Frozen action

One of my current favorite photography techniques, or ‘hacks’, to use the parlance of our times, is to capture slices of time which cannot easily be appreciated otherwise. Mostly because it is easy to happen into accidentally. Anyone can do this.

This great shorpy post of baseball player Hank Gowdy is of a relatively centered composition with nice shadowing and depth of field. While those elements give the photo a lasting quality, what grabs on the first viewing is Hank’s facial expression, and the ball he likely just tossed up to hit for practice popping out of the page just over his head.

It made me think of this photo I was lucky enough to get at my wife’s uncle’s wedding:

The photo isn’t really very successful. The ceiling tilts away from the bachelors while at the same time closing in on the groom, and creates a useless gap of space. The groom is not in focus and his shadow on the distant wall is distracting, as are the baloons and light fixture between the groom and the eligible bachelors. A more successful shot would have started with the camera a few feet higher, used remote flashes, and perhaps caught the garter a few feet sooner mid-flight.

Nonetheless, the photo does work. At least five of the subjects are mid-action. The wedding band is visible. While the flash induced shadows are a detractor in most of the picture, it helps lift the garter and give it precense. Nobody blinked, so to speak. For being amongst the first few hundred pictures with my new camera and first DSLR (what do you mean I have to frame shots through a viewfinder again?), it isn’t a bad start.