Pardon the non-sports posting, but I got some warm fuzzies after reading this story.

As photographers, we depend on licensing our work to pay bills. I think most non-photographers would be stunned to know how much it costs to be in this business. The equipment we have to purchase is astronomically high. I have a set of strobes in the Dean Smith Center at UNC-Chapel Hill that alone cost me over $7,000.

Often, I get requests for people to use a photo of mine for xyz (where xyz could be anything from a poster to a website). I say sure, but we need to discuss licensing. I often get a stunned response. They wonder why would I charge for a photo. After all, it doesn’t cost me anything to email a photo, right? What they don’t consider is the amount of money and time I had to invest to produce a particular photo in the first place. Here is just a short list of investments I’ve made:

• Digital cameras that have to be replaced every 2 years and cost $4K each.
• Professional quality lens. You’d be stunned by how much these cost.
• Insurance.
• The time I spent as a student photographer learning the trade. While in DC, I spent many of my nights and weekends working for my mentor, Mitchell Layton, typically for free. This was a four year stint.
• The time it took me to go out to a particular game where a person sees a photo they want.
• The gas it took me to get to the event.
• The time it took me to edit the entire take from that day.

I could go on ad nauseum frankly. The point I want to make is that I spend more money and time producing images than the casual observer understands. I went into photography to be a good photographer - not a half-ass photographer (or “guy with a camera” as pejoratively known in the industry). As such, I require income to invest in top-of-the-line gear as well as repair it. I have one lens than easily costs $500 for simple repairs. For a camera, Canon charges me $150 just to open the box if I send one in for repair.

So I get obviously frustrated when people ask for my photos for free, unless it is for a legitimate charity. Worse though, is when someone tries to download an image from my website and print it. That is flat out theft. I would imagine that those who steal my images have jobs — don’t they expect to be compensated by their supervisor for the work they do? Shouldn’t I also expect to be compensated for my work?

Well, getting back to the story I wanted to link to. A photographer in Minneapolis was victim to a very overt form of image theft, when a real estate and financial services firm stole an image from his website, and used it in a advertisement. The photographer tried amicable solutions, but when put off by the company that stole the image, pursued the case in court, represented himself, and won almost $20,000 in a copyright infringement case. You go Chris. Glad to know that copyright still means something.

Whoever said “timing is everything” in sports photography left out the other important part: lighting. This post will be of little interest to most people, but for students of photography or those looking to learn more about sports photography, I hope you find it of interest.

One aim of sports photography is to isolate your subject. Typically that is done through depth-of-field, namely a shallow one. You keep your subject in focus, but objects 2 to 3 feet in front of the athlete are out focus. Depth of field (DOF) is determined by three main things:

1. The focal length of the lens used. All things being equal, longer focal lengths leads to a more shallow DOF.
2. Distance to the camera to the subject. The closer the subject is to the camera, all things being equal, the more shallow the DOF.
3. The aperture or f/stop. All things being equal, as the lens is “opened up” (moves towards f/1) the DOF becomes more shallow.

But light can also be used in to isolate a subject. In this case, a sports photographer has to be lucky but also has to be able to spot the chances where the perfect lighting can be had.

Below is a photo from Carter-Finley Stadium, home of the North Carolina State Wolfpack Football team. There is about an 8 minute window on the field when the sun is low enough that Vaughn Towers cast a shadow over the field and stands, but there is a sliver of light that cuts through the openings where the exits are. It lets in just a tad of light over a very small part of the field, but if you can get a picture of a play in this light, it’s just perfect:

Notice how only the player(s) are in the light, but the stands and even foreground are in the shade. These moments don’t come often, but keep your eyes out for when it comes.

—- Update October 8, 2007 —-

Below I thought I would add an example of a flat photo where the subject blends in with the background. This is typically what you get as again, the sun has to be in the perfect position to get the lighting like you saw above.

Inside Lax Photo Shoot

If you have ever wondered what it is like to do a photo shoot with a varsity athlete (and hey, who hasn’t?), then check out this video from Inside Lacrosse. Staff photographer James Schaffer does a shoot with some of the UVA recruits coming in this year.

Link to Video

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I’m fairly fortunate to photograph and have access to sports that fans could only dream of. On the sidelines for NFL football games. Sitting on the floor of the Dean Dome or Cameroon Indoor Stadium for a UNC/Duke basketball game. All is a day’s work for a sports photographer.

As much as I enjoy the experience, it is times with my family that are most rewarding. Today my brother brought my little niece over for her sixth birthday photo. Photographing her is like shooting fish in a barrel. It’s just too easy. If only doing head shots of athletes was this easy.
With this posting is a photo from today. Just had to share. An uncle’s pride I guess.

