The softball photo shoot - pic heavy

[SquarePeg]

As some of you may remember, I agreed to help my friend do a photo shoot for her daughter’s college softball team. In the end, I did most of the photo shooting while my friend made a behind the scene video and kept the girls loose. We had a lot of fun and the girls were thrilled at the “legit” photo shoot with backdrop, lights and reflectors.

They had some poses they wanted to do and I brought my iPad loaded with some cool softball poses I found on the web. For lights we had two soft boxes, a speedlight off camera with a flash disc modifier and a wall of floor to ceiling windows with a partly sunny/partly cloudy mid day sky. Ceiling too high for bounce flash. We shot some of these with just the soft boxes and some with just the flash, trying to use the windows and changing light outdoors as best we could. No time to reset lights for each shot but we made adjustments as needed.

The lighting needs work I know but I learned a lot and have a long list of do/don’t do for next time. This experience was exhausting and challenging and I actually liked it more than I thought I would.

Here are some of my favorites:















I put this in Just For Fun because there’s so many photos but feedback and constructive criticism are more than welcome.

 

[tirediron]

VERY nice; well done! I like the simple lighting, and the creative poses are excellent. I am officially stealing both the "bicep balance" and "glove mask" ideas for future use! A few VERY minor nits: There seem to be some WB differences between the images (easily corrected), and when using the a ball in sporting shots, bonus points for positioning in "upright". Also (especially with females) watch the hair so that it doesn't mask the team branding. You need to go back and reshoot #2 so and have someone pitch the ball so that you can catch it just before it hits the glove.

I expect they are VERY happy with these!

 

[Derrel]

Wow! Pretty GOOD photos. This is indeed "a legit photoshoot". I like the way these turned out.

 

[SquarePeg]

VERY nice; well done! I like the simple lighting, and the creative poses are excellent. I am officially stealing both the "bicep balance" and "glove mask" ideas for future use! A few VERY minor nits: There seem to be some WB differences between the images (easily corrected), and when using the a ball in sporting shots, bonus points for positioning in "upright". Also (especially with females) watch the hair so that it doesn't mask the team branding. You need to go back and reshoot #2 so and have someone pitch the ball so that you can catch it just before it hits the glove.

I expect they are VERY happy with these!

Thanks for your feedback and kind words. The darker photos are a filter that I liked but I didn’t want to use it on all of them. The glove mask idea was mine, she came up with the bicep “balance” on her own - my habit of always having duct tape in my bag saved it from being a fail.

 

[SquarePeg]

Wow! Pretty GOOD photos. This is indeed "a legit photoshoot". I like the way these turned out.

Thanks! I’m happy with how it went and the girls loved the finished photos.

 

[jcdeboever]

Fantastic job, you should be very proud. I think they're wonderful.

 

[SquarePeg]

Fantastic job, you should be very proud. I think they're wonderful.

Thanks jc!

 

[zulu42]

Awesome job. Softball players are strong and tough and your images really brought it.

 

[SquarePeg]

Awesome job. Softball players are strong and tough and your images really brought it.

Thank you. We took quite a few “game face” photos which really showed off how intimidating they can look when they want to. This is my favorite of those.

 

[Light Guru]

Pictures look nice, my only question is why not shoot on the ball field? That gray background just seems unfitting. Maybe a solid white background if you insist on shooting inside.


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[SquarePeg]

Pictures look nice, my only question is why not shoot on the ball field? That gray background just seems unfitting. Maybe a solid white background if you insist on shooting inside.


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Thanks for your thoughts on this. The date of the shoot was set by the coach as the team was leaving for FL a few days after. I would have loved to wait a few weeks for spring and shoot outside but they wanted the photos before the season started. UNE is on the water, mid coast Maine - it was way too cold and windy to shoot outside last weekend and the field was closed due to all the rain from the nor’easter the day before.

We may go back and shoot again on the field and on the beach when it gets warmer.

 

[adamhiram]

You did great! Really nice job.

 

[Light Guru]

We may go back and shoot again on the field and on the beach when it gets warmer.

Beach? I’ve never heard of softball being played on the beach. That’s even more odd then the gray background.


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[snowbear]

Great set. Thanks for posting them.

 

[SquarePeg]

You did great! Really nice job.

Thanks!

We may go back and shoot again on the field and on the beach when it gets warmer.

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You’re just a big ol ray of sunshine, aren’t you?

Great set. Thanks for posting them.

Thanks.