Yesterday, we offered the first half of Yan’s field report from last summer’s Commonwealth Games.

Yan has taken our photo courses over the years and has been fortunate to shoot some high profile, international sports events. Below is part TWO of his report:

“In table tennis, the exchanges are so fast, so I focused on capturing the serves, when players seem to silently implore the ball before unleashing their shot.

Sports photo - student success!

The field hockey venue was the legendary Major Dhyan Chand National Stadium, located at one end of the Raj Path, a major avenue in the centre of Delhi, just next to the historical landmark India Gate. (Field) hockey is a religion in India, and there were more tickets sold for this sport at the Commonwealth games than for all the other sports put together, with some incredible atmosphere when India was playing, especially against their perennial rivals Pakistan or in the semi-final against England.

Once again, I needed to schmooze with some key volunteers at the venue to obtain “the bib” necessary to go pitch side, but it is amazing what a handful of pins and a few Canadian Team caps can do to entice inflexible officials to slightly bend the rules!

I described my experience shooting field hockey in a previous entry of this blog , so I won’t repeat myself and just show a few samples:

sport photo - student success!

sport photo - student success

Once again, it was an exceptional experience having the opportunity to shoot high level sport from close range. But I also remembered the advice given by Harry Nowell in his workshop (“cover the whole event, not just what is happening on the field”) and I documented the life of the Canadian Team, including the visit of Prince Charles and Camilla in the Village, an exclusivity since this visit was closed to the “official” photographers!

Commonwealth Games - 2011

Yan Huckendubler at the Commonwealth Games - 2010

Yan Huckendubler

Chelsea, QC”

Thanks Yan. I am impressed – and a little jealous!

Yan Huckendubler is a graduate of some of our photo courses – mostly sports including the pro-hockey photo course in February – and last summer Yan had the privilege of assisting the Canadian team at the Commonwealth Games in India.

He has posted international sports reports on our blog before.

In the next couple of days he shares stories and his photos from his adventures last summer:

2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi, India

In October, I was selected as Media Attaché for the Canadian Team at the Commonwealth Games in Delhi, India. Although photography was not my primary duty, I packed my camera and a few lenses, hoping to grab some shots of the sports I was assigned to: archery, boxing, table tennis and of course field hockey, the sport I have been involved with for a long time.

I left with the advance Canadian contingent, a group of a dozen staff going about ten days before the rest of the team to prepare everything, and we immediately had to deal with the abysmal state of the Athletes Village, which was well documented in the media. As the only communications person in the group, I was in the eye of the storm, working with the correspondents of the main Canadian outlets, called in from places such as Kabul to cover the “situation” in Delhi.

student success - photography course graduate - © Yan Huckendubler

I was confronted with a dilemma that many photo-journalists probably have: should we release the series of pictures I took to illustrate the sorry state of the athletes’ quarters? The media were pushing to have them, arguing that “a picture is worth a thousand words” and would speed up the resolution of the problem; but the Canadian Team staff did not want to, opting for a more “Canadian” approach and hoping that the Indian officials would become reasonable.

Our dilemma was resolved when the BBC web site published a similar series of pictures (obviously leaked by the English Team) and the proverbial shit hit the political fan, triggering an immediate and decisive action to clean-up the Village.

At these types of events, you need to carry with you all your equipment from venue to venue, and through numerous security checks: computer, video-camera, camera, lenses, rain gear, granola bar, etc… not to mention an “unmarked” neutral shirt recommended by our security group in case you were separated from the official group. So I decided to limit the lenses I would carry to:

• AF-S Nikkor 24-70mm 1:2.8G IF-ED for the casual shots, team pictures, etc…
• AF-S VR-Nikkor 70-200mm 1:2.8G ED for archery, boxing and table tennis;
• AF-S Teleconverter TC-14EII 1.4x, combined with the 70-200 for field hockey.

photo student success - © Yan Huckendubler

The plan “nearly” worked: the combination of 70-200 with the 1.4 teleconverter was too short for field hockey pictures (I would normally use my AF VR-Nikkor 80-400mm 1:4.5-5.6D ED).

For archery, the type of pictures you can take is limited. I was flabbergasted by the regularity with which the archers hit the centre of the target but it is mostly a static sport, everybody having the same stance and being perfectly still while aiming, with little emotion shown after a shot to avoid wasting mental energy.

At the boxing venue, I somehow became friend with the Venue Photo Manager and he let me go “ring side” when the Canadians were fighting. It is certainly a choice position to follow the action, although I spent a lot of time trying to decide if I should shoot below or between the ropes! There is great potential to catch the expressions on the boxers’ faces during the build-up phases, and, with some luck, you can shoot at the right time to catch a wild swing.

photo student success - © Yan Huckendubler

Stay tuned for more of Yan’s adventures from the 2010 Commonwealth Games!

A couple of weeks ago we ran another Intro to Studio Photography Course at Ottawa Studio Works.

We limit the session to two students to maximize hands on learning – and our students soaked up the experience. The morning was spent learning about equipment, theory and some exploratory light sets.

Intro to Studio Photo Class

In the afternoon two groups came in to test the student’s studio portrait photo skills. It’s a challenging day for the students but they did very well!

Introduction to Studio Photography is now offered to anyone throughout the year. Interested? Just contact us to book your session!

Students success!:

Studio Student Success!

Studio Student Success!

We have another graduate from our ProProgram – photo and related business courses based in Ottawa.

Hagen Hohn recently completed the year long program after finishing photo classes, shadowing placements with other photographers and a series of critique and goal setting sessions.

“With Harry’s training and guidance, I’ve learned everything I need to know to start and grow a photography business: 2hphotography.ca.

I have launched the business specializing in high end and exotic cars and other passions such as gardening, in a more exclusive market niche.

This is a long journey and I plan on enjoying every step of the way. The ProProgram gave me the start, the rest is time, effort and practice.”

Congratulations Hagen!

Ottawa ProProgram Photo Course Graduate - Hagen Hohn

Ottawa ProProgram Photo Course Graduate - Hagen Hohn

We finished the Night Light Photo Workshop last week. I smiled when I saw the results.

We had two nights of shooting and encountered fire-breathing dragons, wild night magic and ghosts. Very, very fun. See some student’s work, below. Thanks to France, Al & Alain for sharing!

What participants said:

• “Harry provides real time feedback and guidance making course time more useful and yields better learning experience.”
• “This is the workshop that gave me the best results – photos I am very proud of. It also taught me about new and fun techniques.”
• “Worth all the time and cost.”

The workshop was full. But we are teaching Night Light Custom Course to a father daughter photo team this weekend – always a possibility for all the courses we teach.

Night Light Photo Workshop

Night Light Photo Workshop

Night Light Photo Workshop

Recently, two separate students happily announced their successes in recent contests. I was very proud!

Join me in cheering for them below:

• Hagen Hohn, part of our ProProgram, won third place in Outdoor Photography Canada’s recent Spring 2010 Photo competition. And the photo (below) will be published in the next edition. Yay, Hagen!

© Hagen Hohn

• Michelle Tardiff, who is a proud graduate of our photo courses was bursting with news. She says:

“It is with great surprise that I would like to inform you that one of my photographs was published in the Emerging Photographers issue of Photolife (Aug/Sept 2010 – page 40).

Thank you for coaching and mentoring me in photography.”

Yay team!