Skeeterbytes
Forum Pro
Mistake, or artistic choice? Experts disagree!
I presume the runner's exhaustion is the photo's main intent.
Cheers,
Rick
I presume the runner's exhaustion is the photo's main intent.
Cheers,
Rick
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I shot my first cross country event ever yesterday
- Thread starter Scott Larson
- Start date
Ferguson
Senior Member
I do think this is a fair point. When I look at really talented sports photographers' work, and consider many of the "rules", I see them violated all the time. Wide action shots instead of tight crops because the context was more of the story, cropping motion to allow space to run into (but maybe not), level horizons (except when it's more interesting not), rule of thirds is probably the most violated rule it probably isn't even in the list.
I do not suggest that the "rules" are wrong, but rather they are good guidance for most shots until the photographer reaches the point they decide it is better in some case to do otherwise.
I also suggest that the only way the photographer knows when that is, is to make some efforts along that line and see how it goes. Some will be mistakes, some not and will improvements.
I suggest that pointing out the "rules" is helpful. Arguing about them is not. Everyone has to find their path, and cropping wide for an editor to make choices is absolutely valid (and often requested).
Honestly, to some extent the only way we REALLY judge is which shots editors pick, and I remain so baffled by those choices some days I feel like the only rule is "take a bunch of random stuff because there's no way to tell what gets picked.
I have literally had sports editors take a vertical dunk shot in basketball (a good one, and star player), crop it very wide horizontally, and omit the ball and basket. OK, it showed the face, but ... really?
Linwood
Skeeterbytes
Forum Pro
All fair points. My issue was with citing "mistakes."
Because I shoot sports as a parent or volunteer and not for editorial use, I tend to work at capturing all members of a particular team in addition to telling a sports story. With the chaos that is cross-country, that's a taller order than, say, a field sport like soccer. Your team may have eight runners out of two-hundred. e.g., This runner is finishing her first race coming back from injury, it's her 21st birthday, and in the background are her family who traveled from Canada to celebrate. No editor would run it, but it will make a great keepsake.
What's great about cross-country is the lack of separation between the crowd and athletes, and every course differs vastly from the others. Anybody wanting a challenge, I highly suggest giving it a go, high school or college.
Cheers,
Rick
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Charlie BRM
Well-known member
Good call. I spent years photographing bass tournaments. EVERY weekend in season; both Saturday and Sunday, and hours of driving to the boonies. Culling about 800 shots per day or per weekend.
A few went to print covers, calendars, etc. but the ones I felt good about were when I got tapped on the shoulder at the next tournament to be thanked for posting that person on stage with their top fish. "If you didn't come to these tournaments, nobody back home would see why I spend so much time at these things."
I just shot snowmobile "watercross" racing and again it is the lesser knowns that contact me to ask if I got a shot, any shot, of them participating.
A few went to print covers, calendars, etc. but the ones I felt good about were when I got tapped on the shoulder at the next tournament to be thanked for posting that person on stage with their top fish. "If you didn't come to these tournaments, nobody back home would see why I spend so much time at these things."
I just shot snowmobile "watercross" racing and again it is the lesser knowns that contact me to ask if I got a shot, any shot, of them participating.
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Scott Larson
Veteran Member
I had two goals: avoid monotonous cropping (I'm not shooting for a yearbook), and leave space to give my boss the option to crop photos however he wants because he knows this doesn't bother me. Following "rules" where there are only three "proper" ways to crop a photo would go against both those goals.
Yeah, rules. Whose rules? When some rando on the Internet tells me to ignore what my boss is telling me to do and do it his way, guess what, I'm going to ignore that advice.
You know what's really funny? Ask them what kind of photos they want. I asked him what kind of photos he wanted for this and he told me, "atmospheric photos". I'm not sure what he meant so I figured I'd just make the backgrounds as blurry as possible. :-D
Before I shot this event I went through the school's web site and got a basic idea of what the SID has used in the past so that was my baseline. I also shot some additional closeups and other angles that both he and the conference used.
Did you have a very wide horizontal shot of that player? Vertical shots are very rarely used for articles...
He probably meant fans cheering on the athletes and runners in front of fans/race signs...
Ferguson
Senior Member
I'm sure I did (I don't recall the game now so can't confirm). But they would have been floor shots, on a fast break or something similar. I have their standard aspect ratio and always include some in exactly that. The school goes by the moniker "Dunk City" so they are obsessed with dunks. The prior SID would, or ask me to, do a collage of dunks to fit the aspect with 3-4 players across.
My point is that if you consider who consumes your shots you learn something about how to crop, except sometimes you learn mysterious or even bad things as well. Like the OP's shot with the weird added artistic affect (at least in my opinion it was unhelpful).
Linwood
Scott Larson
Veteran Member
Oh, this race didn't have any of those.
A race with no fans?
Skeeterbytes
Forum Pro
This gets to why they seldom charge admission (parking, sometimes). Championships do attract a crowd, but they're necessarily scattered across many acres, even if there's a scrum for the finishing chute (plan accordingly, those tapes stretch).
NCAA West Regionals
Cheers,
Rick
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Equivalence and diffraction-free since 2009.
You can be too; ask about our 12-step program.
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100%.
Scott Larson
Veteran Member
Yes. There were a handful of watchers along the course but the runners greatly outnumbered the spectators.
That is too bad. Here we get a lot of spectators for XC meets, both at the HS level and the college level.
Scott Larson
Veteran Member
It's hard to get people to come to a hot humid park in the middle of a work day to watch two races that lasted an hour.
Scott Larson
Veteran Member
It would have been even hotter at 3:30PM.
Scott Larson
Veteran Member
I got enough sweat and exercise that day hauling the 400mm f2.8 between three locations.
That is one thing that they deal with, the heat. There is a specific wet bulb temperature above which all sports can not happen so the schools tend to look at the forecast and will sometimes move the start time accordingly.
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