Professional Practice Blog
Throughout this project I will be exploring various different sports photographers, mainly focusing on football. I will be doing this for numerous reasons, the main reasons are to allow me to gain more information about the world of sports photography and to prepare me for going into the working world of sports photography. For this, I will be looking at a range of different photographers and seeing what advice they give to sports photographers who are about to go into the world of photography and doing it as a profession.
My industry interaction was a quite informative aspect of my work as I had to give two different people some work for them to use in their publications. This work would go on to not be used in the publications and this taught me a lot about how volatile publications can be and how one day your work can go from being used to not be. This I felt is a vital learning experience in the world of photography as this is something that is likely to occur numerous times throughout my photography career. I am certain that in the future I will look back on this learning experience and be very grateful that I managed to go through this before I fully relied on my photography for money. Hopefully, now that I will be returning to Burton Albion my interactions with fellow industry practitioners will continue so that I can continue to gain valuable advice. I feel that having a constant interaction with fellow practitioners will be vital for the future as this will also help with future interactions with practitioners.
I would return to Burton Albion in mid-February this would prove to be one of my better shoots as I managed to capture a wide range of top quality images, this was a big relief as some of my recent shoots weren't over very good quality. I plan to continue to go to Burton Albion over the next few weeks to continue to grow my football portfolio. I will continue to go to football games as I will need to continue to grow my portfolio, I will also continue to gain images for my portfolio after the project is finished as this will be vital for my future in the photographic industry. My main reason for continuing my shoots at Burton Albion is to build up my portfolio I already have a wide range of images from various shoots at the games, but I do not have many images from their two seasons in the Championship, so my plan will be to continue shooting whilst they are in the Championship, and as this may not be too much longer I will aim to get to two or three of the remaining four home matches.
Industry Interaction
One of the more interesting practitioners that I met was called Eero Laurila. At the time I met him in 2015 Eero worked for a magazine in Finland who had come to Burton Albion to create an article about the club, but mainly focusing on the clubs then manager Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink. When we spoke before the match he was looking for someone to photograph the match as they had already collected enough images of the manager, I agreed to send him some photographs after the match. After the match was completed he forwarded them to his editor and would let me know if they were used. Unfortunately days after the match the manager left the club and the magazine ran a different article instead. I believe that this gave me some good experience in what can happen in the world of photography, showing me that these things can change in an instant. I feel that this will become a vital tool in the future when I have to deal with various publications, learning that the plans for these publications can change in a heartbeat. This would have also meant that my images would have been published into a magazine in Finland, which would have been brilliant for me as it would have got my work out there and it could have led to more work.
I would say that talking to both Geoff and Eero helped learn about how publications work and how at any time your work could go from being used to not being used. I feel that this interaction will become very useful in the future when I am trying to get my work into various different publications.I have over time at Burton Albion I have also spoken to a range of different photographers, this mainly occurred in my early days at the club and usually centered around them giving me tips about football photography and what is the best way to capture images and certain techniques they would use when they take photographs. I have also received business cards of several different photographers and I have spoken to them about photography, mainly with Eero Laurila.
My interactions with the club photographer John saw me send several images to him and then he would pass them on to the media department at the club which then if the club liked them they would use in the clubs programme. Over the year I have several instances of this occurring. After finding out when exactly I should send the images myself, I would sit down, edit several of my best images and pass them on to the club that way. As a result of this my main interactions with John about passing my images onto the club subsequently ending, but I do still have conversations from time to time about, not only improving my images but about his best images and some of the different photo shoots that he has done at all manner of different football clubs over the years.
My industry interaction was a quite informative aspect of my work as I had to give two different people some work for them to use in their publications. This work would go on to not be used in the publications and this taught me a lot about how volatile publications can be and how one day your work can go from being used to not be. This I felt is a vital learning experience in the world of photography as this is something that is likely to occur numerous times throughout my photography career. I am certain that in the future I will look back on this learning experience and be very grateful that I managed to go through this before I fully relied on my photography for money. Hopefully, now that I will be returning to Burton Albion my interactions with fellow industry practitioners will continue so that I can continue to gain valuable advice. I feel that having a constant interaction with fellow practitioners will be vital for the future as this will also help with future interactions with practitioners.
