Australian Open - Round Three Day One - Practice Court Shots of Sharapova, Williams, Tomic, etc

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Australian Open - Round Three Day One - Practice Court Sh...

anakha
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p.1 #1 · Australian Open - Round Three Day One - Practice Court Shots of Sharapova, Williams, Tomic, etc

Following on from my previous thread, below are some photos I took at the practice courts of the Australian Open. These offer the general public a much better opportunity to shoot close-up with high-ranked players than Centre Court matches.

I stood for two hours in the sun waiting for Roger Federer to show up for his scheduled practice. His practice partner (a sacrificial lamb of a local youth player) waited on the court, Federer's head of personal security was standing on the court with two other bodyguards, about 500 people were sitting in small grandstands around the practice court waiting.I was on the sidelines with a lovely vantage spot - and then at the call comes through to his security team that Roger has decided to practice indoors :-(

I was able to get a few shots of Venus Williams, Maria Sharapova and Bernard Tomic, but didn't have great spots from which to take those photos. I managed to get a nice front-row seat behind the baseline for the Flipkens third-round match. The next night, Tomic was thrashed by Federer.

I also didn't have the rented 200mm lens that day that I used during my previous outing to the Australian Open - just my 85mm Sigma F1.4. As I was only there for a few hours, I didn't think it was worthwhile to pay the rental fee again.

These shots are cropped and I experimented in de-saturating the blue backgrounds on a few shots (based on feedback received in the earlier thread). The photos that I de-saturated completely of blue appear to have some slight colouring around the edges of the players and balls - I would probably leave a bit more blue in to reduce that effect prior to printing.

Please let me know what you think.

Anakha

2013 © anakha

#1 - Maria Sharapova practicing
Canon EOS 5D Mark III 85 mm f/1.4 1/4000 sec 100 ISO 0.0 EV

2013 © anakha

#2 - Venus Williams practicing
Canon EOS 5D Mark III 85 mm f/1.4 1/4000 sec 100 ISO 0.0 EV

2013 © anakha

#3 - Bernard Tomic practicing
Canon EOS 5D Mark III 85 mm f/1.4 1/4000 sec 100 ISO 0.0 EV

2013 © anakha

#4 - Bernard Tomic Practicing
Canon EOS 5D Mark III 85 mm f/1.4 1/4000 sec 100 ISO 0.0 EV

2013 © anakha

#5 - Flipkens
Canon EOS 5D Mark III 85 mm f/2.8 1/4000 sec 400 ISO 0.0 EV

Jan 24, 2013 at 05:30 AM

CW100
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p.1 #2 · Australian Open - Round Three Day One - Practice Court Shots of Sharapova, Williams, Tomic, etc

would like to see more of Sherapova !

Jan 24, 2013 at 08:03 PM

Go4Long
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p.1 #3 · Australian Open - Round Three Day One - Practice Court Shots of Sharapova, Williams, Tomic, etc

Venus Williams looks like she just rolled out of bed and is hitting against a wall, same thing in #3.

#1 is good. I'm on an uncalibrated display, so I can't comment on the fringing you're talking about. you can see she's trying which makes it more interesting.

I've never shot tennis though, so take that with a grain of salt.

And agreed, more Sherapova.

Jan 27, 2013 at 06:37 PM

anakha
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p.1 #4 · Australian Open - Round Three Day One - Practice Court Shots of Sharapova, Williams, Tomic, etc

Seeing as two of you requested more of Maria Sharapova, here is another shot of her. I had to shoot this one over the shoulder of a bystander, so forgive the touch of his shoulder / head on the left hand side.

I've also attached two shots of another tennis player who was practicing on the next court. I think her name was Kick, or something like that.

Anakha

Go4Long wrote:
Venus Williams looks like she just rolled out of bed and is hitting against a wall, same thing in #3.

#1 is good. I'm on an uncalibrated display, so I can't comment on the fringing you're talking about. you can see she's trying which makes it more interesting.

I've never shot tennis though, so take that with a grain of salt.

And agreed, more Sherapova.

2013 © anakha

Canon EOS 5D Mark III 85 mm f/1.4 1/8000 sec 100 ISO 0.0 EV

Jan 30, 2013 at 10:34 PM

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