Photographing Important Techniques

When faced with a situation where you know the photographs you capture are very important, you must consider whether the job is worth it or not.

Think about it.

You are hired to photograph an important event and bomb the photos. Will the person/company hire you again?

When you are faced with the opportunity to photograph an event where important techniques will be displayed, you must understand your own important techniques. For example, dealing with mixed lighting.

This was a large room with big fluorescent lights. Instead of white balancing to the fluorescent light, I brought my own lighting… strobes. This accomplished two things.

• The color temperature was where I wanted it to be
• I was able to shoot at fast shutter speeds to capture karate moves completely still
• The room was small, but big enough for karate classes (obviously) – however, being that there were over 50 people in the room and I was so close to getting karate kicked in the head, I had to find the right angles, heights, exposures and move really fast…. technique

This is the completion of one of the most important techniques in Goju Ryu Karate.

The Mawashi uke, or two hand circular block. Once the blocks are complete the karateka strikes with two Teisho uchis, or two palm heel strikes. The strikes are either to the face or shoulder and lower abdomen or groin. This block and strike are found in many of our katas. This particular one was performed at the end of a kata. The block is normally performed fast and the strike slowly and can accompanied with a strong exhale.

As in the previous picture the stance is a Neko Ashi Dachi.

Zokucho

Thanks for reading and happy shooting,
Scott