Looking down

The main stand at Prescot Cables is of a somewhat unusual design. The main facilities - bar, changing rooms, etc. - are on the ground floor, with the stand on the storey above.

This gives a vantage point only a few yards from the edge of the pitch, at the height normally found at the back of the stand at most grounds.

I am a bit lazy when in selecting a position at home games, particularly in daylight, tending to settle behind the goal Prescot are attacking. I do not therefore make much use of the angles the stand offers, except, that is, when it is raining with Cables attacking the uncovered Safari Park End.

Here are a few shots from up in the stand at Prescot's game with Durham City at the weekend to show some of what is available from this angle that is not so easy to capture at ground level.

Uncluttered backgrounds - for shots of individual players, the background is a fairly plain green (with the pitch fresh after the summer), instead of advertising hoardings, spectators, etc.

A sense of position - in a shot like this at ground level, the two players behind are likely to be obscured by the two in front, so you do not get the sense of them moving into position for a pass.

A clear view of goal.

An unobstructed view of players such as Cables' Tom Spearitt, who does not always appear in the slide shows as often as his contribution to the game warrants: as he is working away in the centre of defence, with other players blocking him from view at ground level.

I returned to my more normal position for the second half, as there is cover at the Hope Street end. The rest of the photos from the game can be seen here.

Shutter speeds

I was looking at a photography book in a shop the other day. In the section on sports and action photography, it gave some tips for minimum (i.e. slowest) shutter speeds recommended to freeze the action. For football, they suggested 1/500s for a player running across the frame, and 1/250s for a player running towards the camera. I would not disagree, and in an afternoon game at this time of year, I would expect to get them without difficulty, like this one, from Cables' game at Woodley Sports, everything frozen at 1/1250s.

However, at our level of the football pyramid, for about two thirds of the season, lighting conditions are likely to be sub-optimal, and in some cases, that will be putting it mildly.
Once it starts to get gloomy, we have to start trading off - freezing the action, against lighting, against the size of image. I will look at kit in a later post, but for the following discussion, I am using a Nikon D5000, which has an ISO range up to 3200, extendible to 6400 equivalent. Going above ISO 3200 means full noise reduction is not available, but I have found the results to be quite acceptable. The main lens I use for football is a 70-300mm f4.5-5.6 zoom. In bright light, I just select the sports preset mode, and let the camera take care of the shutter speeds, apertures and ISO. As the light fades, I switch over to shutter priority mode and work down through the shutter speeds, starting at 1/320s just before the lights come on, and working down as it gets darker.

So, just how slow can you get away with? It depends to a certain extent how sharp an image you want. If the player's head and torso are clear, I will accept a certain amount of blur on the faster moving feet, hands, and of course the ball. By the time it is fully dark, so the only light is coming from the floodlights, I have moved down to 1/200s, which is about as low as I think I can go and get a reasonable number of acceptable shots from which to choose for the slide show.

That is not to say you do not sometimes get one that seems to be defying the laws of optics. Take this, from Prescot Cables' game at home to Cammell Laird, of Cables' Joe Gibiliru.

That was at 1/125s - I had not noticed how low the speeds the sports setting was offering had gone. You can see blurring on the hands and feet, but otherwise movement is still reasonably well frozen.

Then came the next one, at 1/100s - you can really see the blurring on the Lairds player's right leg, but the rest of the shot is still quite crisp.

I have never tried deliberately using this speed for a sustained period: I think the number of usable shots would be low enough to make it of limited use, but in low light I am happy to use all the tricks to catch the most of the light that comes my way.

The slide show from the match is available here.

Hats, kits and polyester pitches

The Evo-Stik League season is now under way, with Prescot Cables having played their first game of the season away to Woodley Sports.

The quickest way to get there (with the best options for Good Beer Guide pubs) seemed to be via Stockport. Since I first got a train through Stockport a few years ago, I had been intrigued by a chimney that you can see from the viaduct.

Stockport was a centre of hat making from the 16th century until 1997, when the last factory closed, so the town has the Hat Works, a well presented little museum. They also had a small display on local sport, apparently Stockport is something of a centre for lacrosse, a sport I have not had the opportunity to watch.

Woodley's ground is in the middle of a building site at the moment, as it is to become part of the new Stockport Sports Village, to be run by the Stockport Sports Trust, which operates the former municipal sports facilities in partnership with Stockport Council.

Woodley have one of the few synthetic pitches at this level, a Field Turf surface, with the "grass" being polyester fibres attached to a polyurethane base, with a rubber infill, avoiding the carpet burns synonymous with the nylon based surfaces of the eighties.For photography it does not make a lot of difference, although the more predictable bounce can sometimes make it easier to keep up with the ball. The fibres seem to be darker than grass, which, combined with the infill (mainly from recycled material from tyres) makes the pitch look darker than grass, which is balanced by the fibres having a slightly wet look.

Prescot have a new kit for the season, supplied by PaxSport, the company run by former Prescot goalkeeper Andy Paxton, here being worn by last season's top scorer, Lee Madin.

The black band at the top looks quite distinctive, although as it does not extend a similar distance down the back, the appearance from the side takes a little getting used to. Along with a number of people who have commented on the club forum so far, I would have preferred a bolder yellow (closer to amber), I am a bit concerned about visibility on a murky afternoon in November before the floodlights are turned on, but only time will tell on that.

