Ryu: Lens lens baby
At the airport cafe in Milano. It’s not Milan as there is no “s” in Paris. Matt knows this as people in France calls Detroit “Detowa”. People, let’s give each other some respect for their respective languages. By the way, it’s “sake” and not “saki”.
I am in Milano having shot the Italian Derby: Inter Milan v Juventus. The hype was more than the match, as a very promising 1st half was not a prelude to the extraordinarily dull 2nd half. Alas, that’s sports. As I have alluded to in my previous post, I had a plan in my head when the match was 2-1 and there was about 20 minutes left. To make a long story short, I was shooting on the Juventus end (Juventus attacking) and I moved to the Inter end as if Juventus score their 3rd goal, it will not be as exciting as Inter scoring their tying goal at home. The clock continued to tick and with 5 minutes to go, my wheels started to spin in my head. What will happen at the end? To my back were Juventus away supporters and my guess (an educated guess, nonetheless) was that the Juventus players will come and celebrate in front of their fans. And exactly at this moment, there was the dilemma in my little head: which lens am I going to use?
If you have been shooting sports for some time, you are likely to have accumulated more than one lens. Usually a long one (+200mm) and a wide one (-35mm). This is just an estimate and some of you might even have a lens that zooms from 28mm to 300mm. In essence, it’s long and wide. As a sports photographer, you have to make a split decision as to which lens to use and you have to live with the consequence of your choice.
So which one to use at which moment? That’s like asking whether I prefer pizza or pasta. It depends. What works for me won’t work for you and vice versa. What you should be concentrating is finding out how you can train yourself to make that decision as smoothly as possible. As a general rule, if you want to concentrate on a single player or a single action, you will use your long lens. If you want the environment to play a role, use the wide one. But on the flip side, you can use the long lens to incorporate the environment (ie: shooting the other end of the playing field) and you can go wide but go for an extremely close up of the athlete. I could get further into this, but as I have said this is very subjective. If you have been wandering why your photos have been a bit lame or that they are starting to look like a bad case of deja vu, I suggest going the opposite of what you have been doing. If you’ve been shooting action with the long lens, go wide and get close. Something like that.
You might now be thinking: “Ryu, if you think you’re like god’s gift to all things lens (I might be), when do you change the damn thing? By the way, how is the pizza in Italy?”. Pizza in Italy is good, but I didn’t eat it this time. Again as a general rule, you change your lens when nothing is happening. Action is happening on the other end, time outs, after a goal, between innings, etc…
For argument’s sake, let’s say that you have two lens: 24-70mm and 70-200mm. But you only have one body as your husband told you that you need to wait for Christmas (shout out to all the sports momtographers out there). You have been shooting your lovely child (Fabio) playing baseball with your 70-200mm and you want to switch to the 24-70 so that you can capture the moment when they win the state championship. It’s the bottom of the 9th, with one out to go. Batter is down 2 strikes and your son Fabio winds up and throws…. hold on wait a minute let’s be kind and rewind. Why have you waited this long to change the lens? 2 outs bottom of the 9th, 2 strikes and you’ve not changed the lens yet? You fail as a sports momtographer if you let this happen. You should have changed the lens before Fabio’s team took to the field in the bottom of the 9th. “But what about all the other action that might take place before the ultimate moment?”. Screw it. You have to make a commitment to the moment you want to capture and you need to stick with it. That goes for the position you will take to and the lens you will select. Sure, you want to be flexible, but not with the expense of not being ready for the moment you want to shoot. If you want to be the coolest sports momtographer in Pennsylvania, you go for broke, all day, everyday.
I can already hear the pundits telling me that you’ve got enough time to change lens in baseball and that it’s more important to get everything. Horse manure. I was using baseball as we just had the American Series (let’s not forget we all that Japan is the world champion) and I thought I use another sport other than football. The point is that you prepare yourself for the moment and you have to be ready to sacrifice other non-important moments. There will always be “what ifs” in sports photography, but that’s the beauty off it. The commitments you make might pay you dividends or it might not. But the important thing to concentrate on that one moment you want to capture versus all the mundane stuff that we will sure to trash in Training Ground next month.
Finally, if you are a monopod user and if you have two bodies (let’s all find an understanding partner), you are wondering how to best make that switch from one camera to another. If you are not clumsy like I am, this is going to not take 6 years. More like 6 seconds.
