During fall quarter I did a shoot with two of the UCI Baseball team players, Danny Bibona and Jeff Cusick. The article was about Ants vs Eaters baseball series, which is a inter-squad series of games to get them started for the season. The photo turned out pretty good and the photo editor and the sports editor wanted to save it for a later issue so that they could print it bigger and in color.

Long story short, it finally got printed in winter quarter but ended up not getting printed bigger or in color.

Below, assistants Marlon Castillo and Pratik Panda stand in for a test shot.

Nikon D3, 105mm, 100iso, f/18, 1/250, manual

Nikon D3, 105mm, 100iso, f/18, 1/250, manual

When I got the call for this photo I knew I wanted to shoot it on a backdrop. I don’t really get to shoot much stuff on a backdrop and wanted to get the studio feel for a change. I realized that I didn’t have any backdrop paper and that I would need to go out and get some before the shoot. I decided to buy a blue one and figured it would be good since its one of our school colors.

I made sure that he brought as much of his gear as possible for props, but also had him in a nice shirt and tie to show the scholarly and professional side of his personality. I originally wanted to have him wearing his uniform underneath his dress shirt but when we actually tried it the photos didn’t turn out as I expected. I had a back up plan and we tried a few different things during the rest of the shoot. These were the shots that I ended up submitting to the paper.

Nikon D3, 70-200mm @ 105mm, 125iso, f/8, 1/250, manual

Nikon D3, 70-200mm @ 98mm, 125iso, f/8, 1/250, manual

Thanks to Lee and Panda for helping assist on the shoot, and Ian for doing the interview.

Nikon D3, 70-200mm @ 34mm, 500iso, f/2.8, 1/180, manual

UCI Men’s Basketball guard Michael Hunter poses for a quick photo before warming up to play UC Riverside.

While he was gone I set up one softbox in the narrow hall where the locker rooms are. I didn’t have much room to work with and I wanted to keep it simple. I had two photographers, Lee and Rashmi, helping me setup. In the photo below, Rashmi stands in and tries out a few poses.

Nikon D3, 70-200mm @ 35mm, 500iso, f/2.8, 1/180, manual

About an hour before the game Michael came back to the Bren Events Center and everything was already set up. I already had the pose decided and all he had to do was stand in. I did the first shot with just his street clothes on.

Nikon D3, 70-200mm @ 34mm, 500iso, f/2.8, 1/180, manual

After a few shots, he went into the locker room and changed into his uniform. When he came back out we took a few more shots. This is the shot that ran in the paper, although I liked the previous one a little better.

Nikon D3, 70-200mm @ 35mm, 500iso, f/2.8, 1/180, manual

I was told to go to one of the social ecology buildings on campus where the coaches office is. It turned out that there was a nice plaza at the base of the building where I would have a lot of room to shoot. It was about 1:35pm so classes were in session, so the plaza was mine for about the next 30 min.

I quickly thought up how I wanted the photo to look. I wanted the coach to be in the middle, pretending to be running with the ball. Then I wanted the players to chasing her and trying to tackle or get the ball from her. When the players showed up I knew it would work. They were all huge guys and the coach was a much smaller woman.

I first did a shot with the coach by herself just incase the other photo didn’t end up working. I shot her with two softboxes on the side, an umbrella in the front and a speed light from behind for some rim light. Then I edited it as a composite to get all the equipment out of the photo.

Nikon D3, 14-24mm @ 20mm, 100iso, f/8, 1/250, manual

After I got that photo done I brought in the players and explained to them the parts that they would be playing. I really tried hard to connect with them and make it an easy and fun experience with them. I did my best to get them involved and even had them growling and screaming to really get the right emotions on their faces.

Nikon D3, 14-24mm @ 20mm, 100iso, f/8, 1/250, manual

UCI Men’s Basketball players pose for a portrait for the New University: (From left) Michael Hunter, Zack Atkinson, Patrick Rembert.

Last quarter I shot a feature photo of a few UCI Men’s basketball players. The photo editor and myself had an elaborate shoot planned out, we had gotten all our equipment together, we scouted locations, and I even had drawn up a story board for how the scene was going to be set up. Long story short, things fell apart last minute but we still need a shot. Its not always the most satisfying, but its important to have a backup. Something that you know you can do every time and that will still look good.

This last weekend I shot volleyball players from UCI, Argentina, Netherlands and Korea. I was trying to replicate this Power Rangers poster below:

I shot it in one of the gyms with all the lights out. It was big enough of a room so that the light would not spill out far enough to hit any walls. I knew that I would need a relatively soft light to light the main part of the players faces. For the main soft light I angled it so that the light would fall off on the face and fade to black. Then I used an additional light more to the left of the camera and set to a higher power, to give more of an outline on the edge of the face.

I shot each player individually and then merged the photos later in photoshop. One thing I did not intend to have was the shadow cast on the players faces from the nose. It was from the more powerful light that I used to outline the players from the side. Hopefully I can learn of a better angle to place that light in order to cut down on that specific shadow.

Below is a group shot that I took with one player from each team together. I needed to take a back-up photo just in case the other photos didn’t turn out as planned.

I had a lot of fun just messing with the lighting on this shoot. It was pretty simple but it showed fundamental ways to manipulate light.