Pro boxing match

[jakki-]

Hi all!

I desperately need some advice! I mainly shoot wildlife and occasionally portraits, but after doing some portrait shots of a few Japanese boxers, they've asked me to shoot their upcoming match (April 2nd). This is a huge deal because boxing never comes to Okinawa (tiny island south of Japan), and there are some really big name boxers (Kameda brothers, if anyone knows them...).

Anyway! I have never shot a boxing match before, so even though I'm confident in my photography abilities, I'm freaking out about this a little. :P

I shoot with a Nikon D200 (it's about 5 years old now, and doesn't deal with high ISO very well at all any more). Considering renting a D300S for the day, even though it costs an absolute fortune...

I currently have 3 lenses: 35mm f1.8; 18-200mm f3.5-5.6 and 70-300mm f4.5-5.6. Can also rent a 17-55mm f2.8.

So after all that lead-up, my questions:
- Does anyone have any general tips for the day? About the closest thing I've done to this is live music photography.
- Do you recommend any lenses other than what I've mentioned? I probably won't even take the long lens with me...
- What kind of focus would you use? I've had some marginal success at their sparring sessions with continuous.
- Which spot do you choose for focussing? If I choose top center in landscape I always end up cutting their feet off, or with boring subject-center pics. Portrait is a little better, but you're limited in what you can catch there too.
- White balance? The colours on my practice shoots are awful, and everything I do in PP just seems to make it worse. :P
- Any tips for PP?

I went to get some practice at one of their sparring sessions this week... tried to make it as close to the real thing as possible, but the practice ring was so close to the ground I ended up having to almost lie down at a very weird angle. Haha! The lighting was also *really* bad - flourescent lights right behind the boxers' heads that didn't really do much for lighting up the room anyway. :P

Here's one of the better shots of the evening:


And a few more can be seen in the gallery here: http://kaminotora.deviantart.com/gal...catpath=scraps

They just look so amateur, and I'm really not happy, so any help would be very much appreciated! (PS- see what I mean by the high ISO problems? Those were all shot on only ISO400! )

Sorry for the long post! Thank you so much!

[zerodog]

Here is my take on it. I shoot local MMA events. It is hard. Fighters are trying to fake out their opponent. So they will fake you out too. If you are at a big event they will have big lights. But it is still a cave. One of the events I shoot has huge lights and looks almost like a real UFC event. With my 300s I shoot at ISO 4000 f 2.8 and somewhere around 1/500. With the D3s I shoot at ISO 10,000 or 12,800 and get the shutter speed up to 1/1250ish and f4 so I get some DOF. You have to remember you have 2 subjects that are moving. 2.8 is not always ideal. If you could, you should skip the 300s and rent a D700. Or even, if it is an option a D7000. The main reason for this is more ISO. I would just put them at ISO 6400 and let it rip. If you do get a 300s, set it to ISO 4000 and expose correctly and use custom WB. Both of these will help control noise and make it manageable in PP.

On the DX format, for 1 lens coverage if you are ringside is a 24-70. On FX you are split. 24-70 is great to halfway across the ring. But the 70-200 is really the ideal tool for anything 1/3 of the way on. So if they are closer, you are screwed. But if you are shooting from the stands or within 20ft of the ring, the 70-200 will be the tool to have on DX.

Good luck with this and post your results. Fights are fun, but they are really hard to shoot. So just think of it as a learning experience. Also if you can, take the opportunity to shoot the guys before and after their fights. Way cool and for this ISO is not as big of a deal.

[jakki-]

Thanks for the reply!

I wish I could rent a super snazzy camera, but as I said, Okinawa is a really tiny island, and the little they do have to rent here costs a fortune - just the D300s costs US$120 a day, and each lens around $70.

