Buford’s Heddinger Throws No-Hitter
Buford Junior Josh Heddinger through a no-hitter against AA rival Greater Atlanta Christian School Friday. Heddinger was perfect until giving up a fifth-inning walk.
The game was called after five according to GHSA rules for margin of victory. Buford prevailed 12-0.
Coming Soon: 2008 Lanier Bowl
I’m excited to announce that I will be photographing the 2008 Lanier Bowl, the Championship games of the Forsyth County Youth Football Association. The event is occurring on Saturday, November 22 at North Forsyth High School in Cumming.
For three seasons I’ve photographed the cultural event that is high school football in the Southeast – so I’m excited to see the roots of it in an event that stretches from age 5 up through age 13. A total of 7 games will be played on Saturday morning, afternoon, and evening.
A full range of photographic prints, CD’s, and custom posters will be available through the website.
High Flying Volleyball
The most exciting element of volleyball is the play at and above the net. When photographing Saturday’s matches between Greater Atlanta Christian and Henry County, and later Marietta’s the Walker School, my goal was to get tight isolation on the play at the net.
Saturday’s matches were all at Holy Innocents Episcopal School in Dunwoody. The gym has average lighting when photographing from from floor level, but when shooting down on the participants you almost double your light. As the faces are looking up and facing the lights directly, you no longer have a shadow falling on the face. This lets you increase your shutter speed and get better stop action.
When shooting volleyball, I use a combination of lenses – usually the 70-200 and 300/2.8. I spend a lot of time following individual players and waiting for the rhythm of the game to bring the ball their way. When it does, I’ll shoot a two or three shot burst to get the full range of action and capture a great face waiting for the ball.
Change of Plans: Rainy Night at Lovett
Friday’s AA match-up of Greater Atlanta Christian at Atlanta’s Lovett School had a lot of dimensions. The two squads were both hoping to improve their chances of making the playoffs with a victory. With region 6-AA receiving four playoff slots, undefeated Buford is in the driver’s seats, trailed by Blessed Trinity (one loss), GAC (one loss in region play entering this week) and Lovett (two losses entering this week).
The weather proved to be a big part of the game, at least from my point of view. A rainy Friday hit Atlanta with more than an inch of rain, leaving the field very wet and with light rain still falling at game time. The rain was almost fog light and created some refractions when coupled with flash.
So plans changed: I decided to use Lovett’s lights (slightly better than average in quality) to light tonight’s game rather than my usual flash setup. I protected my primary body (with the 300/f2.8 mounted) with Lightware’s Rain Cover. It’s a basic cape of heavy duty water resistant nylon and does a good job of keeping things dry.
I swapped out my normal 70-200/2.8 on the second body for a 50mm/1.8 lens to give some additional light for a higher shutter speed with the natural light. The wider field of view helped on the Spartans first scoring run.
Friday Night Lights, Spring Edition
Soccer is as close to a full-school gathering for athletics as Greater Atlanta Christian comes in the spring. While it doesn’t reach the levels that football does in the fall, it is a well-followed sport.
Friday night GAC honored the Seniors on the Soccer team, and took the field against Decatur in a pair of matches. Both teams handled their opponent well.
One of the harder parts of shooting soccer is the game flow is far more open than many sports (Football for example). The game quickly changes ends across a large open field. It makes covering all aspects of the game difficult.
I’ll usually work a rotation around the field – working from one end to the other along the end lines and the sidelines. Sidelines offer a different view of the game – you can watch the players working up the field, passing as they go. It’s also where the goal keeper’s kicks tend to land so it’s prime land for a header or other in-flight kicks.
Even so, working at the end line with a long lens and a high resolution camera gives you the ability to tighten up midfield action greatly with cropping.