NCSU Football Media Guide Front Cover 2007

NCSU Football Media Guide Back Cover 2007

Earlier this year, Annabelle Myers, NCSU associate athletic director for athletic communications, talked with me in her office about the athletic department’s vision for the 2007 media cover. They were inspired by the cover for the DVD to the TV series The Closer and wanted to bring the concept to our cover. The goal was to have Coach O’Brien at the forefront, with his hands planted on a reflective conference room table, and the players behind him. I was excited about their idea. It is always great to have a client that thinks outside of the box and wants to try new ideas.

The photo shoot took place at the Murphy Football Center in the TV studio that has a green screen installed. Wolfpack fans are familiar with this studio as this is where the coach’s weekly show is filmed. The green screen facilitated the process of photoshopping out the background around the players and placing them onto a solid black medium.

I packed every single light and light modifier that I had in my arsenal. The shoot was not overly complex, but I expected it would require a lot of light modification. Indeed it did. We used anywhere between three and four lights utilizing softboxes, grids and snoots.

We photographed Coach O’Brien first. The first challenge was finding a table that was high enough for him to lean on, and had a good reflectivity so that his hands would reflect. Annabelle, Pat Norris (also of sports information), Rob Bradley (my friend who was helping) and I scratched our heads for about 10 minutes trying to find a strategy. We finally settled on the coffee table that appears on the weekly coach’s show as a prop. We raised the table by stacking it on top a couple crates and boxes. It was ingenuity at its best; although coach had to be careful to lean too hard on the table or it would tip over.

Marcus Stone Media Guide

We had to work a couple angles and ask coach to move his hands in different places before we finally found just the right angle to that had the perfect reflection and perspective. Coach was very pleasant to work with and patient as we moved him around literally inch by inch. After we finished with Coach O’Brien, we photographed the six seniors that are pictured on the front. Each player was photographed seperatly because there was not enough room to photograph them as a group in the room. Also, we wanted to light each person slightly differently to the final image would not look flat.

For the back cover, we photographed the remaining seniors including Marcus Stone, pictured on the right. Marcus is smiling because Annabelle was able to get the always stoic Marcus to actually crack a smile.

(Quick note, the back cover is missing one person because we had one player not show up. I photographed him about 3 weeks later, but he did not make the pre-production mock-up that Annabelle sent me. The final printed version obviously has him.)

Given that I cover ACC sports in the Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill area, and that there is an immense amout of interest in those sports by those who blog, I frequently find my photos being ripped off and used in blog entries. For the most part I have not really taken action against those who steal my work even though I have rights to seek damages against them. Although, what I have always found ironic is bloggers hate it when other bloggers steal their work, especially when the original writer is not credited. Yet these same bloggers seem to forget these rules when the comes to photography.

Today I was pointed to one of the most egregious acts of a blog stealing photos (although in this case not mine). Here is a quote: Read the rest of this entry »

Sometimes I feel like I missed the “golden era” of photojournalism. It seems every time I turn around my colleagues are loosing their jobs as newspapers seek to become more profitable.

So imagine my surprise and relief when I read this article from Reuters.

U.S. newspapers that spend more money on their newsrooms will make more money, according to a study released on Wednesday, which questioned the wisdom of the media industry’s trend of cutting jobs to save costs.

The authors of the University of Missouri-Columbia study, which was based on 10 years of financial data, said news quality affects profit more than spending on circulation, advertising and other parts of the business.

The study was done by a school of journalism which has a vested interest in people getting jobs in the industry. So take this as you will.

I don’t know how long this link will be active, but I had to link to this photo gallery of photos by Charlotte Observer photographer Jeff Siner. The photos are from North Carolina’s 79-73 victory over Duke at Cameron Indoor Stadium. The action stuff is great, but the feature (the non-action) work he did is what really impressed me. Check out this great work to see what the rivalry between UNC and Duke is like. Also good toning to get rid of the terrible color cast typically of photos taken in Cameron Indoor. (sorry, only a photographer like me would note this)

**Update 3/15/08**

Well sadly, the gallery has been archived and is no longer up.

High Dynamic Range Imaging, or HDR, is an interesting concept that has come with the advent of Photoshop and digital imaging, specifically when Adobe released it’s built in “merge to HDR” function in 2005 with Photoshop CS2. Explaining what Dynamic Range is would take a long time. But basically, it is a scene’s range in brightness from completely black to the completely bright. For Ansel Adams fans, it’s Zone 0 to Zone 9. HDR imagine could roughly be translated to the traditional B+W photography and printing techniques of dodging and burning although there are some differences. Read the rest of this entry »

Photographers know that an SLR camera lens is very expensive. Although the digital camera has changed the paradigm somewhat, one can still say that the lens is more expensive than the camera itself.

Canon has posted an informative video on how a Canon 500mm f/4.0 IS lens is constructed from beginning to end. After watching the video and seeing the labor involved to put one together, I can now see why they charge so much for the lens which typically is priced around $5,500. Read the rest of this entry »