Sport

The Kendo Studio Shoot

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I confess that I’m pretty much in love with all things Japanese. My garden is designed with a loose Japanese feel and I keep koi and bonsai. So it was inevitable that eventually I’d want to create a body of photographic work centred around an oriental aesthetic.

This Kendo shoot is the start of a project that I feel will last for many months as I try to create images that communicate how I feel about the look and feel of the orient. To me it’s mysterious and uber stylish and if there’s one sport that encapsulates that, it’s Kendo. Just to look at these guys sends a shiver up your spine and trust me, when you see them in full fight mode it really is something else. This is ritualised, highly controlled violence - but of course a Kendo aficionado would never say that!

Over the next few weeks you’ll be able to make your own mind up because we’ll release the video of our shoot with the Gaku Shi Juku Kendo Kai club in Leicestershire. But in the meantime here’s a few worked up images to give you an idea… it was an epic shoot!

Ice Hockey Project Underway

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I’m a Nottingham lad born and bred and as I grew up there were (for me) two major team sports to follow - football and ice hockey. I went the football route but several members of my family went down the ice hockey path and are now Nottingham Panthers season ticket holders. I’ve been to quite a few games and it really does make for a great night out.

I’ve photographed it twice too, both times in Coventry at Coventry Blaze games. I went there because they are more photographer friendly than Nottingham - but you are still shooting through the plexiglass. It’s ok, but there are so many more possibilities, so I contacted Nottingham’s National Ice Centre to see if they could point us in the direction of the local ice hockey club.

Our contact is Matt Bradbury, the Head Coach of the Nottingham Lions, the senior team of the Nottingham Ice Hockey Club. When we make these pitches timing is everything and we were really lucky this time because the NIHC have just commissioned a new website, so they are looking for images to populate it. Matt has pulled together a project team of managers across all the age groups right up to senior Lions level to facilitate the shoots.

The project will have two distinct outputs;

  • Standard photographs of players & matches for their website & social media

  • Iconic images, closer to art than reality

I’ve created a Pinterest Board for the iconic category - lots to go at there!

I think this will be a long running project and video will be a big part of it - which is great for Alex because he’s massively into ice hockey, although sadly for him it’s the wrong team since he’s a Sheffield Steelers fan :-(

Matt has his own sports coaching and consultancy business. He works with schools and community groups coaching Urban Hockey (street version of ice hockey), cricket and other sports, so we’ve said we’ll help him with that too.

I’m really excited about this one!

This image came from a Coventry Blaze game - I shot this through the plexiglass

The High Board Diving Shoot

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I did my fourth platform diving shoot at Ponds Forge, Sheffield, just before Christmas. This is probably the most technical shoot I do & involves me triggering 4 remote flashes from 70m away in the stands. You can watch the behind the scenes video at the bottom of this article.

I shoot at 1/2500s to freeze the water droplets so I need to use High Speed Sync for the flashes. As you probably know, when you are shooting with a DSLR camera most flashes limit your shutter speed to 1/250s, otherwise you’ll literally see the shutter curtain coming down on the finished shot - it appears as a horizontal black line across the image. That’s because the flash is not firing for longer than 1/250s, so part of the image is lit & part not. Not every flash can fire faster than 1/250s but fortunately for me my Elinchrom & Rotolight Neos do.

I also used some constant LED lighting this time & it was a good job I did. I’d neglected to take account of the fact that my previous shoots had all been done in daytime, so I had ambient light flooding through the roof to help me. This shoot on a December evening didn’t have that luxury & boy did it make a difference. I was shocked at just how much extra benefit the daylight brought - lesson learned!

Anyway, all went well. Massive thanks to Alex & Tom for the video, Marlies for organising the divers on the platform and of course to Nikki Smith and the girls, boys and parents of Sheffield Diving Club, without whom none of this would be possible.

The Fencing Shoots

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I think fencers create fantastic shapes when they execute their moves, almost like ballet dancers. Their tight fitting white outfits give them a sleek outline and their opaque face masks stop you seeing their faces and consequently any expressions. They seem almost alien to me, devoid of emotion, executing moves with a weapon so far removed from modern life.

They fascinate me and it's a subject I've wanted to photograph for years. These shoots with the Sheffield Buccaneers & the Nottingham Cavaliers were designed to capture some of the iconic poses I've admired for so long.

A few images below & the shoot video.

Fencers

Members of the Sheffield Buccaneers