Off Side!

Flamingo, Lake Nakuru, originally uploaded by http://andrewskelton.net.

Well that was fascinating… and for all the wrong reasons. As mentioned earlier in the week, the football team my boy plays for were part of the half time entertainment at the Reading vs Cardiff football match, where they were taking penalties on the pitch.  I was given permission to go on with them to take shots of the kids as the took their shots;  You can guess what’s coming next can’t you.. Sod’s first law of “what can go wrong, will go wrong” was duly displayed and as such I had to leave my camera gear at Reception as some jobsworth security guard wouldn’t let me in. The worst part is that I spoke to lady, who gave us permission initially, once in the stand and to whom the official said he had contacted… guess what.. he hadn’t spoken to her, and she knew nothing about the issue – she was very apologetic but by that time it was too late.. Cross of Reading*.

The whole football game, crowd etc was fascinating in itself as well, I presume there are pHDs into the psychology of the game and more importantly the fans … I actually felt a bit like a fish devoid of its natural habitat. Still, its only a month until I get to go and see a proper game…. rugby

The most interesting thing for me was the actions of the Pro photographer stationed just in front of me who was anything but.. chimping, broken arms, staring at anything but the action, its a wonder he got any photos… away with the fairies springs to mind. I can understand looking at the back of the camera (or chimping as it’s called) when conditions are variable, you need to check exposure, but in such circumstances it’s histograms that help as the display doesn’t necessarily display the photo correctly (you can vary the brightness of most dSLR cameras). The light level didn’t vary, there was constant lighting from the stadium flood lights.. so what he was doing I don’t know. That all sounds a bit bitter, but it isn’t meant that way, I find it rather ironic that I feel I would have done a better job but wasn’t allowed in with my gear to photograph a kids game.  Perhaps that is the point!

It has given me a taste for this sideline I have in photography – I might see if I can convert my amateur football photography on the small pitch to professional on the big pitch… well, if I can get in to Rugby as well.

I have a favour to ask, please; my next plan for photographic world domination is to enter as many competitions as possible, not for the prizes (well, not only for the prizes) but to try and get “noticed“.  I’ve had one photo accepted for the WWT competition that is running, which as well as the category I’ve entered it in,can also take part in a people’s vote.  If you wouldn’t mind clicking on a button on the next link I would be eternally greatful (that is a long time I know..) – and if you’re a user of various social networking, could you forward the link to anyone and everyone please…. pretty please… I won’t forget you, Dear Reader, when I’m famous!  Here’s the link :

http://photo.wwt.org.uk/gallery/gallery/single/8594/

*There is an English idiom, “Cross of Tunbridge Wells” denoting a pseudonym used to parody letters written into the broadsheets by the middle classes.  Letters to the more weight tomes complaining about this or that were often signed using an adjective followed by the persons’ location.

Advertisement