1. Take the monopod with your left hand.
2. Place the bottom of the long lens, where the lens meet the body over your left shoulder. If this is really confusing, I will put a picture of it upon request. Seriously I will.
3. Grab your other camera with your right hand, aim, shoot, and you’re golden.
That’s it. Don’t be that guy who puts the long lens horizontally on the advertisement board. Too long and takes too much space. I’d say practice at home, but it’s better if you practice at the game of your choice. You don’t want to be that guy who’s doing the “You talkin’ to me?” version of lens switching in front of the mirror.
Deciding which lens to use and when to use it, making a commitment to a lens to capture the moment you want, and switching from one lens to another, smooth as butter. These are not everything about lens, but it’s a start. I hope you all realise that reading this post will not make you a princesses of lens. Practice and repetition will. Beckham doesn’t score those free kicks because he read “Free kick: The definitive guide” or Ichiro doesn’t hit those infield singles without ever winning any games by watching “You can hit like Kerby”. Repetition and planning will make you almost perfect. Oh and pure talent will help, but we all can’t be like Scott. :)
Ryu
Matt: Fear & Loathing & Rodeo 2011
In about a month, I will be heading to Las Vegas to cover the 2011 Wrangler National Finals Rodeo. For 10 days, which in Vegas time is about six weeks. I took an assignment for the Ferndale Enterprise to shoot Ferndale native and #2-ranked steer wrestler Billy Bugenig as he tries to overtake Dean Gorsuch and hold off the rest of the 15-man field for the world title, the gold buckle, and a pile of cash.
I’ll also be shooting the other events, the behind the scenes action, and probably a good bit of the guys at their bar of choice each night.
I’m going to do a running diary here at Big Lens Fast Shutter with a picture of the day, (the pictures I make of Billy and his family will be held until they are published in the Enterprise) and maybe a brief recap of my daily adventures in Sin City with a bunch of cowboys and cowgirls. If there’s anything you want to see or hear about in these daily reports, I’m open to any suggestions, just leave them in the comments.
In the mean time, check out my pictures of the 2011 Wrangler National Finals Rodeo qualifiers here.
Always Be Shooting – Even When You Don’t Have a Camera
A few weeks ago, I wrote about how you should always be editing, and I probably should have started at the beginning. As someone who is serious about photography, you should always be shooting. I don’t know if Malcolm Gladwell is correct when he writes about the 10,000 hour rule, but I do know that I didn’t get to where I am by not shooting. Luckily for all of us, Gladwell allows practice, performance, and even time spent thinking about your skill to count towards the 10,000 hours.
To be very clear, if you are serious about photography, you should be shooting as much as you can, no matter what the subject. There will always be times that you can’t be shooting, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t still add to your craft. A couple of weeks ago I was thinking about how to express this, when fate led me to follow a link to this excellent blog post called “Taking photographs with your mind”:
You can’t always have the camera at your side, or up to your face – part of photography is missing things. That’s a very difficult lesson to learn as a photographer, our pursuit is dedicated to controlling and stopping time. I remember hearing a well known photographer that I respected say that “you miss photos all the time, and that’s part of photography” – it came as a real relief. We’re human, the pursuit should be rooted in pleasure and sometimes it’s good to just acknowledge that you saw the moment, framed it and captured it and stored it on your personal harddrive of neural networking.
The writer is talking about the pleasure and posterity of photographs, and I agree, but I want to take it a step further and apply it to getting better at sports photography. In my post about editing, I talked about using failed pictures to learn what you are doing wrong in order to make better pictures. But what if you don’t have a camera with you? What if you have a long lens on, and a play comes directly at you or happens too quickly for you to focus on? It’s natural to curse yourself or your gear, and you should be hard on yourself if you miss because chances are no one else will. But you can still benefit from the experience if you burn it into your “personal harddrive” and use it on the next play or at the next game. What could you have done differently, how could you have used the players eyes or body language to predict the play, and how could you give yourself a better chance of success the next time?
