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Sport Photography: How to use a slider, ring lights and light painting to get stunning images by Antony Scully

2/03/2014 Matt 4 Comments


I have to tell you that it is easy to amaze us with a new video, we watch a lot, but Antony Scully (website ), a fantastic photographer who lives in Trinidad, has done it again. First it was his post " Are you tired of boring photographs of musicians? Uses CTB+CTO gels....and Glitter" and now how to use a slider, two ring lights and light painting to get stunning images.

Antony explains the story behind these images:

Narend Sooknarine, the editor of Zorce Racing Magazine approached me to shoot "Ram" and his new bike.

The bike is a Cervelo P5. It's the cycling equivalent of a Formula 1 car.

After ordering this machine, Ram was invited to visit Cervelo's labs where computers analysed his riding positions and how his body produced power. The bike was built to suit his body.


This was a highlight of the upcoming editorial feature, as well as the 16lb weight of the bike, and it's Formula 1 - like shape and construction, so I set out to give the readers a feel for these lab procedures. I needed to show movement and the analysis in a single frame.



We shot some frames earlier that evening of the bike on the road, then headed to the studio, and setup some constant lights on either side, two Alien Bees AB800 strobes with 20º grids, and a 22" beauty dish on an Alien Bees AB400 at the front to do some long exposure zooming shots. With a studio backdrop, and the camera on a tripod and the bike on a stationary stand, he started to ride, and I captured several frames with lots of movement of him riding, and from the lens zooming while the shutter was open. (Image A - 1 sec f/18 @ ISO 320). The left to right movement of his head, together with the shape of his helmet painted an amazing pattern in the finished images.


After this, we came to the finale. We adhered several tiny LED lights to his body, and the bike frame The Canon 5DMKIII was setup on a 60" video slider, parallel to the bike, the house lights were shut-off, a strip light was placed facing the front of the bike, and another strobe was used on a boom above to light the background.


After a few test shots using a cable release, a shutter speed of 6 sec, and the speed of camera travel along the slider were determined.

A few frames later, I released the shutter, moved the camera down the slider, popped the trigger for the strobes at the end of the slider, and the image was made (Image B).

Many who see the image first think "Photoshop", but this method allowed me to capture the motion, colours, and sinusoidal light-painting all at once.




EQUIPMENT AND LIGHTING SETUP:

6 sec f/8 ISO 320
Camera: Canon 5DMKIII
Lens: Canon 24-70 2.8L II
Lights:
1. White lightning XL1600 with Creative Light 120x30 Striplight with Grid.
2. Alien Bees AB 800 with 30º Grid.







CREDITS:

Photographer: Antony Scully - www.antonyscully.com

Assistant: Sarita Rampersad
Location: Studio30, Trinidad
Video: Evan Salina - http://vimeo.com/evansalina
Bike: Cervelo P5 - http://www.cervelo.com/
Client: Zorce Racing Magazine - www.zorce.com

One more time, thanks for sharing Antony. Amazing.

Note: If you like this post and you wanna share on your website, no problem, you can, we love it...but do not forget credits :D 

4 comments:

V. Dave Surajdeen said...

WoW! If I had not seen the production of this, I'd have surely thought that it was mostly graphics. Great job everyone.

Unknown said...

He lives in Trinidad not Trinity!

Yeah!! Thanks a lot, I was thinking on Matrix :D. Fixed

This is fantastic.

Thank you for sharing!