I would return to Burton Albion in mid-February this would prove to be one of my better shoots as I managed to capture a wide range of top quality images, this was a big relief as some of my recent shoots weren't over very good quality. I plan to continue to go to Burton Albion over the next few weeks to continue to grow my football portfolio. I will continue to go to football games as I will need to continue to grow my portfolio, I will also continue to gain images for my portfolio after the project is finished as this will be vital for my future in the photographic industry. My main reason for continuing my shoots at Burton Albion is to build up my portfolio I already have a wide range of images from various shoots at the games, but I do not have many images from their two seasons in the Championship, so my plan will be to continue shooting whilst they are in the Championship, and as this may not be too much longer I will aim to get to two or three of the remaining four home matches.
Industry Interaction
Throughout my years going to Burton Albion I have had numerous interactions with different practitioners. Over the years I have learnt a variety of different things from talking to all the different photographers, I have also gained a lot over very valuable pieces of advice from them that I have since used to help improve in my own photography.
One of the more interesting practitioners that I met was called Eero Laurila. At the time I met him in 2015 Eero worked for a magazine in Finland who had come to Burton Albion to create an article about the club, but mainly focusing on the clubs then manager Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink. When we spoke before the match he was looking for someone to photograph the match as they had already collected enough images of the manager, I agreed to send him some photographs after the match. After the match was completed he forwarded them to his editor and would let me know if they were used. Unfortunately days after the match the manager left the club and the magazine ran a different article instead. I believe that this gave me some good experience in what can happen in the world of photography, showing me that these things can change in an instant. I feel that this will become a vital tool in the future when I have to deal with various publications, learning that the plans for these publications can change in a heartbeat. This would have also meant that my images would have been published into a magazine in Finland, which would have been brilliant for me as it would have got my work out there and it could have led to more work.
I would say that talking to both Geoff and Eero helped learn about how publications work and how at any time your work could go from being used to not being used. I feel that this interaction will become very useful in the future when I am trying to get my work into various different publications.I have over time at Burton Albion I have also spoken to a range of different photographers, this mainly occurred in my early days at the club and usually centered around them giving me tips about football photography and what is the best way to capture images and certain techniques they would use when they take photographs. I have also received business cards of several different photographers and I have spoken to them about photography, mainly with Eero Laurila.
My interactions with the club photographer John saw me send several images to him and then he would pass them on to the media department at the club which then if the club liked them they would use in the clubs programme. Over the year I have several instances of this occurring. After finding out when exactly I should send the images myself, I would sit down, edit several of my best images and pass them on to the club that way. As a result of this my main interactions with John about passing my images onto the club subsequently ending, but I do still have conversations from time to time about, not only improving my images but about his best images and some of the different photo shoots that he has done at all manner of different football clubs over the years.
I also met a practitioner call Geoff Ford who when I met him in 2015 worked for the Staffordshire Guardian and we worked together on an article for the publication, he was writing one about Derby County and he was giving me advice about writing one about Burton Albion's season. We met at Burton Albion's championship ceremony as were taking photographs of the team celebrating winning the League Two trophy, so I was writing a short article for him about the teams title winning season. The main problem was at the time of year this was going on I had a lot of work to finish off for college and this other work took and back seat. When I finally managed to finish the article and had sent it to him with some photographs of the season attached to the article, it was a long time before I finally heard back from him. When I finally did he back from he told me that the article that he had done had been published seven weeks late but I never heard anything about what happened with the work that I had sent him I had just presumed that they decided that they did not want to publish it. I believe that this was the main reason as he said he had two articles printed, one about Burton Albion and nothing at all about Derby County which was what he had told me he was writing about. Not hearing anything about my work at all did annoy me, but I think it helped me to learn that your work isn't always going to get published. This learning experience is just an extension of the learning experience I would get from working with Eero Laurila later on in 2015.
Over the next few months and years, I continued my interactions with various industry practitioners. This mainly involved discussing various photographs that we had taken over the different matches we had gone to, these talks did not just focus on the games that I was attending at the time the conversation took place. I would also talk to various photographers who would in the early days give me advice when getting started and now after four years of photographing at Burton Albion, the photographers continue to give advice but instead of advice on getting good images, they advise me on how to take my images to the next level. The main advice I would be given is about nighttime photography. When I started going to the games it was winter so the second half of games would be at night, so I was advised by the club photographer John Potts to get as many images as I can in the first half. I was then advised by other photographers on the rough settings I would need to photograph the football in the dark and as shown by the image I believe that I did reasonably well.