I have missed pictures three times in the last couple of weeks, and since I know some of you like to hear stories about professionals who screw up, I’m going to share. The first came at the end of the first week of Occupy Oakland, the Wall Street protest that is ongoing just a couple of blocks from my house. I had been shooting it all day for a week, as an exercise, and on Friday evening I was totally burned out and went to meet a friend for coffee not far from the protest site. I thought about taking a camera, but just wanted to relax and catch up, so I didn’t. Not 10 minutes later, we walked by a Muslim man leading a prayer, various Muslims and non-Muslims wrapped in a semi-circle around him, heads bowed. The early evening sun was bouncing off of a nearby mirrored building. I was cursing myself out loud for not bringing a camera, but rather than waste the opportunity by walking away, I stood there for a few minutes, imagining exactly what I would do if I did have a camera with me. Everything from the angles to the exposure, depth of field to framing. I don’t have anything to show for that – right now – but I do know that the next time I see something even remotely like that, I will be ready to make pictures from the moment I see what’s going on.
Since Ryu is gritting his teeth that my first example was unrelated to sports, here’s a sports example: A couple of weeks ago I shot the Raiders-Patriots game in Oakland. It’s easy to get caught out of position on a punt, especially if you are shooing the offense head on from the end zone. I stupidly gave up on a Patriots punt and was walking around the corner of the end zone when the ball bounced on the 10 yard line and two Patriots dove through the air to keep the ball from going into the end zone for a touchback. Perfect backlight, two incredible athletes four feet off the ground, reaching for the ball to save 15-20 yards of critical field position. And I was caught walking, both cameras at my side. I was left with a perfect mental image on my “personal harddrive” and the sting that I could have had that picture if I had been prepared. And because of this perfect picture no one else can see, I am making an effort to shoot more special teams plays, like this one from yesterday’s Raiders-Chiefs game:
Raiders punter Shane Lechler gets off a punt behind blocker Manase Tonga who has his helmet ripped off by Chiefs linebacker Demorrio Williams.
My last example is the simplest example, because it involves a failed picture that I had the opportunity to correct in the same half of football.
Here’s me trying to nail a leaping touchdown catch at the Stanford-Washington game on Saturday.
I had my focus limiter set to full meaning that the 70-200 would focus from about 3 feet to infinity. This is necessary for when you think that a play is coming right at you, like on a run at the goal line with the anticipation of a celebration very close to your position. I guessed wrong, and the focus hunted even though I was right on the play. This is a very very bad miss, and I got very pissed at myself and wanted redemption.
It doesn’t always happen like this, but in the very next quarter I was able to make amends, carefully tracking this play all the way into my lap.
Literally, as the photographer sitting next to me bore the brunt of the impact and crashed into me. As I checked the screen, I saw that I had 7 pictures of this play, all in perfect focus, and I’m chalking it up to being extra careful because of the previous play and the jumping catch picture that only I could see.
As a photographer, your mind and your eyes are the most important things that you have. You can become a better photographer by using them even if you don’t have a camera, or can’t get exactly what you want in your camera.
Ryu: Right on schedule
Planning. Some people get allergic reactions when they hear that word and I would have agreed with them 6 years ago. Back then, I lived for the moment and the moment lived for me. But since I became a professional sports photographer, I had to say goodbye to the moment and go steady with planning. I’m now even thinking about marriage, but maybe I’m a bit ahead of schedule.
When shooting sports, your planning skills will be tested to the limit, at least that’s how I felt about it then and that’s how I feel about it now. Obviously, the more you shoot a certain sports, the more you understand the specifics of what to look out for during the course of the match. Once you are comfortable with your shooting plan, you will be able to give yourself more time to experiment during the match. Less planning = inefficiency = can’t concentrate on the shoot = bad results. Since I’m feeling slightly altruistic, I’ve created a basic schedule of shooting football. Yes, this could be used in North America when shooting “soccer” as well as shooting “foot” in France.
1. The team sheet
That’s what we call it here in Europe, so check with your local American as to how you call it there. It’s the sheet that tells you who’s in and who’s out and usually given to you by the press officer about 30 minutes before the match. It will tell you A) who is starting 2) who is on the bench. For example, you are shooting Brazil v Germany and you have a specific player that you wanted to shoot that day (let’s say it’s Pele as it’s Pele) and he’s not in the starting 11. This is what goes in my head.
Is “Pele” in the starting line up?
Yes = You will shoot him during pre-game warm ups and during the match.
No = Is he on the bench?
Is “Pele” on the bench?
