Friday, 27 January 2012

Tennis Photography - Thinking Outside the Box

Since I've been doing a lot more tennis photography (and badminton to be fair) I've been trying to find something slightly more 'inventive' for the photos. Getting away from the stereotypical action shots. These which I took at last years end of season Masters Tournament at the O2 arena in London, for example. (Click the photo to see it full size in my FlickR stream)

Tsonga @ O2


These are the sort of photographs that you see regularly, and it seems to be about finding the right angle and getting your timing right. I am loving capturing these shots, though. Tennis is such a fabulously athletic sport you can come away with some amazingly dynamic photographs.


I want to capture something different though.


So while a friend of mine was having a quick practice while I had some time to pull out my trusty Nikon D90, I had a play. 


My base settings which I started at didn't get changed much as I took more and more photographs. ISO 400 at f2.8. I started at 1/100th of a second and was playing around with the different angles and composition you can get on the tennis court.


The final photograph — which I was excited about as it confirmed to me that the idea I had is definitely possible and has potential  — was shot at ISO 400, f2.8 and 1/60th second but only with my 50mm lens. 


Movement


I definitely think there is potential to improve on this style of photograph. I'm going to get down to the courts again this coming week and try some more angles, and composition and also see how slow I can get the shutter speed to be and still keep some clarity in the important features (namely the face and tennis racket).


I'll also take my 80-300 Sigma lens to see how effective — if at all, with the high probability that the background will be all motion blurred anyway — a narrower depth of field will be to the photograph.


That's all for now, look out next week for a follow up post and if you have any comments or suggestions, please feel free to comment here and I'll get back to you.


See you anon.
Chris

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