Sunday afternoon was spent in the freezing cold standing on a rugby pitch in Terenure College RFC watching Lansdowne and Terenure play what turned out to be a one-sided affair. I was there to watch my brother-in-law Darragh, who plays in the centre with Lansdowne. The match was cut short after one of the Lansdowne players broke his leg in two places with about 20 minutes to go, and by then my fingers were too numb for any more photography.
One of the benefits of going to a match like this, as a photographer, is the ease of access you get for some good action shots of the game. There was no barrier between me and the pitch, and very few people watching the game, so as line outs, scrums and penalties were taken I could align myself to the action along the sideline and get a good angle for photographs.
I always think rugby photographs are enhanced by mud – the muddier the players the better for conveying the intensity of the game – and the pitch at Terenure (not the main pitch) didn’t disappoint in that respect. Getting the exposure just right to show enough detail in the mud while still holding detail in the sky required a bit of post-processing effort, but nothing that the 12-bit RAW file that my D700 produced couldn’t handle.
The one thing that this photo is lacking, sadly, and which I feel a good rugby photo should have, is a view of the ball. It’s still in the scrumhalf’s hands and the next frame I have is after the put-in, where it is already on its way to the back of the scrum, but obscured by the Terenure players’ legs. Next time I photograph a scrum I will hold fire on the shutter until the ball is visible. I didn’t think (for a split second) about photoshopping one in there, but that’d be too much work and I’d still know it wasn’t really there.
I still like the photo for its portrayal of the physicality of the scrum in rugby. More than that though, the mud, the cold and the colour of the team jerseys brought back vivid memories of my very very short lived rugby playing days at Christian Brothers College in Cork, where our school jerseys were red, yellow and black and our main rivals (Presentation Brothers College aka Pres) work purple, black and white.
This is my every Saturday afternoon! I follow Tunbridge Wells Rugby Club around and shoot for their 1sts each week.
There are several good shots to get at a scrum… The front row just about to crouch (either from the side or behind the posts if they’re close to the try line and if their opponents drop first!) can be good. The scrumhalf putting the ball in from the opposite side of the scrum is difficult… as soon as he drops to put the ball in you lose his face. Watch for him raising the ball above the scrum just before the put in if that’s the shot you want. The other shot is to drop behind the scrum and go for the scrumhalf diving to get the ball away to his backs.
I enjoy your blog. Keep posting. Sadly I don’t have the discipline to post regularly myself!
Thanks Bruce, both for reading and for the tips. They’re really good. I just had a quick look at your blog and it looks great… you have some great rugby shots and other off-camera flash stuff there that I’ll look in more detail at when I get a chance. Keep posting yourself, even irregularly! Thanks again.
This is from someone who hasn’t ever seen rugby played, strictly from a “viewing this photograph” perspective. I’m sure rugby fans are already strongly drawn in to look at the action no matter how distracting other elements might be in the photo.
As I scrolled down to read your article, the image scrolled partway off the top of my screen. The resulting shot showed just the lower floors of the houses in the background, eliminating most of the sky. It really drew my attention in to the players in a way the full image failed. I think this is because of how a view’s eye is drawn first to the highlight areas in an image, which in this shot means the clouds in the sky and white paint on all the houses in the background keep drawing the viewer’s eye to the top half of the image.
If you crop it to a panorama – cropping just above the referee’s head – the viewer’s eye is drawn more to the shadows, trying to seek out the ball, trying to learn all there is to learn about the action going on down in the mud. The colors on the jerseys stand out more (not competing with the sky and houses), etc.
I hope your BIL’s teammate heals quickly!
Funny you should say that JC – I had this on display in a camera club competition last night, projected on to a big(ish) screen and could see how a panorama crop would work well also – one to try for a print perhaps. Then again, someone later commented on how they liked seeing the trees and the houses as context showing this was a local game.