Sports photography skills

Lead: Sports photography emphasizes authenticity, immediacy and accuracy. Although the work is a static and silent picture, it presents a tense and fierce competition atmosphere and a thrilling and beautiful moment. This paper will introduce some necessary skills for the success of sports photography.

What preparations do you need to make before shooting?

1, understand the game

In sports photography, the most important thing is to know the details of the game you shot. Because any moment in the game is fleeting.

In order to take powerful photos, you must be able to predict the behavior and manners of athletes. If you don't know the rules, you can't keep up with the rhythm of the game.

2. Need to find inspiration

The most important thing is to find inspiration before stealing the camera. Whether reading magazines, browsing online galleries or looking at the works of other photographers, it will be a very effective way. Of course, seeking inspiration does not mean copying other people's works. Simply put, looking at other works is to understand other people's creativity and ask yourself, why do you like his works? What parts do you think can be improved? How would you choose to shoot in such an environment?

Look at the work before shooting, clear your mind and make clear the effect you want to shoot.

Step 3 choose the right lens

Next time you watch the game in front of the TV, pay attention to the sideline, there are many photographers busy there. Although you may not be able to afford their cameras? Cannon? But you really need a suitable lens.

The first thing to consider is whether the game is played indoors/at night or outdoors/during the day. If it is the former, then there must be a lens with a maximum aperture of at least f/4. If it is the latter, then ordinary lenses can do it.

For most games, you need a lens of at least 200mm. You also need a 35mm or 50mm lens. However, if you only have a standard or wide-angle lens, you may spend most of your time waiting for the athletes to come to you.

4. How to set up your camera?

Indoor and outdoor sports have completely different lighting environments, so you need to judge the lighting conditions you will face first. Well-lit sports include tennis, baseball, track and field, football and so on. And sports with poor lighting include basketball, table tennis and volleyball.

5. Find the best shooting position

Angle determines the composition, and it is easier to capture key images in favorable shooting positions. For example, in this competition, a profile photo formed an interesting reflection.

Shooting is about to begin:

1, forecast

As mentioned above, you need the ability to predict the behavior of athletes, and predicting what will happen next is another equally important aspect. Always stare at the camera and pay attention to every move on the field.

When you realize that something is going to happen. Crazy? Press the shutter slowly. At this time, the continuous shooting mode of the camera is very advantageous.

When a scene is over, don't rush to play back the photos on the camera and continue to pay attention to the scene. Getting into the habit of looking at the camera right away will make you miss some rare opportunities.

2. Control the shutter speed

Almost all competitions are about speed. The athletes run fast, throw fast and hit fast. You need a high-speed shutter to freeze these moments. The ideal shutter speed is above 1/400s, but in dark environment, 1/250s is also acceptable.

In some cases, a slower shutter speed is more interesting. Try 1/30s or115, and then use the subsequent shooting technique. In any case, you should pay attention to the shutter you use. In a fast-paced game, choosing the wrong shutter will ruin your shooting plan.

3. Concentrate as much as possible.

In some competitions, you can know in advance where things will happen, but you don't know when. For example, in softball, cricket or volleyball, you know that the key moment will happen at home plate or online. All you need to do is pay attention to these positions in advance and wait.

If you know the exact shooting location, you must ambush in advance. You don't have to follow the athletes, just wait for them to enter your pre-focus range. Sometimes it is better to use manual focusing or autofocus locking.

? Focus mode

Accurate focusing is the basis of taking good photos. Most SLR cameras have three focusing modes (AF-A/AF-S/AF-C), and the AF-C continuous focusing mode is generally used for shooting motion. Of course, in some cases, lock the focus in advance? Trap type? Give your shot of the athlete a little early and let him automatically break into your focus? Trap? Focusing is also a multiplier.

4. Settings of shutter and aperture

No matter whether you are indoors or outdoors, you should at least ensure that your shutter speed is above 1/250 seconds (except special effects). Under the outdoor conditions with good lighting environment, using the ISO200 sensitivity of F8-F 1 1 aperture will bring you photos with ideal depth of field. If the shutter can be raised above 1/500s, it is often necessary to use F2.8-F4 aperture with high ISO value in indoor sports shooting to obtain higher shutter speed.

Step 5 write a composition

In sports photography, composition plays a direct and obvious role in dynamic performance. A good composition method can fully show the light and heavy relationship, primary and secondary relationship, perspective relationship and spatial proportion relationship of sports pictures, so as to better reflect the photographer's creative intention, show the fierce competition of sports pictures and show a strong dynamic effect. In sports photography, we often use the following composition methods:

? Changing composition

In variant composition, the main and disturbed objects are deliberately arranged at a certain angle or a certain side of the picture, and the proportion is slightly higher than that of other accompanying objects, thus resulting in the light and heavy contrast of the picture and the effect of picture circulation.

The changing composition can guide the reader's vision well, and the whole picture gives people space for thinking and imagination, space for further judgment, and is full of charm and interest. Usually this composition is used to express humorous moments in sports competitions.

