More NCAA College Basketball

I’m sorry but this is the closest thing I have to March Madness, so if you want something more you might as well head on over to Sports Illustrated dot-com or ESPN dot-com. If a few shots of the Arizona State University Sun Devils Basketball game against USC will help with your March Madness fix than this is the place to be.

Image © Doug James, no use without written permission

Thankfully I have a few images of the “older” Sparky uniform before the change over to the “new and improved” Sparky that no one seems to like.

Image © Doug James, no use without written permission

At least they didn’t change the cheerleaders outfits.

Image © Doug James, no use without written permission

24 January 2013: Jordan Bachynski #13 of the Sun Devils dunks the ball during an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the University of Southern California Trojans at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Sun Devils beat the USC Trojans 98-93.

Image © Doug James, no use without written permission

24 January 2013: USC Trojans Byron Wesley #22 drives toward the basket during an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the University of Southern California Trojans at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Sun Devils beat the USC Trojans 98-93.

Image © Doug James, no use without written permission

24 January 2013: Dewayne Dedmon #14 of the USC Trojans during an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the University of Southern California Trojans at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Sun Devils beat the USC Trojans 98-93.

Image © Doug James, no use without written permission

24 January 2013: Jahii Carson #1 of the Sun Devils during an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the University of Southern California Trojans at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Sun Devils beat the USC Trojans 98-93.

Image © Doug James, no use without written permission

24 January 2013: Jahii Carson #1 of the Sun Devils during an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the University of Southern California Trojans at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Sun Devils beat the USC Trojans 98-93.

Image © Doug James, no use without written permission

24 January 2013: Carrick Felix #0 of the Sun Devils dunks the ball during an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the University of Southern California Trojans at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Sun Devils beat the USC Trojans 98-93.

Image © Doug James, no use without written permission

24 January 2013: USC Trojans Eric Wise #34 takes a shot while ASU Sun Devils Jordan Bachynski #13 defends during an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the University of Southern California Trojans at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Sun Devils beat the USC Trojans 98-93.

Image © Doug James, no use without written permission

One last farewell to the “good” Sparky.

2013 NCAA March Madness Basketball

It’s March and for many sports fans that means NCAA March Madness Basketball. Lots of people follow the annual college basketball brackets with fantasy sports leagues, office bracket pools, and television coverage all leading up to the final four!

Sadly, I don’t have any coverage from any of the tournaments, only a few shots from a game where the UCLA Bruins took on the Arizona State Sun Devils. I hope this satisfies your need for college basketball.

26 January 2013: UCLA Bruins Shabazz Muhammad #15 dunks the ball during an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the UCLA Bruins at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Sun Devils beat the Bruins 78-60.

26 January 2013: Sparky, the Arizona State Sun Devils mascot (foreground) and the UCLA Bruins stand for the National Anthem prior to the start of an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the UCLA Bruins at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Sun Devils beat the Bruins 78-60.

I know this game is from way, way back in late January, but it’s all I have, so you will have to make due. From the opening tip-off to the final buzzer, this was a great game.

You just had to know I’d get a few shots of the Sun Devils Spirit Squad.

26 January 2013: Arizona State Sun Devils Jordan Bachynski #13 dunks the ball during an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the UCLA Bruins at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Sun Devils beat the Bruins 78-60.

It looked to be a full house as the second half started.

You just gotta love the outside jumper in front of the opposing teams bench.

26 January 2013: UCLA Bruins Kyle Anderson #5 (center) during an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the UCLA Bruins at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Sun Devils beat the Bruins 78-60.

26 January 2013: Arizona State Carrick Feliz #0 and Jonathan Gilling #31 celebrate after winning an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the UCLA Bruins at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Sun Devils beat the Bruins 78-60.

PGA Golf — 2013 Waste Management Phoenix Open

I know golf is not hugely popular on my photo blog, but I thought maybe if I had some images of one of the most popular local players, Phil Mickelson and some brightly colored images I might get a few extra viewers. Here are a few shots from round 2 action, I hope you enjoy these.

February 01, 2013: Phil Mickelson on the 9th green during round 2 action of the Waste Management Phoenix Open at the TPC Stadium golf course in Scottsdale Arizona.

To see more from the 2013 Waste Management Phoenix Open, click the continue reading link below:

The Arizona State University Sun Devils Final 2012 Regular Season Home Game

Everyone seemed excited for the Arizona State University Sun Devils football final regular season home game on November 17, 2012. I was excited because it would be a day game and I would get to create images in the beautiful sunlight rather than the typical night game, high ISO of most of the ASU games I cover. This was the game when the Sun Devils would celebrate the graduating seniors on the team so a great many of the players had several family members either in the stands or on the sidelines.

You could almost feel the excitement in the air as the teams took the field, and for many of the players, the last time they would play in front of the home crowd.

17 November 2012: Arizona State Sun Devils QB Michael Eubank (18) drops back to pass during the Pac-12 conference match-up between the Washington State Cougars and the Arizona State Sun Devils at Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, Arizona.

To see more of the exciting Sun Devils action, click the “continue reading” link below:

With youth sports images, does quality make a difference?

Almost all of the modern digital SLR cameras available today will make reasonably good photos even in the worst of conditions, so does the quality of an image really a determining factor in your purchasing decisions?