Despite not long sending my photographs directly to John I often have conversations with him about football and photography as he continues to give me advice on my images. We continue to talk about how to get the best sort of images, how to take my photographs to the next level and how is the best way to promote them and get them more attention.
Burton Albion shoots
Prior to the game, I had no set plan of what I was going to capture, this would have been different had this been a team that I had photographed Burton playing against before. What I did was I would just try to capture what I would at a normal football game, which is to just try and capture a wide range of images showcasing the best moments of the match. I feel that I managed to capture this quite well, this came as a huge relief as a few of my more recent football shoots have not quite been up to scratch when compared to my earlier shoots. This was an enjoyable shoot as due to a red card for Nottingham Forest midway through the first half it saw Burton Albion do a lot of attacking in the second half which was towards the goal I was sat behind, this allowed me to capture a lot more images that I would have done had it been an 11 vs. 11 game.
This shoot was certainly valuable to my work as it allowed me to capture a lot of images to add to not only my portfolio but also to include in my book that I will be producing for my FMP. I would also say that this shoot was of decent quality and I am quite happy with the shoot overall. Despite the success of this photoshoot, I will still be returning to the club to do some more shoots as not only will I be needing them for my portfolio, I will also be needing them for my FMP. I feel that as I have a few images from last season that I will not need to go to a lot of games between now and the end of the season, but as I don't have a large collection of images from last season I will still need to go to two or three of the final four home games of the season. The team currently have nine games remaining but due to the hand-in date of the FMP, this rules out the final two games, one of which is a home game, for shoots for my FMP. This leaves seven games three of which are at home, due to travel issues I am unable to get to any of the away games. So from this, I only have three matches available to do shoots of, for my FMP so my plan will be to go to at least two of these. Even though there is a match at home after the hand-in date I am still planning to go to it so that I can continue to grow my portfolio.
Despite not long sending my photographs directly to John I often have conversations with him about football and photography as he continues to give me advice on my images. We continue to talk about how to get the best sort of images, how to take my photographs to the next level and how is the best way to promote them and get them more attention.
Burton Albion shoots
On February 17, 2018 I returned to Burton Albion to continue my photography. Whilst I was there I would plan to improve on previous images that I had taken in previous games. This game was against Nottingham Forest, so this was a team that I had not photographed Burton play against before, so this was a huge opportunity for me to add to the collection of teams that I had photographed Burton play against in the Championship.
Prior to the game, I had no set plan of what I was going to capture, this would have been different had this been a team that I had photographed Burton playing against before. What I did was I would just try to capture what I would at a normal football game, which is to just try and capture a wide range of images showcasing the best moments of the match. I feel that I managed to capture this quite well, this came as a huge relief as a few of my more recent football shoots have not quite been up to scratch when compared to my earlier shoots. This was an enjoyable shoot as due to a red card for Nottingham Forest midway through the first half it saw Burton Albion do a lot of attacking in the second half which was towards the goal I was sat behind, this allowed me to capture a lot more images that I would have done had it been an 11 vs. 11 game.
This shoot was certainly valuable to my work as it allowed me to capture a lot of images to add to not only my portfolio but also to include in my book that I will be producing for my FMP. I would also say that this shoot was of decent quality and I am quite happy with the shoot overall. Despite the success of this photoshoot, I will still be returning to the club to do some more shoots as not only will I be needing them for my portfolio, I will also be needing them for my FMP. I feel that as I have a few images from last season that I will not need to go to a lot of games between now and the end of the season, but as I don't have a large collection of images from last season I will still need to go to two or three of the final four home games of the season. The team currently have nine games remaining but due to the hand-in date of the FMP, this rules out the final two games, one of which is a home game, for shoots for my FMP. This leaves seven games three of which are at home, due to travel issues I am unable to get to any of the away games. So from this, I only have three matches available to do shoots of, for my FMP so my plan will be to go to at least two of these. Even though there is a match at home after the hand-in date I am still planning to go to it so that I can continue to grow my portfolio.
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