Lighting pages from 39 4 su06 cjet

lo ok i n or st at h av ead ow in aila of to do bl o u or e l n-c se ar igh am fix en t er ed a to a ph im fla str ot pr sh obe os o s . ve

A

I n d o o r L i g h t i n g

The Light Show

Sports facilities

Keep the light out of their eyes

For Example

Back off

North Carolina State University guard Julius Hodge battles University of Massachusetts center Micah Brand.

Hodge was the University’s third leading scorer with 2,040 career points and was drafted in the first round of the 2005 NBA draft by the Denver Nuggets.

Photograph by Roger Winstead

• Communication: Journalism Education Today

Summer 2006

Summer 2006

Communication: Journalism Education Today •

• Communication: Journalism Education Today

Summer 2006

For Example

Stretch

Flathead High School’s (Kalispell, Mont.) Mack Andrews (21) and Jason Russell (34) go up for a rebound against Missoula Sentinel’s Jacob Jobe during a competitive game on Feb. 16, 2006.

Photograph by Craig Moore/Daily Inter Lake

Summer 2006

Communication: Journalism Education Today •

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For Example

Over the top

Lauren Goehring and Cari Jensen position themselves to block a spike from a Missouri player in the second game of the matchup. Kansas State won the match, three games to two.

Photograph by Kelly Glasscock

Summer 2006

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“

Improving the light

Sports Illustrated was really the first publication to

For many schools, light is a scarce resource in athletic arenas. Using mounted strobes may be part of the solution.

By Bradley Wilson

F

or Tim Morley and the students at Inland Lakes High School, the problem was not bad photography. They had decent equipment and photographers who knew how to shoot superior action shots.

Their problem was bad light. Quite simply, in their gym like most high-school gyms, available light photos lacked punch. There was barely enough light to shoot fast-enough shutter speeds to stop the action. And what light was there was of poor quality so it was difficult to obtain a true white regardless of what white balance the photographers used. Pop-up flashes on the camera and on-camera flash generated harsh shadows and looked unnatural.

To correct the problem, the Indian River, Mich., staff started looking around and researching how professional photographers obtained the high-quality action shots

they were accustomed to seeing in magazines such as Sports Illustrated. The staff discovered that professionals did not depend on available light except in the newest and biggest professional and college arenas. Instead, professionals mounted lights around the arena to provide enough of the right kind of light to stop the action without distracting the players or looking unnatural.

Patrick Murphy-Racey, a freelance photographer in Powell, Tenn., pointed out, however, that lighting indoor arenas is nothing new.

“Arena strobes have been around for a long time. Sports Illustrated was really the first publication to start lighting arenas and fights back in the 1950s,” he said. “Back then, faster color films were of poor quality. When SI started up, the editors wanted to completely blow away all other publications in terms of their reproduction of indoor sport-

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Mounted strobes can prove valuable for a wide variety of sports, from basketball to hockey. Photograph courtesy Carolina Hurricanes

ing events. By using extremely powerful lights and by shooting slow slide film such as Kodachrome 64, SI pretty much cornered the market on the best looking sports action pictures for years.”

Morely and his staff also found mounted lights were not cost prohibitive. They looked into remote controls for the units and low-cost strobes such as those made

by Alien Bees or White Lightning along with stands so the units didn’t have to be permanently mounted.

Rather than using strobes on stands, most professional arenas now have high-pow-

ered flash units mounted in catwalks to allow more natural lighting, particularly at basketball and hockey games. National Basketball Association arenas have started charging photographers to use the lights mounted at the stadium. However, the highpowered lights are not preinstalled at smaller arenas or at scholastic venues.

“Some freelancers, like myself, have purchased lights to be able to take assignments from editors wanting ‘strobed’ event coverage,” Murphy-Racey said.

He also cautioned that safety must be a top conSummer 2006

”.

o start lighting arenas and fights back in the 1950s

– Patrick Murphy-Racey

Wes Stele wraps his arms around a steer’s horns as he jumps off his horse in the steer wrestling competition at the Kansas State University Rodeo.

Photograph by Kelly Glasscock

cern if the strobes are to be mounted in the rafters or on catwalks above a gym.

“Catwalks are very dangerous. If you are careless, you will put yourself and others at great risk of injury or even death,” Murphy-Racey said.

“People want to run out and buy gear and place it on the catwalks and start shooting on strobes. It is dangerous and requires very specific equipment to fall within the National Collegiate Athletic Association and pro organizations’ (NBA, NHL) rules for flash duration and power.”

Recognizing the complications, Morley and his students decided to maintain portability by choosing to keep the strobes mounted on movable stands placed well away from the court.

Of course, improvements do not stop with lighting the arena. Now more professional photographers are mounting Summer 2006

cameras triggered by remote control to get unique vantage points.

A Detroit Free Press article about photographer Julian H. Gonzalez, “the paper’s guru of remotes,” summarized his working methods: “Those (really cool action shots from

anything else, did not work correctly the first time when they put up their lights in the gym to photograph basketball and volleyball. They had to experiment with the direction in which the lights pointed by trying direct and bounced lighting. They also

Strobes are much less distracting than on-camera flash and are so common, it is hard for administrators to say “no.” sports) don’t just happen.

They are the result of the hard work of many photographers with even more cameras, including some they don’t even hold. Remote cameras let photographers be in five places at once and in places they could not be themselves, such as behind the backboard or in the goal net.”

Morley’s students found that their innovations, like

had to experiment with the settings on the flash heads, full-power vs. half-power, and the accompanying problems of flash recycle time.

Most of all, they had to experiment with where to place the stands so that people would not trip over them and so that the flashes would not bother the players or the audience.

In Michigan, as in most

other states, the ability to use flash is left up to the building administrator, not the coaches or the referees. Strobes are much less distracting than on-camera flash and are so common at professional and college-level sports that it is hard for administrators to say “no” when the equipment is placed and powered properly.

As a bonus, Morley and his students found that the lights could be used for more than photographing action at a game. They started using the lights in their own temporary studio to shoot portraits for the yearbook and at other events in the school’s athletic facilities.

In short, the $1,500 initial investment more than paid for itself in quality images and in higher-quality publications in its first year. Now they use their decent light to obtain even better photos. n

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Get started The photographers at Inland Lakes High School (Mich.) started with good cameras and with the ability to shoot high-quality, fast-action shots. What they lacked was good light in their gym.

Alien Bees’ Intergalactic Bee package retails for $1,548.28. It contains three light units, umbrellas, stands and a power unit.

Sample prices White Lightning Location Package kit includes 2 X1600 flash units 1 X800 flash unit 2 13-foot stands 1 backlight stand 1 background reflector 2 48-inch shoot-through umbrellas 1 48-inch light stand carry bag 1 location case $1764.66 http://www.white-lightning.com

Early tries Early experiments with the mounted strobes provided better stopped action and fewer problems with color balance although the light seemed a bit harsh.

Alien Bees DigiBee package includes 2 B400 flash units 2 CB1 single light carrying bags 2 10-foot general purpose light stands 1 48-inch transluncent shoot-through umbrella 1 48-inch silver/white reverse-bounce umbrella $599.03 http://www.alienbees.com

Neither package comes with batteries or remote control devices. Such items are available separately.

Bounce light Light bounced off umbrellas instead of shining directly on the players seems much less harsh and more natural. It’s still daylight balanced and more powerful than the available light allowing the use of faster shutter speeds to stop the action.

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