Sports Photography 3 - Shots on the Cheap

Continuing my past posts on Sports Photography techniques, today I'll share my thoughts on some successful techniques I've used to create successful action shots on a budget.

One of the biggest constraints of the amateur photographer is the lens. As previously discussed, professional sports lenses can cost anything in the region of £1500 - 7000, far beyond the budget of most people. Most sports photographers also carry a range of fixed lenses with them, further increasing the outlay. At the moment, I only use a Nikon 70 - 300mm f4-5.6 G-type lens - it's about the cheapest telephoto on the market.

1. Shoot at "alternative" moments

Joe Denly Practicing

If your chosen sport has a "warm up" period prior to the main action, it can be a very good time to get closer shots than might otherwise be possible. The example I've used here was taken at a Surrey vs Kent cricket match a couple of weeks ago. My lens is nowhere near powerful enough to pick out facial detail from 500 yards away, but during the players' warm up they were practicing on the edge of the outfield, so I was able to get much closer. The other advantage of shooting in the warm up is that most of the crowd won't be paying very much attention - if you need to move around, people are much more willing to have their view momentarily obstructed than during the main action.

2. Shoot with a crop in mind

Greg Randall

Shooting from the stands, you will rarely have much control over the viewpoint of your shots. With that in mind, I find it helpful to "see" a completed shot with a crop in mind. It's not ideal, but it works - take a look of the portrait of Greg Randall at an ice hockey match. Your pictures may look cluttered in camera, but a bit of Photoshopping after the event can work wonders

3. Shoot images that capture some of the atmosphere around the ground

T-Shirt Gun

Think of shooting at a sports event as an opportunity for a photographic essay. Newspapers generally only carry at most a couple of pictures from an event, so they don't look repetitive. If you're shooting for a couple of hours or more and all your shots are of the action, no matter how good they are, they will start to look the same after a while. Use the opportunity to take shots of other action around the ground / arena - in these kind of shots, you're competing on a level playing field with the professionals.

Sports Photography 2 - Ideas

Photos of professional, top-flight sportsmen adorn the back pages of almost every newspaper across the country. News and shots from major events of the day are the stuff of journalists the world over. Most of these professional images are technically excellent - they convey excitement, drama and emotion - yet they rarely get looked at for more than a few moments, because their purpose is primarily to inform and support a chunk of text.

As an amateur "sports photographer", your aim is to make people look at the image.

This means that the people appearing in the image do not have to be famous, instantly-recognisable superstars. It is better to try and show something attractive about the sport or personalities playing - after all, you most likely aren't taking pictures to support a chunk of text - though many amateur photographers do provide coverage for local newspapers. Have a look at this example of mine:

Milton Keynes Lightning

This is a simple image of a goal celebration in an ice hockey match. The league and team that the players come from doesn't matter - the image is about the emotion and joy when a goal is scored. It could easily be the NHL; it happens to be the English Premier League.

Approach local sports teams and take your camera to local events - you will be amazed just how much enjoyment you will get from taking shots, and likewise how much local teams enjoy being photographed. So long as you are polite and respectful, most teams will love having a photographer to take shots of them.

There is enormous scope for taking photos of amateur sport - my images tend to revolve around the things I'm interested in - ice hockey, cricket, boxing, etc. This is the joy of the amateur. Most sports are not "professional only", so seek out lower-league or semi-pro opportunities. Explain who you are and what you'd like to do, and most sports will open up for you.

In my next post, I'll look at some techniques to make the most of limited shooting opportunities at professional events.

Sports Photography 1 - Considerations

Sports photography is a challenging field to work in. On a technical level, the lenses required for most sports are very expensive, and to add to the difficulty, amateur photographers are likely to have only very restricted access at a professional event.

For most professional sports, an amateur photographer will have to confine themselves to the crowd along with everyone else. This can cause all manner of problems:

• The photographer is unable to move around freely
• Key moments may be interrupted by people moving around in front
• It is impossible to set up a tripod, and even a monopod may prove difficult
• The photographer may be too far back from the action, beyond the capabilities of their equipment
• Indoor lighting will be uneven and focussed on the play area

Most sports require the crowd to sit some way back from the action. Therefore, to get a shot of a player in action will require a telephoto lens with a reasonable zoom. Now the problems begin:

• Freeze-frame action requires fast shutter speeds to avoid motion blur
• Fast shutter speeds require wider aperture settings
• Telephoto lenses generally don't go wider than f5 without the cost skyrocketing

These problems can be made even more acute with indoor sports, where the artificial lighting indoors will be uneven and not suited to photography. Dimmer lighting conditions will also require lengthier exposures - but remember the problem with the tripod? With most standard kit the only solution is to crank up the ISO sensitivity, but with this comes a loss of picture quality.

Professional sports photographers overcome these difficulties by having top-quality telephoto lenses with enormous zoom capabilities, or a range of fixed prime lenses (rrp £6000 - 16000) along with access to press areas and freedom of movement around the event. They also have room to set up tripods, monpods, etc. In simple terms, they are not hampered by the many difficulties faced by the amateur photographer.

Yet it is possible for the amateur photographer to take very credible and pleasing sports shots. Over the next week or so, I will post more in this series with ideas and examples of my own work.