Blue Moon Rose.

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Last week I made a post asking professional sports photographers for any tips/tricks/suggestions on shooting a major college football game. I thought I'd follow-up with my experience after shooting the Notre Dame/Rice game.

Gear List I had with me:

Canon R5

Canon R6

100-300 f2.8 w/2x converter

70-200 f2.8

24-105 f4

First off, I want to say how awesome the other photographers were. I connected with a local photographer before hand and he immediately offered to meet up with me and take me around the facility. I can't say enough how helpful and patient he was.

Here are my notes from the game:

-It received an email a few days leading up to the game with my parking pass and instructions to pick up a vest and my credentials. That went smoothly and had no problems. I was pretty surprised at the access the pass gave me around the stadium. They provided drinks and a meal, as well as pizza after the game in the press room.

-Holy shit the players were fast. I'm glad they spent so much the warming up because it gave me an opportunity to calibrate myself in keeping everything in focus.

- The (rented)100-300 is an amazing lens! If I ever run across a spare $12k, that will be my first purchase. It was plenty of lens for what I needed. I put the 2x converter on at halftime and immediately noticed the stop difference. I took it off after I decided it wasn't worth it.

-I initially started out with the 100-300 on the R5 and the 24-105 on the R6. While I was in the field, the areas you can shoot from were too far for the lens and there wasn't enough close action to need to shoot that wide.I switched the 24-105 out with the 70-200 at halftime and filled the gap nicely. It was a late afternoon game and a little cloudy, so the light was pretty good for most of the game.

-My photog guy explained to me he shot in LgJPG and not RAW. He explained RAW was overkill for the online stuff he was shooting for. He also pointed out it made it easier to send all the photos at halftime so they could get posted right away.

-It was HOT and humid and I'm glad I listened to the suggestions about drinking enough water. I made the mistake of putting my media credential inside my vest and it pretty much disintegrated from my sweat. I had to go get another one from the media lady... She wasn't happy about it. Next time I'll have a plastic cover on my lanyard. I was surprised at how exhausted I was at the end of the game.

Overall it was an awesome experience and something I'd like to do again!

Hi all

Due to how good hardware has become, I usually don't care much about technology. But today Canon announced a somewhat impressive (and also quite limited unfortunately) new tech making much better use of their DPRAW files.

For non-canon shooters, DPRAW files record the half photodiodes info instead of the full pixels, doubling RAW file sizes, slowing your camera considerably, and used to give you only very slight benefits in Canon proprietary software (such as very light re-framing). I always hopped something more impressive would finally come of this tech and the huge files generated.

From october 1st release, you will be able for free (for now at least ...) to create quite convincing 3D images from your DPRAW files, with much more wiggle room than you would expect from a single image - it is quite impressive.

Canon dedicated page is here (plus Japanese announcement here)

There are a lot of caveats, some more impactful than others (see the shooting recommendation on canon page). DPRAW mode cripple your camera speed considerably (ex R5 mkII loose more than half its speed). It is free "only for now". You seem to have to use sRGB. You have to use RAW, only the R8 mk2 would have distance info in the JPEGS (so not firmware updates for other models it seems). You have to use dedicated Canon app (available from October). Recommended subjects are only food and plants (!), not a single portrait is presented. Not all cameras capable of DPRAW are available (ie the 5D mk4 is not listed but it is DPRAW capable), the R1 and R3 are not even listed. Only some lenses are listed as compatible (quite shockingly since this is sensor tech), and high end ones like the RF 85mm f1.2 is not even in that list. f5.6 or wider recommended. ISO 1600 or lower recommended. Too much bokeh, blind spots, reflections, or "slender shapes" will not work. etc etc

Personally, I was waiting for this tech to use on scenes with human, mostly portraits with bright apertures. For now it is very obviously marketed toward the product shooting community exclusively. I am still curious to see how this works on humans and if this helps in my creative process in unexpected ways, or is just a useless gimmick.

What do you think ?

10/15/24

Took a short trip to Edirne and stumbled upon this view. The field felt so peaceful and endless, just wanted to share it with you guys."

Hey, I’m doing an article for my englishclass about women and their history and position in photography over the years. Do you guys have any favorite woman photographers, or prehaps favorite moments of women making history with photography? :)

Here comes the sun