Photographing school sports

PSA Journal, Oct, 1996 by Bobby D. Parker

If you have an interest in sports and know coaches from the schools in your community, you may have an inroad to an exciting and profitable career in sports photography. Numerous opportunities exist. Since beginning my photography business in 1979, I have photographed football, girls and boys cross country, girls and boys tennis, girls softball, golf, girls volley ball, girls and boys swimming, baseball, girls and boys basketball, girls and boys track, girls and boys soccer, wrestling, cheerleading, pom poms and band, choral and debate groups in both junior and senior high schools.

To begin a business of this nature, it is a good idea to get permission from the principal or the athletic director of each school to individually, visit the coaches of each sport or activity. Competition and politics play a significant role in today's society. so don't give up when they say no. Keep coming back and eventually they'll give you a try.

Once you have established the contracts, you must follow through and service each account now as well as in the future. I've found that dropping in on each coach from time to time during a given year makes it easier to obtain a contract for the upcoming year. Everybody likes attention. Besides, they need to know that you're still around.

Another way to obtain contracts is to give of some of your photography services instead of always taking. Each year, high schools produce sports books with each sport team and all lettermen from the past year individually pictured. During a given year, these books are published for sport occurring in the fall, winter, and spring. The books are sold at the athletic events to help raise money for the athletic departments. Here's the point: You can provide all the photography pictures for all three books in each school serviced. This entails photographing each athletic team along with each lettering boy or girl in each sport. Depending on the weather, I use either T-Max Kodak 100 or 400. My home lab is utilized for the black and white film developing and processing. The photographs are then provided to the publisher. I provide this service to all schools that allow me contracts for the majority of their sports. Each coach is also provided a complimentary team and individual photo.

Once the contract has been secured, I make up legal size envelopes listing three different packages to choose from and additional photos that can be purchased. There is also a place for each name, address, city and zip, telephone number, package number, additional pictures, and school and sport on the envelope.

Package #1 contains a memory mate, 2-5x7's, 1-8x10, 1 magazine cover and 12 wallets; Package #2 contains a memory mate, 2-5x7's, 1-8x10 and 8 wallets; Package #3 contains a memory mate, 1-5x7 and 1-8x10. All 8x10's in each package are team pictures and all 5x7's, magazine covers and wallets are individual pictures.

Additional pictures include buttons (individual), wallets (individual), magazine cover, 10x13, 16x20, 5x7's, 5x7 or 10x22 calendar, 20x30 poster, wallet photo magnets and 8x10's. The additional photos can be team or individual.

Prices will vary according to the competition in your area and your lab preference. A good rule of thumb in pricing your product is two and one-half to five times your cost.

Before doing the types of jobs mentioned above, you must contact one or two good film developing and processing sports laboratories. Ashton's Photo in Salem, Oregon, and Sport's America in Springfield, Missouri, are two labs with excellent reputations. These labs reflect my package and additional picture prices.

Film is an important consideration in photographing sports. An important decision for team pictures is depth-of-field, especially with more than 15 members. Depth-of-field means closing the lens down. Everything from the lens to infinity will be in clear focus. By using this technique, everyone will be clearly focused in the picture. Therefore, my choice is high speed film, Kodak Pro 400, because of the contrast and latitude.

I use the Mamiya RB67 medium format camera and the Sekor F 3.5 90mm lens for all large group photos. Three flash strobes are utilized: one Norman 200B, and two Honeywell Strobonar 780S with slave units. When photographing outside in the sunshine, I'm looking for an f-stop between 22-32, and inside an f-stop between 11-16, at a speed of 1/125. Four frames of each group are provided to the lab and they pick the best picture.

For individuals, I use the Nikon N90 camera and Nikor zoom 28-70D lens (3.5-4.5). My film preference is Kodak PRO 100 or Pro 400, again because of the contrast and latitude. The Nikor SB-25 is used in TTL mode as a flash strobe. I prefer to utilize the N90 in the landscape program mode for in-focus background and subject. Outside sunlight photos are made with an f-stop of between 16-22, and inside photos with an f-stop of between 8-11 using a speed of 1/30.

As you photograph each team and individual, you label each shot with the group and individual names on a numbered shot list. This way the lab can identify your work.