Yes = You will shoot him during pre-game warm ups in case he doesn’t play.
No = Is he in the stadium?
Is “Pele” in the stadium?
Yes = Shoot him in the stands before the match starts and you’re done with him for the day.
No = Goto plan B
You see what I did there? To expand on this, if Pele is on the bench, then I can go and shoot Germany 1st half and shoot Brazil the 2nd half. This way I can cover two teams trying to score rather than just one. Obviously it depends on what your assignment is but if you plan carefully, you will be able to maximise your shooting time at the match.
2. The pre-game warm ups
We all need to warm up and so do these multi-gillion athletes. This is also the perfect moment to get close up shots of them as you will not be able to get that close during the match. They usually start limbering 30 to 40 minutes before the start of the match. At this juncture, you will be able to shoot A) players entering the pitch and B) players warming up. If you put this into the context of my work flow, first I shoot the players coming through the tunnel and onto the pitch. Then I look at where the assistant coaches are setting up the cones for the drill. When they set up the cones, I make my way over there. If I want to get them coming back into the tunnel and back into the dressing room, I will look at my watch as well as what the players are doing at the moment. Then time myself accordingly. It’s important that you look at the time as you will be able to guess when they will be heading back. Always anticipate their next move. Don’t wait for them to make it.
3. The grand entrance
The music starts and the PA system is in full annoying swing. The players come out of the tunnel with those pesky children in tow. In my case, there are two things…
Hold on. Wait a second. Before you get too excited, check where you are standing or sitting. Are you on the correct side? You have to decide which team you want to shoot as in most cases you won’t be allowed or have the time to cross the river to the other side.
Now back to where we were. Two things. 1) getting the entire team, so to get the entire feel for the match. 2) getting just one player. It’s really up to you, but I try to stick to just one of the two.
二兎追うものは一兎をも得ず。
It’s Japanese proverb for “Dude who tries to catch two rabbits won’t catch one because he’s greedy like that. What a fool”.
So, you’ve just witnessed CR7 do his ritual hop and you’re all excited. Then the teams line up. Do what you must here. If this is a national team match, this is when you have the… national anthem. Sing along if you must, but you should be active in shooting the players humming, singing, kind of singing, closing their eyes, or picking their nose as the entire nation is cheering them on. Last but not least is the group photo. I don’t shoot them as they are lame and I frankly don’t understand the fascination behind this tradition. But if you need that shot, make sure you position yourself well because if you are short (like me) and stuck in the back, you will miss it.
4. The coin toss
Ah. I know you thought we were going straight to the match, huh? Well, you’re so wrong that Matt’s mother is crying whilst she reads this post. Before the match and 99% of the time, you can ask officials, fans, or a photographer who speaks English which direction the home team will attack in the 1st half. But 1% of the time (which always feel like it’s a lot more than 1%), they don’t go the way you want them to go. To counter this annoyance, some take their stool with them to the grand entrance so that they can go which other way after the coin has been tossed. Some have resigned themselves to fate and stay with their original position whilst some will be seen running from one end to another right after kickoff. This is entirely up to you, but you can cheat and secure two positions on both side of the pitch. Then no matter what happens with the coin toss, you have a good position to shoot from. But be mindful that some stadiums won’t let you move after kick off. Ah, it’s oh so complicated.
5. The match
I rather not go into the specific details of the shoot during the match as I will leave that to Matt or to me for some other time. If you have a specific team that you are shooting, it’s quite obvious what you should be shooting. One thing I like to do is to put myself in front of the away fans, IF the away team is attacking on that end. You will rarely see an away team celebrate in front of the home fan as that is suicidal in most professional sports arenas. But just make sure that you know what you came here to shoot. There could be a bit of a scheduling conflict here. For instance, it’s the 2nd half and Brazil is leading the match 1-0 against Germany. You are sitting on the German side. Now, is that a smart move if you are gunning for an emotional explosion after the goal? Maybe not. Because the match tying goal will not be celebrated as it’s only a match tying goal. My advice is to be flexible and always keep in mind the situation of the match. What is the context of the match? Where is this match being played? Who is the most important person in the match and why? And so forth. Always a good thing to read the paper or browse the web for pre-game intel as the context of the match will lead to better planning for your shoot.
