cross country meet

I started taking sports photographs in high school and never stoppped. I've shot NFL games and college games along the way, but I still like taking pictures at high school events. The access is great. Most of the time I can shoot from whereever I want.

I even like taking pictures at cross country meets, which some photographers find boring. After all, it's just runners running. But you can be very creative at the meets by using different backgrounds, different parts of the course, different lenses and different shutter speeds.

The New York state cross country championship meet was held in Warwick, which is about 30 minutes from my home in Middletown. I got to shoot 10 races, which gave me the opporunity to try things a few times until I got the photo I wanted.

I shot the start of three or four races before getting this photo.



First I tried shooting from ground level. Then I noticed a tall ladder by the finish line. I set my shutter speed to 1/40 and braced the camera on top of the ladder. I have my shot line up perfectly, and then a silver van stopped on the road behind the starter. That ruined the photo for me.

So I waited one more race and got the picture I wanted.

Another work in progress

We have lots of squirrels around our house in Middletown, N.Y. Every once in a while I see one jumping from our fence to the roof of our garage. My idea, as a photographer who loves to shoot sports, was to get a peak action shot of the animal in the air.

Unfortunately, as soon as the squirrel would see me, it would take flight before I could take the photograph. I even tried set up in the yard and then have one of my children go around the house and herd the squirrel in the right direction.

This photo is close, but not exactly what I was looking for. It's a cropped version of a horizontal photo.



The moral of this story: if you see something interesting but don't get the photo, just be patient. Wait for the moment to happen again.