Luckily, the boxers don't seem to move quite as fast as MMA fighters do, so most of the time I'm able to get their faces in focus with just the hands moving. It is a big event, so there will be better lights than in the picture above (considering that gym is basically a converted apartment with a bunch of flourescent lights stuck to the walls, I should hope so! ;))

I will be ringside as well, so a wide lens is better. I looked into it, but unfortunately the 24-70 isn't an option.

And I'll be the photographer in charge of all the fighters for the host gym, so will be going in with them and taking gloving-up shots and all of that. Done that with them loads of times, and they're used to me now, so that won't be a problem at all. Just hope they win so the post-fight pics are good! ^_^

Thanks again! Will definitely post results.

[zerodog]

Then go for the 300s and the 17-55. Not a bad combo. Use your 35 for the backstage stuff. But you will love that 17-55. If you expose right the 300s will go to ISO 3200 really well and tolerates 4000 with some more NR. Do not be afraid to go this high. Also shoot full manual. The metering is easily faked out by bright mat and dark background.

[groovehouse]

I have always wanted to shoot a boxing match. Good luck and let us know how it goes!

[JMK]

The 35mm will suffice for this event. On a 300s, a 1.5x sensor, will be about 50mm, which is close to what the human eye sees at.

I also teach boxing photography online:

www.BoxingPhotographySchool.com

-Jason

[jakki-]

Finished shooting a couple of hours ago. Man, that was tiring! 9 matches of crouching (today I wished for the first time that I was shorter!) and craning the neck up into that ring make for some very wibbly legs and a very sweaty, disgusting me. :P

Thanks to the earthquake, I wasn't able to get any of the equipment I wanted to rent. Would have liked the extra camera for quick lens changes, but the 35mm was pretty good to me today. I thought it a little strange that all the other photographers had huge lenses on when we were right next to the boxers, but I guess they wanted the close-ups. :P

I haven't gone through the pics yet, but I think I got a couple of good ones. Will post a few as I edit them, but here's a teaser:

Daiki Kameda, super flyweight world champion, celebrates his win with his brothers.

[jakki-]

Argh. Sorry. I just saw that those links didn't work.

Just uploaded some to the member galleries, so here they are:

[Photo-John]

Thanks for re-posting those photos. I was disappointed when I saw those broken links. In fact, there's a good chance you would have been Featured Photo for the Sports Photography forum if they'd worked. Maybe next week

These are looking good. Always happy to have a new fight photographer here. Someday I'll have to try shooting boxing or MMA fighting myself. I imagine it's got to be really difficult.

[SmartWombat]

Great to see the photos at last.
I think the 35mm worked well when the action was close.
On the that first shot, I like the faces watching the action - the wider view not just the fighters.
So all round I think that's a good choice of lens for your position.

[jakki-]

Thanks guys!

Yeh, I don't know why the links didn't work... I used the same place as that first picture and that's still there. :P

I was very happy with my lens. Would have liked something a touch longer for when they were in the ring because I had a lot of excess space that I had to crop out in, for instance, the second picture. But it was great because the bigger, male photographers kind of shoved me into the corner where I was bothering the trainers, but that also meant I could get all the coaching, spitting, drinking, pep-talk shots. ^_^

I love the faces in the first shot. ^_^ Especially the grey-haired guy at bottom left. He was the head doctor, and he had this fantastic beard/mustache that looked like he belonged in an old kung fu movie.

[SmartWombat]

I would have used my 24-70 f/2.8 zoom, because the action distance varies so much, and because I've got one
But I think I would have been tempted to zoom in on the fight and miss shots like your first one.

[jakki-]

A couple I changed to b&w. I am loooving the look of this.





I think I'm biased towards these images because I know these guys pretty well. :P
I love the first because I know the guy doesn't smile very often at all, and the smile is added to by the fact that the loser is sitting and pouting within view. Haha.

In the second, I wish his right hand was a liiiittle more out of the way, but I love the vulnerability in his eyes. (He went on right after that to punch the other guy so hard that the other guy went flying across the mat, and he put a crack in his own hand. :P)