6. The end
Winners and losers. In most instances, you cannot plan what will happen at the end. Therefore, once again, be flexible. But don’t be too flexible as indecision will be your death. If you want to shoot the manager right after the match, then stick to it. He might not react to the way you were hoping, but at least you were prepared. There are so many things that happen during the match and you will need to be very decisive. Remember, the Japanese proverb? No? Go read it again. Until you are comfortable with the flow of the game as well as your plan, make it as simple as possible. You will miss some shots, but hey, that’s life. Winners and losers.
7. The end continues
Some teams celebrate even if they won a measly league match. So keep yourself on all your toes and be alert. If you see some fat photographers rumbling towards another direction, keep an eye on them. Maybe they know something you don’t and they might tell you what to eat so that you can be just like them.
That was long, but that’s how much it takes for you to pre- plan a match. As I have said before, the more planned you are the better you are prepared and better results you will get. At times you have to be flexible and other times you have to be decisive. The more you understand the game that you are shooting, the better shots you will get.
So plan well, as the only surprise you want during the course of a match is a streaker running across the pitch.
Ryu
Podcast: Episode 8 Pt 2 – Training Ground & You Win
Because we ran long this month, We broke the podcast up into two parts. Part one can be found here.
As always, listen and download links here:
- Subscribe and listen via iTunes
- Get RSS feed
- Get MP3 (Click to listen or right click to save it to your computer)
Training Ground
With more listeners participating in our critique feature Training Ground, we supersize this segment with plenty of criticism for all. Even if you didn’t participate, you can still benefit by listening along and checking out the pictures.
October’s Training Ground is now open, post your images here for constructive or destructive critique.
You Win
Our September 2011 competition was “Dirt”.
The winner is Ettore from Ascoli Piceno Italy with “Service”.
Second place is by “Dust Flies” Mark Fletcher, and third place is 20100417_AC09177 by Carlina999.
The October themed competition is…NO THEME. Goto our BLFS flickr group page for competition rules.
Special thanks to…
Icon by Arvin Bautista
Audio Production/Editing: David Whittaker
Shooting in the Dark – A Crutch for High School Football
After “What gear should I get?” the question I am asked the most is “How can I get better pictures of high school football at night?” As I have mentioned before, my path started with high school sports exclusively. Budget-conscious school districts aren’t usually thinking about photographers when they buy field lighting, in fact sometime I wonder if they’re thinking about whether or not the players can even see the ball. It’s easy enough to set up remote speedlights or strobes for basketball, wrestling and other sports, but it’s just not possible to do it for football. So most people run up the ISO and shoot at borderline shutter speeds, and just deal with the resulting motion blur, color casts, and noise/grain even on the top-of-the-line bodies. I wasn’t happy with these tradeoffs because I was using high school football as a stepping stone, and I wanted pictures that I could sell to parents, but also could run at decent sizes in the local papers I was shooting for and go into my portfolio. There were times when I could pick the games I wanted to cover, and I would always choose the schools that played either at college fields or the best HS lighting. But sometimes assignments would take me to fields that were poorly lit, including one field lit with portable construction lights powered by diesel fuel. And if you’re a dad- or mom-tographer (a term I just learned from one of our readers!) you’re not going to have a choice where your kid plays.
I got pretty tired of having to do a bunch of color correction/noise reduction on tight deadlines – and still not being very happy with the results – so I started thinking about a solution. My first attempt was on-camera flash. But as anyone who has used even point & shoot cameras, red eye is a big problem when shooting people. Take a more powerful flash, couple it with a long lens, and red-eye happens on nearly every picture. The pictures from that first game needed just as much work as the non-flash pictures, removing red-eye substituted for the other adjustments. Before the next game I bought a Stroboframe flash bracket that wedding and event photographers to get the flash off axis from the lens. This didn’t work either, and I learned the hard way that the longer the lens, the further away the flash needs to be to get off-axis. And using 300mm and 400mm lenses means that a flash bracket is never going to be able to get the flash off-axis enough; the angle of difference just needs to be bigger to avoid red-eye.
Finally I figured out that attaching the flash to the monopod would increase the off-axis angle, and eliminate red-eye in most pictures, leaving the questions of how to attach the flash and how to fire it. I had some studio gear at the time and used a Photoflex Multi-Clamp bolted on to a Manfrotto Super Clamp clamped to the monopod. To get the flash to attach, I used the Stroboframe cold shoe as it is far better than the one that comes with the Multi-Clamp. This is a very solid set up that can take the bumps that come with running up and down the field.
