Posts Tagged ‘Sports’
A Couple From Sports Assignments Last Week
© Matthew Jonas 2011/Evergreen Newspapers 2011
Its been a busy weekend with several wildfires (I’ll have an upcoming post about covering that in the future) and lots of scheduling conflicts. I am also in the middle of moving to much cheaper living arrangements due to the rising cost of, well, everything lately. So anyway, I apologize for the lack of my regularly scheduled updates. Here’s a couple from sports assignments last week.
Assignment First: Water Polo Player Portrait
© Matthew Jonas 2011/Evergreen Newspapers 2011
I love “assignment firsts”. Making a portrait of a high school water polo player for the Columbine Courier sports section was definitely a first for me. I didn’t know we even had non-collegiate water polo clubs in Colorado.
Good Weather, Good Light
© Matthew Jonas 2011/Evergreen Newspapers 2011
I am glad that spring sports kicked off this week. The weather was sunny and warm. The afternoon light was a nice change from the available darkness found indoors. It also feels really good to be sitting on the grass instead of a hard basketball court. LAX, track, soccer and baseball here I come.
Favorite Basketball Photos From the 2010/2011 Season
© Matthew Jonas 2011/Evergreen Newspapers 2011
Basketball season has come to an end. All of the teams we cover have been eliminated from the playoffs. It was a long season. I must have shot 30 games this year. Out of those 30 games only a couple of them were not lit. My light kit (blogged about here) worked great for most assignments. Every year my timing gets better and I enjoy the challenge of lighting different gyms more and more. I have selected a few of my favorite pictures from this season. You can see a few more over at my sportsshooter.com member page here. Thanks for looking.
2011 CHSAA State Wrestling: Day 3 Finals
© Matthew Jonas 2011/Evergreen Newspapers 2011
After 2 days, only one of the schools in our coverage area had a grappler in the finals. Conifer High School’s Travis Himmelman wrestled Valor Christian High School’s Torey Welch in the Class 4A 145lbs final match. Much to my surprise (sarcasm) Himmelman, with a 37-1 record going into state, once again destroyed the competition and claimed a third state title in 4 years. It made for some good pictures and probably the cover of the High Timber Times this week.
Not everything was good throughout the weekend though. An increasing trend seems to be credentialing MWCs (moms with cameras) to state events. The sidelines were extremely crowded during the finals. Although I have only covered state wrestling for 4 years, I have never seen as many photographers as I did this year. I actually overheard “I’m just a mom with a camera,” that proved my suspicions about the number of “media” at the event. I saw at least 20 people that fell into the MWC category last night. It’s starting to become a problem.
2011 CHSAA State Wrestling: Day 2
© Matthew Jonas 2011/Evergreen Newspapers 2011
So much for not shooting things super tight like I did yesterday. This one just stood out to me as a good opportunity to fill the frame. Finding a clean background is extremely tough at the Pepsi Center. Shooting tight is pretty much the only solution. I moved from press row into the Denver Nuggets photo room today. You can see a photo after the jump. It’s much quieter and easier for me to come and go from. The internet seems to be faster as well. Most of the bandwidth is being used by the CHSAA TV people who are live streaming the matches. It’s become a problem for anyone else trying to file on a deadline.
2011 CHSAA State Wrestling: Day 1
© Matthew Jonas 2011/Evergreen Newspapers 2011
Off to an interesting start. The first match I was supposed to photograph was over before it started. Due to a questionable medical call, a 3A heavy weight wrestler from Clear Creek High School was disqualified. I’m not a doctor but to me the injury in question was nothing but mat burn. The medical personnel for CHSAA though it might have been something more serious. It’s tough break for the kid, who is a senior, and will now miss his last opportunity to wrestle.
One From This Weekend
© Matthew Jonas 2011/Evergreen Newspapers 2011
I made this picture on Friday night at Evergreen High School. That gym is one of my favorites to light. I’ll take good action and good color over ISO 3200 and a motor drive any day. This picture was made using techniques learned from strobist.com. Speaking of the strobist, David Hobby himself will be visiting Denver on March 22, 2011 along with Joe McNally on the flash bus tour. If you are looking for a good (cheap) workshop that will most likely be packed full of information about getting your flash off of your camera this is it.
Don’t Fight the Light
© Matthew Jonas 2011/Evergreen Newspapers 2011
“Don’t fight the light,” was a phrase that I heard many times from my photojournalism instructors in college. It is a constant battle for photojournalists. We are forced to make pictures in situations that send CCDs scrambling for brighter fields. The picture above is from a situation many will face. Go to the local rec center and make pictures of a high school swimmer for a sports feature. Seems like a simple assignment. However, it quickly turns from simple to complicated.
Lighting High School Gyms for Basketball
© Matthew Jonas 2010/Evergreen Newspapers 2010
Editors Note: While I am compiling my Year in Review photo galleries, I thought it would be a good time to post a few things I had been keeping in the bank. Enjoy.
The frozen parts of me are glad to be off of the football field and into a more temperature controlled environment. I’m talking about the start of the high school basketball season, of course! With the change of scenery comes a change in the equipment. This year I have streamlined my lighting equipment and managed to pack everything I need to light a gym into one small backpack, my Think Tank Photo Airport Antidote. Many shooters have given up on lighting gyms with the introduction of cameras that are capable of producing low noise, high ISO pictures. I still like the thrill of timing a picture just right and making an image that has good color to go along with good action.
