Butterfly; Angel or Devil?

Tags

action sports photography, Butterfly, Butterfly Stroke, Competitve Swim, portraits, Swim

Check out these two high school athletes at a swim meet.  Both images were shot within 10 minutes of each other.  Two different emotions from the same subject!

When I shoot sports images, I never rapid fire shoot–hoping that I get a great image.  I observe and try to understand the motion, the light and timing to capture the height and drama of the action.  Not every image works.  But when the stars align-oh it’s a thing of beauty!

Which do you prefer?

Butterfly Stroke Intensity

Butterfly Swimmer

Both images were processed in Lightroom with some tweaking in Niks Viveza2.

Tri-Events Triathlon Series…30 Years of No Excuses!

Tags

5k, Action Portraits, action sports photography, Athlete, Bike run, Bonelli Park, Championship, Hammer Nutrition, Polar, Race, RD Photo Services, San Dimas, Swim, Triathlon, Trievents, TriExpress

As an action sports photographer I love shooting TriEvents’ Triathlons at Bonelli Park in San Dimas California! The enthusiasm is contagious..I am nurturing my passion of shooting while these athlete’s live their passion by competing!

Tri-Events is 30 years old!  The oldest triathlon in the country!  The setting is beautiful.  The lake is back dropped by the spring snow topped foothills.   The only problem is that there is only one me and too many shooting opportunities!

Transition from Swim to Bike

So What is a Triathlon?

Three races rolled into one event!  The Championship Race athlete’s swim 500m, bike 23.3k and finish up with a 5k run.  Not sure your up for the Championship Race?  Then the Express race is perfect for you starting with a 300m swim, 12k bike race completed with a 5k run.  Both races are at the same time with staggered starts.   Interested in competing?  The next race is May 12th and June 10th.  Find out more by visiting the Trievents website.  http://www.trievents.com

Prepping for the Swim

Race Layers

Ready Set Go!

Capturing the Swim Finish

Swim to Bike Transition

Swim to Bike Transition

Suzy representing POLAR and Hammer Nutrition finishing the race

The Finishing Kid Athlete's were inspiring!

Top Finishers Award Ceremony

POLAR and Hammer Nutrition Sponsor

Of course if you want more information about the races check out Trievents’ Facebook page (Like them while your there to get all the up to date race information!)

 

Portrait Project 365

Tags

Action Portraits, action sports photography, Adult League Soccer, Dog, girls water polo, guitar, Kids Portraits, Musician, Pet Portrait, Soccer, water polo

This gallery contains 5 photos.

Portrait Project 365 Images January 13-18th.  So busy I got behind posting these great portraits.  Even though my car has …

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Backroom Magic!

Tags

Action Portraits, action sports photography, Black and White Prints, claremont ca, Color Efex Pro, girls water polo, Lightroom, Nik Software, Photo, RDPhotoServices, Sepia Print, Silver Efex Pro

Clients also love their images in a variety of color treatments.  From the final image I utilized Lightroom (my own special formula to create the Sepia Tone) Nik’s Color Efex and Silver Efex Pro to create the Black and White image.

Which image do you prefer?

Backroom Magic!

Tags

Action Portraits, action sports photography, Claremont, claremont ca, girls water polo, https://www.facebook.com/RDPhotoServices, Lightroom, Photoshop, RD Photo Services, RDPhotoServices, Rdphotoservices.com, Technical stuff made easy

Yesterday’s Portrait Project 365 image of Lauren listening to her coach is a beautiful portrait of this athlete.   But there is a lot more than just shooting a well exposed, realistic image to getting a great portrait that clients can’t wait to display in their home.

I shot several images of Lauren (mostly hoping that she would look over towards me) but she is an intense athlete that can not be distracted from listening to her coach.  Take a look at the top image.  It is a “raw*” image unprocessed directly out of the camera.  Sort of flat but an ok image.  The image below is the final processed image with a little extra work done in Lightroom and Photoshop to remove the distracting athlete behind her.  Nik software ColorEfex was used to soften the tonal quality of her face.  I like using it on portraits to create a glistening dew like complexion.

The Technical stuff made easy to understand:

*  Many cameras (available on consumer/pro cameras) allow you to choose the format that the image saved as.  Although many people use JPGs I choose to mainly shoot raw.  JPGS is a convention of saving certain data (throwing away the data that is not in it’s logarithms) to create a pleasing image from averages (average exposure, white balance etc.)  Shooting “raw” allows the camera to save all the data collected by the sensor.  The image is not viewable/printable without being “processed.”  There are many applications to process raw data images.  I discovered Adobe’s Lightroom several years ago.  It is an affordable application (approx. $200).  It is really easy to learn to use and there are lots of online free tutorials available.  The glory is that although you should strive to nail the exposure and control the white balance (enabling control of reliable color representation) you can adjust the exposure by several exposures up or down and adjust the white balance.

Did you realize there was so much work to prepare the images?

Backroom Magic!

Tags

Action Portraits, action sports photography, Claremont, claremont ca, girls water polo, High School, https://www.facebook.com/RDPhotoServices, Portrait Project 365, RD Photo Services, RDPhotoServices, Rdphotoservices.com, Varsity, water polo

High School Varsity Water Polo Player Lauren M intently listens to coaches instructions.  Portrait Project 365

Check out more images on Facebook!  “Like” me to receive coupons and specials!

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Robin-A-Driscoll-Photography-Action-Sports-Senior-Portrait-Photography/258411135430

(Source: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Robin-A-Driscoll-Photography-Action-Sports-Senior-Portrait-Photography/258411135430)

Portrait Project 365

Tags

action sports photography, adult portraits, claremont ca, Kids, Kids Portraits, Lifestyle, Lifestyle Portraits, Portrait Project 365, portraits, Project REV 2012, RD Photo Services, RDPhotoServices

On January 1, 2012,  I started the Portrait Project 365! I am committed to shooting a great portrait everyday! I’ll be around town, visiting the park, walking the trail etc with my camera in hand! To thank my participants I am offering a free Facebook download of the portrait Project 365 image to my subject! My camera and I hope to see you around town! I’ll bring the camera…you just bring your smiling eyes!

(Source: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Robin-A-Driscoll-Photography-Action-Sports-Senior-Portrait-Photography/258411135430)