The photos from the game are available here.

Colour photography

Prescot Cables' last game of their pre season programme was at home to Marine.

Whilst I spend most of my football time following and photographing Prescot Cables, I also support Dulwich Hamlet, who I am usually able to watch 5 or 6 times a season. On this occasion, I was wearing a replica Dulwich Hamlet 1937 FA Amateur Cup shirt from TOFFS.

The shirt is a design worn by Dulwich from 1927 until the 1960s. The history of the club's distinctive colours can be found in this article on the Hamlet Historian blog. The photograph at the beginning of the article shows players from the 1937 FA Amateur Cup winning side, sporting the shirt from which the TOFFS shirt was modelled.

Wearing the shirt when Marine are playing occasionally raises a wry smile from people who know their club's history. Marine's foremost achievement was reaching the FA Amateur Cup Final in 1932, where it was their misfortune to meet one of the best Dulwich Hamlet sides in the history of the club, including the legendary Edgar Kail, and they succumbed 7-1.

During the game, I was approached by a gentleman who described himself as "more of a ground hopper, and a bit of a Marine supporter". He had purchased a Prescot scarf at the merchandise table too, so we are not complaining. We chatted about cameras and lenses, and a couple of photo ideas he had. He also enquired after my shirt. The following conversation ensued.
Me: Dulwich Hamlet.
Him: (quizzical look)
Me: 1932 FA Amateur Cup Final?
Him: Ah, the team that beat Marine 7-1.
Me: Yes.
Him: So, Marine lost 7-1 to a team playing in pink? Not a lot of people know that, but they might now.

A comment like that will usually attract a reply along the lines that the shirt has history, and enquiring about the history of whatever they are wearing. This did not seem appropriate with someone who clearly had a knowledge of his club's history, but a question came to mind - how would he know?

Last time I was in the Marine clubhouse (some years ago), they had a large photograph from the 1932 Final, about a third life size, behind the bar, and there are pictures from the game in the club history, The Mighty Mariners. However, in common with almost all photographs from that time, they are in black and white.

Although colour photography existed at this time, the process was too cumbersome for sports action: Kodachrome colour film was not to come to the market for another three years.

Many people under 30 have probably never taken or appeared in a black and white photo, unless they are, or know, an enthusiast. Everything is in colour, newspapers, magazines, the web. For those of us a bit older, we can remember that only a few years ago newspapers were all black and white, and even most magazines only had a few colour pages.

It is a welcome development that more people than ever are interested in the history of their clubs. The ways and traditions of clubs are being recorded and catalogued, but in the case of memories of games more than 30 or 40 years ago, mainly in black and white. It limits our ability to visualise the past. The TOFFS shirt above was created from an actual playing shirt, lent by the late Ernie Toser, a member of the 1937 FA Amateur Cup winning side. The prototype shirt, made before the actual shirt was available, created by best estimates of the colours from black and white photographs was quite literally pale by comparison. Club colours are part of their tradition, and clubs who play in their historic colours are playing their part in keeping alive the history of the game.

Dulwich still play in their traditional colours, having used different patterns over the years - here is the latest version.

So, in answer to the question, yes, the 1932 FA Amateur Cup (and 1920, 1934 and 1937) was won by a team playing in pink and blue, and feel free to tell more people that the club are still proud to play in their traditional colours.

As for the game I was actually watching and photographing, the pictures can be seen here.

Relaxing rule 1

There is one time I will relax my rule 1, and show a picture that would normally find its way swiftly to the bin. Take this one: I have only caught the goalkeeper, a principal participant in the action, from the chest down, but ...

... a goal is a goal - this one scored by Prescot Cables' Billy Flynn, after a fine run round 2 Vauxhall Motors defenders.

The rest of the pictures from the game can be seen here.

Rule no 1 - or how not to do it

I promised some tips that I follow when producing my photos, so here is the first one - make sure anything with which you are not completely satisfied never sees the light of day. If you have only taken a small number, and that leaves you with just one or two photos, that is not a problem, one photo is useful to illustrate a match report or go in the programme.

It is always easy enough with a bit of practice to take some decent photos at a football or rugby game. The sort of camera being used will affect what it is possible to do, but it is generally possible on a reasonably bright day to get a few pictures showing some action, which can then be cropped to create a good, professional looking shot.

However, one thing is even easier - to take a dud one. In a fast moving game, players or match officials will get in the way of the shot you want, the action will move more quickly than you can keep up with it, or the camera will decide to focus on something you did not want.

I shall break my rule about showing the bad shots just this once, and show a couple from Prescot Cables' pre season game against a Wrexham XI to show what I mean. Here is an extreme example, with the assistant referee getting in the way of what may have been a reasonable shot, an occupational hazard of taking photos from the sidelines:

To be fair, I do not see many of these in football photos: although its equivalent from parties and social occasions appears often enough.

This one is a bit less clear cut, and crops up more often - the sign on the terraces is in perfect focus, which cannot be said for the players.

Its place is the bin, and it needs to go there without a second thought.

That is not to say that when a picture does not turn out as intended, it is always a bad thing - for this one, I was trying to catch the goalkeeper, but I like the effect with the focus on Wrexham's No 4.

The pictures that made it into the final selection from the Prescot v Wrexham game can be seen here.