Next I had to figure out how to best fire the flash and control exposure. The simplest (and most dependable) method is a cable that connects the camera to the flash. These vary based on the equipment that you have, but can be found easily and relatively cheaply. But I didn’t go with hardwiring for two reasons: 1) this setup is already a handful, and I didn’t want to risk getting tangled, and 2) I didn’t want to have to bend down to adjust the flash output. So for me, I settled on using a Nikon SU-800 to control/fire the flash from the hot shoe. With the SB-800 flash set to either remote or TTL, I was able use the SU-800 to control power either on TTL using exposure compensation or on straight manual depending on how far away the play was.
This worked to the point that I was getting properly exposed pictures with no noise and no need to correct for color temperature. The only drawbacks are frame rate (totally dependent on how fast the flash could recycle for any given power) and the somewhat odd shadows that come from having the flash below the lens.
A couple of closing points: I have found that shooting at your camera’s max sync speed (usually 1/200-1/250) is best. The flash will have to be powered high enough to freeze the action (2 stops over ambient is usually the rule of thumb.) Your ISO will obviously be much lower than without the flash, but high enough that it will let some ambient light into the exposure. From there, adjust your camera/flash settings to suit the conditions and the look that you prefer. When I was doing this, I was looking for as much ambient light as possible because I found having the background somewhat visible added depth and made the pictures look more natural than if the exposure consisted only of light from the flash. If you get to the field early, you can dial in the exposure during warm ups and be set for the game.
Some people have expressed disbelief that I was able to use flash at high school football games. I’m not going to get into a discussion about it because I don’t know the rules in every state and every league. I will say that no one ever stopped me from using this setup, and the people with whom I have shared this setup have not had any problems either. Most of the time, if you act as if you know what you are doing and have done it before, you will be left alone. A little discretion goes a long way, however. The first time you let a full power flash blind a receiver who’s trying to catch a pass, will be the end of strobing football at that school.
With a couple of months left in high school football season, hopefully this will help some of you get some good pictures. I’ll so another one of these for HS basketball if there is enough interest.
Podcast: Episode 8 pt 1- A Question of Ethics
Podcast: Episode 8 – A Question of Ethics
We ran extra long this month, so Episode 8 comes in two parts. In Part 1 we talk about shooting tennis and argue about cropping. In Part 2 (available Monday October 10th) we get dirty in the monthly competition, and dole out some harsh critiques. Listen and download links here:
- Subscribe and listen via iTunes
- Get RSS feed
- Get MP3 (Click to listen or right click to save it to your computer)
News – Our best and worst shoots this past month.
Ryu got sand in his 70-200 shooting beach soccer and had to fork over a bunch of Euros to Nikon. Matt lost autofocus on his 400mm, and had to hand over a bigger bunch of dollars to Nikon, but is very happy to be back shooting football.
We introduce… Matthew Stockman
Matt interviews Matthew Stockman, a Getty Images staff photographer. We talk about tennis, amateur sports, changing course in the middle of a shoot, and more.
Master class
Ryu and Matt learn that they are on opposite sides of the fence when it comes to cropping and Photoshop:
Matt = Cropping good, Photoshop bad.
Ryu =Cropping bad, Photoshop good.
Part 2 of this month’s podcast with The results of the September themed competition and our Training Ground critiques will be up on Monday Oct 10th. Apologies for the delay.
Special thanks to…
Icon by Arvin Bautista
Audio Production/Editing: David Whittaker
Inside Bag Porn
A typical conversation with my cousin who lives in America:
Me: Hey, I’m thinking about getting another bag.
My Cousin: Really, didn’t you get one recently?
Me: Yeah, but that was for the Ricoh GXR. I need another one just so I can carry my monopod.
My Cousin: What? You can get one for your monopod? Awesome. No problem, I’ll get it for you. Do you know there is a bag for stools? It’s awesome.
Me: Really? Throw that in for me and I will Paypal you. Make sure you mark it as “Gift” and make sure the value is “30 bucks”.