With today’s digital cameras almost anyone can stand on the sidelines of a high school football game and come away with some reasonably good photos and for many high school football games there are several moms, dads or students on the sidelines with decent digital cameras. Many of the people taking pictures from the sidelines have no training in either photography or specifically capturing good sports images, but does that really make a difference?

These days it seems most of the photographers on the sidelines of a high school football game are either a parent of one of the players on the team or a student attending one of the schools so I’m going to have to assume that is their reason for being on the sidelines.

When I was in high school and just learning photography we would photograph our high school football games either for the yearbook or for the school newspaper, things were much more complex back then when we shot film. First not everyone had a camera and everybody shot everything in black and white film. The reasons we shot black and white film were three-fold, we could develop the film at the schools photo lab, printing color images in the yearbook or school newspaper was very expensive, and lastly we could “push” the film speed to deal with the poor lighting conditions on the fields. Those days are long gone, with easy access to low-cost highly capable digital cameras that don’t require any background or instruction in photography almost anyone can take pictures at a high school football game, and they do.

Shooting high school football at night can be very challenging due to the poor lighting conditions so the first thing most mildly experience photographers do is increase their ISO, and for the photographer that doesn’t understand things like ISO and shutter speed the camera will take care of most of those settings for you. One of the problems with shooting high, or very high ISO night football is the grainy images – back in the film days we would call images grainy, today we call them noisy – higher ISO images tend to be noisy and have a lot of deep shadows inside the helmets making it almost impossible to see the player’s face or eyes. One way to deal with the poor lighting conditions, deep shadows and lack of face/eye detail is to shoot with a flash, not the built-in flash that pops up on top of your camera, but a dedicated hot-shoe flash, sometimes referred to as a speed-lite or strobe.

Shooting flashed football with strobes or a speed-lite requires an entirely different skills set from shooting your typical ambient light night football game. The complexities of shooting flashed football are extensive and range from where you mount your flash to how you trigger it so let’s not go into the details of that and focus the discussion on the quality differences and if they are a determining factor in your purchasing decisions.

Some examples of the quality and “look” of flashed football.

With flashed football you can clearly see the player’s face and eyes, the colors are brighter and the grain or noise is very low.

To read the rest of the story click the continue reading button below.

PGA Championship Golf, wait . . . What? Really?

Yes, PGA Golf is a thing, and a big deal thing at that, well at least for some people.

Photographing professional golf is so much different from photographing something like football, it’s an entirely different skill set, but many of the same concepts apply. I like the challenge of photographing professional golf tournaments because of the rules involved with not firing your shutter before the player strikes the ball and dealing with challenging lighting conditions out on the course.

Golf is an exciting sport to a great many people, well at least that is what the Professional Golfers Association (PGA) would like us all to think. I don’t know a whole lot about golf but I enjoy the challenges of trying to make nice photographs during the tournament, so off I went.

02 November 2012: Jay Don Blake hits up onto the 18th green during the second round of the Charles Schwab Cup Championship on the Cochise Course at The Desert Mountain Club on November 2, 2012 in Scottsdale, Arizona.

To see more from the Charles Schwab Cup Championship PGA Golf, click the continue reading link below:

NCAA College Football — September 8, 2012 Illinois at Arizona State

I haven’t posted any college football this season and I’m not sure why, so I thought I would show you some stuff from a few of the games I covered. I’ll start this with the September 8th, 2012 game between Illinois and ASU.

When one of the coaching staff holds up a sign that says “Nasty” you know this is going to be fun to watch.

To see the rest of the game photos, click the continue reading link below.

Friday Night Lights — High School Varsity Football

Friday night high school football is a time-honored tradition that I can remember from way back when I was in high school. I love photographing football, and the challenges that come with making meaningful photographs at a high school football field.

I’m not going to post a ton of images, but I will link to the MaxPreps website gallery for this game in case you wanted to purchase prints, posters, t-shirts or any of the many options available from MaxPreps. You can find images from the Aug. 24, 2012 Marcos de Niza at Notre Dame Prep Varsity Football game on the MaxPreps site.

Here are a few of my favorite images from the game, and remember to contact me for custom graphic poster options, like the samples shown here.

To see the rest of the images and read the rest of this High School Football post, click on the continue reading link below.

Playing catch up with some NCAA College Basketball from December of 2011

I realized I had not posted any college basketball from this season and I’m sure some sports fans are missing college basketball with March Madness being finished and the Final Four all but a distant memory. It’s hard to pay attention to college basketball when the team you cover is consumed by player’s behaving badly, so much so that they are tossed off the team, the rest of the team not playing well and the fate of team being placed on the shoulders of a single player to carry the team to victory ever week. To top off all that the team plays a bunch of teams no one has heard of or, sadly cares about. What can you do?

17 December 2011: Durrell Norman (34) of the Lumberjacks tries to push inside against the ASU defense during an NCAA Basketball game between the Arizona State Sun Devils and the Northern Arizona University Lumberjacks at Wells Fargo Arena in Tempe AZ. The Lumberjacks beat the Sun Devils 69-68.

I loved this picture because I could hear the flesh hitting the solid defender’s chest and see the sweat fly off the player’s face as the two crashed together. Although cutting off the defender’s head kinda makes it a fail. Oh well, I never said I was that good of a photographer and I know I still have a lot to learn.

To see more of the hard-hitting action click the more link below.

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