? Compact composition

Compact composition method is to enlarge the close-up form of the main body of the scene to make it full of pictures, compact, delicate and microscopic. In sports photography, it can play a good role to use compact composition method to close up athletes, such as showing the scene of sweating after exercise.

? Centripetal component

Centripetal composition is a composition form in which the subject is in the center and the surrounding scenery is concentrated in the center, which can strongly lead people's eyes to the center of the subject and play a role in gathering. It has the distinct characteristics of highlighting the subject, but sometimes it will also produce the feeling of oppression and embarrassment. Using centripetal composition to shoot the explosion effect, both of them have the same characteristics, which can make the picture have strong visual impact and strong sense of movement. ? Elliptical composition

This composition method can make the picture form a strong sense of wholeness and produce visual effects such as rotation, movement and contraction. It is often used to express that it does not need special emphasis, but focuses on the picture content of the scene or the main body of the rendering atmosphere. In sports photography, using the oval composition method to shoot items with rotating characteristics such as pommel horse, or shooting special effects with explosive effect, can show the picture dynamics well.

? Eccentric composition

Usually, photographers like to arrange disturbed objects in the center of the picture. Although this can give the picture a stable structure, it often makes the picture lack of sense of movement and movement. Therefore, the photographer may wish to be flexible and make an eccentric layout of the subject, which can present a sense of movement to a certain extent. Moreover, the greater the eccentricity-in other words, the closer the position of the subject in the picture is to the boundary of the photo-the stronger the sense of movement that can be generated by composition.

? Diagonal composition

Diagonal composition is to arrange the subject on the diagonal, which can effectively use the length of the diagonal of the picture and make the companion have a direct relationship with the subject. Dynamic and lively, it is easy to produce the convergence trend of lines, attract people's attention and achieve the effect of highlighting the main body.

Another composition method derived from diagonal composition is called diagonal composition, which can not only effectively highlight the main body, but also show a strong dynamic effect. Because the progress and change of the movement of the moving body are represented by diagonal lines, the picture can be dynamic. Its dynamic degree is related to the diagonal angle. The angle is greater than 30? Yes, it means to move forward, and a bigger angle means to move forward bravely; If the angle is greater than 45? When, it means falling, not moving forward.

? Curve composition

Curved composition can make the scenery or lines on the screen in a curved state. Curve has the characteristics of extension and change, which can well show the gradual rhythm and unrestrained trend of the main movement, making people look rhythmic and have a sense of beauty and harmony. Therefore, curve composition is especially suitable for shooting artistic gymnastics and other projects with great artistic beauty.

? Vertical composition

Vertical composition is a top-down composition method, which is most suitable for top-down movement in sports photography. For example, diving, especially synchronized diving, vertical composition can show the moment when athletes enter the water at the same time, which can make the picture very beautiful.

? Cross composition

Cross-shaped composition is a composition that makes the changes of scenery, tone or color on the screen appear in an orthogonal cross shape. This composition can leave more space, so it can accommodate more backgrounds and foil bodies, so that the viewer's eyes can naturally focus on the cross. In sports photography, the cross-shaped composition is mostly suitable for shooting regular competitive events.

? Triangular composition

Triangle composition takes three visual centers as the main position of the scene, and sometimes the geometric composition of three points into a plane arranges the position of the scene to form a stable triangle. This triangle can be a regular triangle, an oblique triangle or an inverted triangle.

One of the biggest characteristics of regular triangle composition is to make the picture extremely stable and the whole tends to be balanced. However, prosaic is also one of the defects of regular triangle composition, which is not conducive to the dynamic performance of the picture in sports photography. Therefore, photographers use this composition method to shoot more formal and serious scenes such as receiving awards.

Inverted triangle composition has a bright and open feeling, which is very suitable for dynamic expression. But on its left and right sides, it is better to have some different changes to break the absolute balance between the two sides and avoid the rigidity of the picture.

Compared with the regular triangle composition, the oblique triangle composition fully shows a vivid and flexible trend, and the subject on the screen appears to be both reactive and unobstructed, with strong movement and directionality. Diagonal triangle composition is a common composition method in sports photography.

? Composition suggestions for some specific sports

There are thousands of different sports in this world, and I have only experienced a small part. For these sports, there are some regular shooting postures. Knowing these places can give you a good start.

Baseball: Stand next to home plate or third base, so you can only see second base. Choose home plate or third base according to the position of the sun to find the sunny position.

Basketball: Don't stand on the sidelines, stand on the left or right behind the blue box. If you use a telephoto lens, you can stand in the corner of your field of vision.

Football: If you have a lens over 400 mm, stand directly to the left or right of the goal line. Otherwise, you can stand by and watch. You can change your position occasionally according to the changes on the field. Also keep a light posture.

? Small, compact

Compact refers to composition or cutting. When shooting sports, enlarger lens should be taken, focusing on the sports itself. This also requires some practice. You need to keep up with the rhythm of the game and catch the whole audience at the same time.