Not exactly, but close enough. My cousin does all the equipment trafficking for me and has been doing it for some time. Thus, I don’t want to reveal his identity as the feds are probably already after him. He’s a good man, I’m just a bad one. By the way, there is a bag for a monopod here.
Bags, we love them and we cannot have enough of them. We buy one like women buy their shoes, bags, and yet another black shirt. Honestly, I have no idea how many black shirts my wife owns, but apparently they are all different thus “it’s not the same”. Therefore when she asks me why I’m getting a new bag, I just tell her that “it’s not the same”. Eye for an eye, dumb argument for a dumber one. This week, I thought I take this rather contentious subject and give everyone a chance to show off their bags. It’s not camera porn, rather inside your bag porn. This also is dedicated to a poster in our BLFS flickr group who wanted to know which bag is the best for carrying lots of equipment. I have tried the rolling kind and the backpack kind and below are the pros and cons.
1. Rollers
There are lots of rollers from lots of different companies, but I and other sports photographers keep on going back to the one and only Think Tank rollers. Why? Because they are the best. Top quality construction, amazing life time warranty, and endless supplies of wheels. If you want a roller, you won’t be disappointed if you go with theirs. Although everyone says that their whimsical handles are quite sucky, I for one thinks they damper lots of undesirable vibrations to your arms. The bad thing about rollers is that A) You have to roll them and rolling things through narrow corridors, crowded trains, aisles of airplanes, and over unsuspecting civillians’ toes are not good for karma B) Vibrations are not good for your equipment. I’m sure you understand A) so let’s goto B). Apparently, there is a myth in the sports photography biz that rolling bags which cause undue vibrations can ruin and loosen stuff inside your expensive camera equipment. Some are such believers that they opt for the backpack option, even though all these equipment can easily weigh over 20kg. Anyway, some roller rangers you want to consider are:
Think Tank Rolling Camera Bags
By the way, I have purposefully not included any of those plastic water proof Pelican cases as they have the crappiest wheels and are not made for long distance rolling. If you are going to just go from here to there and not way over there, go for the pelican. Meaning, if you use your car more than your feet, you can go Pelican. If not, just stay with the list above and you won’t go wrong.
2. Backpacks
If you want to break your back, knees, and everything you’d want to keep using after you retire as a sports photographer, I won’t go with this option. As I have said earlier, some swear by their backpacks because they really believe that saving some loose screws will give them a hall pass to Valhalla albeit on bended spines. In any case, I don’t recommend it, but if you don’t carry anything too heavy, meaning if it’s less than 10kg, going backpack is a much better option than rolling. I’d list all the bags that are out there, but as long as they are not one of those messenger bags, you should be fine. You’ll look dumber, but your shoulders will send you a thank you card 10 years down the line.
Now that I put some logic into that tired brain of yours, here’s what’s inside my bag.
Bag: Think Tank Airport International
1. 400mm f2.8 AFS with Aquatech hood
2. Modded Radio Poppers
3. 2 x SB800
4. D3
5. D3
6. 16-35mm f4 VR or 100 f2.0 DC
7. 16mm fisheye
8. SU800
9. 24mm f3.5 PC-E
10. 70-200mm f2.8 VRII
13 MBP goes on top of all this stuff. Newsgear rain thing for rainy days and various cords, card readers, and spare batteries.
Here’s what Mr. Cohen carries around
Bag: Think Tank Airport Security
1: Nikon D3S
2: Nikon D3
3: Gitzo GM2942 Monopod (4 section/Basalt)
4: AF-S VR Zoom-NIKKOR 70-200mm f/2.8G IF-ED
5: Nikon AF-S Teleconverter TC-14E II
6: AF NIKKOR 85mm f/1.4D
7: AF-S NIKKOR 24-70mm f/2.8G ED
8: AF-S NIKKOR 14-24mm f/2.8G ED
9: Nikon HK-27 hood
10: AF-S Nikkor 400mm f/2.8D IF-ED II
Top front pouch: Think Tank Pixel Pocket Rocket card wallet with extra cards, Extra EN-EL4a battery for cameras
Bottom front pouch: Think Tank Skin belt system, Think Tank Hydrophobia rain covers
I’d like for you to show us all and leave nothing to the imagination. I’ve created a topic in the BLFS flickr group to show off your bits.
Inside Bag Porn – Flickr group
Don’t be afraid, we won’t judge. :)
Ryu
