing the shutter. Later the photographer would review the video clips and choose the best frames for publication. For web and newswire distribution 4K resolution was good enough for them, and they indicated that it was very unlikely that the perfect shot would fall outside of each 1/60 second frame.
- pixelfarmer 2y ago
  Doesn't need video anymore, high end cameras can run wild on taking picture after picture and start doing so before you even fully pressed the shutter, to account for human delays and the ones of the tech itself. I mean we are talking about a part of photography where even back in the days of film a camera would run through a roll of film in seconds for exactly this sort of thing.
  - PaulHoule 2y ago
    It amazes me that I can walk out of a game with 2000 images, I just read an article by someone who shot 9000 images of a game. With film it would cost at least $10 to buy and develop film for about 30 shots, so I'd be spending upwards of $600 to develop film. It's hard to be nostalgic for film when you see it that way. (I still shoot images faster than I can process them, but it helps a lot that I got Keysticks working with lightroom so I can sit back and use an XBOX controller to scan through photos.) I am thinking about shooting short video clips instead because I think those might do even better on social and let you tell stories that photos can't.
- brudgers 2y ago
  Later the photographer would That’s why I prefer one-and-done. Making a photograph always creates future work…future chores. For me, I enjoy the process of making pictures. I don’t enjoy the rest nearly as much. I would rather paint. But I have always made pictures for a hobby. What makes sense when working for money doesn’t drive my process. Meaning and or expression drive what I do. Documentary photography is not so much.
briandear 2y ago
The other interesting thing about rafter strobes is the recharge rate: I could sometimes get two shots in a row, but more than that and the flashes could keep up. So the fast motor cameras weren’t that useful because you’d only get one or two blasts from the strobes because they had to charge for a few seconds. You really had to be good at timing the shot. Also during the big moments, you’d often get overexposed because all the other big news wires would be shooting the same shot at the same moment, so you’d get four sets of strobes blasting out your shot.
- FireBeyond 2y ago
  > The other interesting thing about rafter strobes is the recharge rate: I could sometimes get two shots in a row, but more than that and the flashes could keep up. I'm somewhat surprised (although it's certainly a niche) that some of those larger flashes intended for commercial (sports, primarily) photography, don't have "dual capacitors", i.e. keep both charged and essentially recycle asynchronously.

dylan604 2y ago

> when I was shooting a lot of high school soccer, better action shots came from “skating to where the puck is going.” way to mix sports metaphors. /s to get better action shots, it really helps to understand the nuance of the sport itself. being able to anticipate off the ball movement while being able to anticipate a play developing will all help you improve your luck to be pointing your lens in the right place. I followed a specific NCAA football team for a season, and got to the point of anticipating plays and recognizing formations even though I'm not really a throwball fan. I'm much more of a proper football fan, and can do much better than skating to a puck metaphor as I know tactics much better and see how off the ball players are moving and why they are doing it. This definitely allowed for better action shots of players with the ball. As anything, someone with specific knowledge of their subject will improve their luck over someone just there for some shots.

brudgers 2y ago
At the time I was refereeing a fair amount and so I was on the field anticipating player behavior and ball movement “in anger.” And for a bit of cash. It informed my photography.

mysteria 2y ago

But for what it is worth, when I was shooting a lot of high school soccer, better action shots came from “skating to where the puck is going.” And turning off spray and pray because there’s only one best moment to click the shutter and mechanical sympathy is the best way to get close. I unfortunately don't have a source but I remember hearing about some action photographers trying out 4K60 cameras set to a high shutter speed and basically shooting video clips instead of stills. They would emphasize proper framing, exposure, and focus instead of worrying about timing the shutter. Later the photographer would review the video clips and choose the best frames for publication. For web and newswire distribution 4K resolution was good enough for them, and they indicated that it was very unlikely that the perfect shot would fall outside of each 1/60 second frame.

pixelfarmer 2y ago
Doesn't need video anymore, high end cameras can run wild on taking picture after picture and start doing so before you even fully pressed the shutter, to account for human delays and the ones of the tech itself. I mean we are talking about a part of photography where even back in the days of film a camera would run through a roll of film in seconds for exactly this sort of thing.
- PaulHoule 2y ago
  It amazes me that I can walk out of a game with 2000 images, I just read an article by someone who shot 9000 images of a game. With film it would cost at least $10 to buy and develop film for about 30 shots, so I'd be spending upwards of $600 to develop film. It's hard to be nostalgic for film when you see it that way. (I still shoot images faster than I can process them, but it helps a lot that I got Keysticks working with lightroom so I can sit back and use an XBOX controller to scan through photos.) I am thinking about shooting short video clips instead because I think those might do even better on social and let you tell stories that photos can't.
brudgers 2y ago
Later the photographer would That’s why I prefer one-and-done. Making a photograph always creates future work…future chores. For me, I enjoy the process of making pictures. I don’t enjoy the rest nearly as much. I would rather paint. But I have always made pictures for a hobby. What makes sense when working for money doesn’t drive my process. Meaning and or expression drive what I do. Documentary photography is not so much.

briandear 2y ago

The other interesting thing about rafter strobes is the recharge rate: I could sometimes get two shots in a row, but more than that and the flashes could keep up. So the fast motor cameras weren’t that useful because you’d only get one or two blasts from the strobes because they had to charge for a few seconds. You really had to be good at timing the shot. Also during the big moments, you’d often get overexposed because all the other big news wires would be shooting the same shot at the same moment, so you’d get four sets of strobes blasting out your shot.

FireBeyond 2y ago
> The other interesting thing about rafter strobes is the recharge rate: I could sometimes get two shots in a row, but more than that and the flashes could keep up. I'm somewhat surprised (although it's certainly a niche) that some of those larger flashes intended for commercial (sports, primarily) photography, don't have "dual capacitors", i.e. keep both charged and essentially recycle asynchronously.