Focus Locus
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 p.1 #9 · Gymnastics: Maryland vs UNC vs Bowling Green State | |
M-a-v...
Feedback in order of my memory as I type this, not necessarily in your picture order:
Really, Really, Great: (5) Your Shaposhnikova on bars... with the face, and caught midair with hands off, but still early enough to see the dust cloud off the low bar for a sense of movement, and much more importantly, to see the gymnast in an almost Pak Salto shape just before she breaks form to pike to reach for the high bar and drop her legs through. That's why, to capture this body shape, this move from this angle works better than an actual Pak from this angle. The Pak sucks from this angle because her eys are aiming toward the low bar, but the Shaposhnikova works great, because her eyes are aiming toward the high bar that she needs to grab next. You picked the right angle to shoot this, and you exposed and composed it well using the apparatus to frame the gymnast and tell the whole story. I'm jealous of this shot. Really great.
Great: (10) Your Gienger on bars, once again shot on the correct side to see the face. Just think, if you were on the the other side of the bars in flat profile, this would be nothing butt a back shot. So you know how to be at the right place at the right time. Since college gymnasts are specialists, you can predict she will do a Gienger every time she competes bars, so not only will you know to be on this side, but you can experiment with shifting your shooting position a bit more to the left toward the low bar next time she does it in order to get out of the flat profile, so she faces you more in mid release, and you pick up more of the apparatus in the left foreground of your frame. If shooting in an arena such as you were, then putting the suggested angle on this shot has the added benefit of throwing the background even further away from the athlete, as the bleachers in the radii of the elipse are further away (and less lit) than the bleachers at center court, so to speak. An angle also might diminish visual competition with the LED advertising panels one can't do much about.
Great: (11) Your double full on floor. What is it with you and you always being in the right place at the right time. Again, imagine if you were shooting from the crowd side of the floor when her tumbling double full twist was at full vertical, full straight, at full height such as you caught it? Nothing butt back. But you have her face. What is difficult to appreciate about this shot is that you nailed the focus DESPITE shooting into the crowd. That isn't so easy to do without doing some sort of trick, like zone focusing on the mat and locking out to manual (or releasing back button or whatever people do). Often times the mat isn't there. But whatever you did, you made it happen in a very challenging circumstance. Had you shot from the crowd side to avoid the clutter of heads, you wouldn't have this shot with the gymnasts face, as well as the contextual story of a bunch of people actually interested in the action taking place. Cool.
Great: (4) Front Aerial on beam. Really clear face, nice low angle, cleverly positioned the beam to block distracting heads from coaches and other gymnasts who were hanging around. Usually a lot of people on the competition floor in the shot aren't paying attention to the athlete you are shooting, so the presence of their heads looking this way and that is a distracting element that takes away focus from your subject. You solved that problem with your angle of attack. What is it with you and these great angle choices of yours? To freeze that foot in a fast whipping front aerial on beam, it takes at LEAST 1/800th. Some people like the motion blur, some don't.
Horrible: (7) Your other shots are so enviably great, it is a puzzle as to what you were thinking with #7. It pulls down, way down, what otherwise is a great set. No matter how "artistic looking" the port-de-bras in this image may appear, the fact remains that this event ain't some Twyla Tharp choreographed free form modern dance routine from a 1970's musical revival of Jesus Christ Superstar. And this athlete isnt a level 4 grade schooler stricken with acrophobia who is challenged to stay upright on a beam. This is collegiate level gymnastics. Most gymnasts I know, at ANY level, would be embarassed, if not outraged, to have what looks like a wobble on beam posted online, publically, for the world to see. It just isn't fair to that athlete. It is often said that to shoot a sport well, one should know the sport. In my opinion, #7 doesn't represent the sport very well at all. It would never run any of the gymnastics publications. I'd take it down right away. Can you tell how strongly I feel about that?  
Anyways, all the compliments above still stand. Remove that wart of #7, and this set will be stronger.
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