Don't just look through the telephoto lens. You should open your eyes and observe the viewfinder and the surroundings at the same time. Quickly change the camera position when losing the target. You can also use tools in post-processing to achieve the purpose of compactness.

6. How to shoot track events

Track events are a part of competitive sports, and there are more track events than field events. Therefore, shooting should also focus on track events. Race against time? 、? Fight for the top? Describe a race. Track events are divided into sprint, middle and long distance running, long distance running, relay running and hurdle running. Different races have different shooting points.

? Sprint shooting

First, you should choose a good shooting spot to shoot the sprint. Because of the short schedule, such as 100 meter race, it will be completed in about ten seconds. So the choice of shooting position is very important. The whole sprint time depends on the athlete's starting effect, speed endurance and the sprint on the way. In addition, the shooting method can not be ignored. According to the creative intention of shooting, we should determine what kind of lens to use, what kind of method to use, whether to use fixed shooting or chase shooting.

For example, shooting 100 meter sprint is generally based on three characteristics. Shooting positions must be played without affecting or interfering with the athletes' competition. First of all, avoid eight lanes, and secondly avoid blocking the sight of referees and timekeepers. The location selection of the 100-meter race can be divided into three areas, namely, the starting area, the midway area and the finishing area.

Starting area: From the moment the athlete steps on the running aid, it gives people a feeling of intense tension. When shooting the starting shot, it is usually taken from the front, and the angle will be high or low. If you want to include every player, the lens should be shorter. If you shoot a key player, you should change to a medium focus lens or a telephoto lens, and the depth of field is based on the aperture. Grasp the timing of pressing the shutter. After the starting gun is fired, the athlete's hind legs suddenly jump forward, and when the front legs are straight, the picture can give people the feeling of an arrow leaving the string. This moment is short and needs to be cherished. There is only one chance.

When shooting the starting action, the shutter speed can generally be 1/250 s due to the athlete's low speed. Of course, if the shooting distance is relatively close, the shutter speed should be relatively increased.

Midway area: After the athletes start, they sprint for 20 meters, and then turn to running on the way. The speed on the way is relatively fast, especially the photos taken at the position of about 70 meters can best reflect the characteristics of this sport, because the athletes who run 100 meters compete on different tracks and are in a straight line. In this position, the athlete's technical characteristics are obvious attack, the largest movement range, fast frequency, fierce kicking and high legs, which can fully show the swing arm and coordinate the force of the upper and lower limbs. The photos taken can give people a rough, stretched and masculine aesthetic feeling.

When shooting, the shutter speed of 1/500s is generally appropriate. Of course, choosing a slow door speed below 1/60 is also a good way to show the competitive dynamics.

Terminal area: the terminal area is aimed at by many photographers, because the sprint stage of sprint is the most exciting moment of track and field sports. In recent years, many track and field competitions have set up special photography platforms for photographers at the finish line. This platform is about 30 meters from the finish line. The platform was crowded with photographers, and a door was set in front of each reporter? Cannon? It is not so much a track and field competition as a contest for photographers.

After the sprint, athletes can see their expressions and movements in various ways. Many photographers have taken many good photos here. Many people often ignore the initial effect of shooting 100 meter run. After the athlete rushed to the line, he pressed the shutter and moved the camera elsewhere. Therefore, opportunities are often missed. Good shooting comes from outside the game, that is to say, keep the strings in your mind tight at all times and don't give up any chance of shooting competition easily. Shooting in the 200-meter and 400-meter runs is similar to that in the 100-meter run, but the rhythm of the athletes has changed. In order to be different from the 100-meter race, it is generally best to shoot in the corner.

? Middle and long distance shooting

Shooting middle and long distance running, the shooting point is generally chosen in the corner. In this way, because of the angle, although the athletes follow closely, they will not overlap. After a few laps, the distance between athletes gradually widened, naturally forming several teams or groups, and the battle of wits and courage became more intense. This is the best time to take pictures. Another good time to shoot is about 200 meters after the start, when the athletes run in a cylindrical shape and can shoot at a high angle. For many athletes' cross-country long-distance running, it is also very spectacular to shoot the big scene of starting with a telephoto lens.

In addition, before the competition, we should also know the situation of the contestants and aim the camera at the excellent athletes. Shooting middle and long distance races is much more opportunities than shooting sprints, and the speed is much slower than sprints, which provides photographers with more shooting opportunities.

? Relay shooting

For relay photographers, the lens plane can be aimed at the moment when the relay is completed at high running speed. When the relay and the receiver enter the 20-meter relay area and run nearly the same distance, the baton will be started at a distance of about one meter. This is the best time to press the shutter. The shooting position can be selected from10m to15m. When shooting, it is best to choose outside the runway and take pictures from the side close to the audience to the direction of the venue.

You can choose any shooting method. If you are sure, it should be the best choice to follow the shooting method. The moment of grabbing the baton is the characteristic of shooting relay running. It is necessary to know whether the athlete grasps the stick with his left hand or his right hand. The left hand is on the left and the right hand is on the right.