Getting into sports photography

My business partner (Petr) and I felt we needed to take good quality sports action photos in order for the creative aspect of a couple of online projects to launch successfully.

[clearly there are a number of critical success factors for any online venture, this part is concerned with carrying off the creative concept]

RugbyHair.com is currently on the WordPress blog platform, awaiting a much-needed design make over which will coincide with a platform change so that we can push the concept forward by having

• The ability to receive people’s uploaded photos and video
• Ad serving ability
• Flexible layouts
  

Essentially, we need to be able to effectively convey the idea of the site and motivate/stimulate/enthuse the viewer into contributing (reviews, ratings, upload their own shots, enter competitions).

Enter: Need for good action photos

The concepts for the sites were fairly simple so it is the ability to go live with a great array of high quality photos and video that we are hoping will carry things off.

Photographic experience

Our experience has been limited to mostly compact digital cameras. The results were average (static subjects only) but OK for use online.

Before getting a ‘real’ camera

The compact camera I was using was incapable of getting anything like the quality of action photo that we were looking for (some of the better examples appear below – not great).

Some of the close-up photos from the compact were at least legible.

Video (for online consumption) was also OK for our purposes.

Sample here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWOhH0Q9btI

I had a JVC Everio hard drive model and an earlier Panasonic DV digital camera so I was happy enough with our video-taking capabilities for the moment.

Content up until now

We got enough material to begin a content-discovery process for RugbyHair.com. Basically, I needed to see how things would work out

• What the main areas of the site should be
• How to position things to create some longevity to some of the material; and, at teh same time,
  
• How to report on current events
  

We had general ideas around the type of content we wanted on the site but weren’t sure of the exact make-up. We decided to embark on a free blogging platform, work on the content from there and then move to a more feature-rich platform when we had sufficient content and clearer idea of the structure etc.

Then we would be in a position to explain the concept and pitch for advertisers, sponsors, etc.

Proof of Concept

On the first outing with (what I assume is) a half-way decent camera (Sony DSC-H5), we were able to take some reasonable shots (for online use) just from the grandstand.

Examples from the initial outing (with cropping):

More here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rugbyhair/

Camera Selection

It sounded like Canon and Nikon made reasonable-to-high quality cameras in the range of ‘upper amateur’ to ‘early professional’ capability.

My capability was certainly not ‘upper amateur’ but the idea was to grow into the equipment as we went. We had planned to be at several events in the coming months and so would get a lot of live practice.

I found this article very informative in terms of beginning to understand the core features.

I won’t get into all of the considerations when pondering the purchase of a DSLR. The important ones for us were:

• Burst rate
• Ability to grow with our capability
• Ability to get some reasonable shots straight away - easy of use to get a good outcome from auto-settings
• Brand strength
• Priced accordingly

We initially had our sights on a Nikon D90. It had received very positive reviews (especially, this one on Amazon), and seemed like an ideal start for us.

Petr happened to be in Japan at the time on a business/holiday and so was checking prices there while I was checking them here (and reading copious reviews).

He found a deal on the D90 with a cool-sounding Tamron zoom lens.

It seemed like a good price but there are some mixed reviews on Amazon and I was worried that we wouldn't be able to take it back if we experienced the same problems

http://www.amazon.com/Tamron-18-270mm-3-5-6-3-Aspherical-Nikon/dp/B001DYC0CS

So we committed to a same-brand lens (Nikon with Nikon or Canon with Canon).

We were almost there with our deliberations when Petr found a great deal on the Canon EOS 50D with Canon lens so we were there.

We hooked up in a bar in central Auckland on the evening of Petr's return from Japan. It was kinda like Christmas, unpacking the biggest 'present' I'd received in a while.

We only bought the one lens and so there was little chance of getting a shot in a crowded, dark bar but it was fun to look ...

My first look at/through the Canon EOS 50D

There was a rugby match on the next night on the other side of the bridge (North Harbour v Northland in New Zealand’s NPC competition), so we are ready!

Also, I had managed to get photographer accreditation for the BayPark stadium, the home ground of the Bay Of Plenty team in the same competition. This team, while not favoured before the competition, had won their first 3 matches and so were running hot.

And this was an afternoon game so I was really looking forward to it (and just a little scared at the same time). I was hoping for a positive experience on the evening match before it to gain a bit of much-needed confidence.

I hadn’t convinced myself that the camera was going to do all of the work for me.

I will post some of the results tomorrow