Remote Camera Action – For Basketball, it’s a Slam Dunk!

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Mike Tedesco is a freelance sports and performance photographer based in Sammamish, WA. One of his favorite assignments is to photograph local High School sports – the action, the emotion, and the spirit of the crowd all make for memorable images.

Basketball Remote Camera Set Up

For basketball images, Mike likes to set up a remote camera behind the backboard to capture the exciting action as the players drive for the basket. We asked Mike to share how he uses a remote camera to kick it up a notch and capture images that go beyond your typical high school sports shots.

Setting up the Remote Camera – Safety First

When setting up a remote camera, Mike is always thinking safety first – he makes sure the equipment is secure and that his security has back up security! He always choses a spot where he can add a second magic arm/clamp and safety cables. In the words of Mike, “Never sacrifice safety for a different angle/shot.” For this game, he used (2) Manfrotto Variable Friction Magic Arms (one with camera bracket), (3) Manfrotto Super Clamps, (2) Impact Safety Cables, gaffers tape, and zip ties. In addition, since the camera was angled slightly downward, Mike used electrical tape to secure Cinefoil, an anti-reflective paper, underneath the lens to help guard against unwanted reflected light from the highly polished gym floor.

Pro-tip:  to minimize distraction to the players, electrical tape was chosen to secure the Cinefoil because it is black on both sides. Gaffers tape has a gray sticky side which when adhered to the backboard, could be distracting to the players.

Setting up the Remote Camera – Anticipate the Action

Pro sports photographers know that to capture the best images, you must anticipate the action – so it’s important to know the level of athletes that you are shooting.

Remote Camera Placement

For this high school game, Mike knew that the players were not dunkers. To best capture their action, he placed the camera higher up on the backboard and angled it down. If you are shooting a college or NBA level game, it would be good practice to bring the camera down and shoot more at rim level. In addition, the remote camera must be discreet, not distracting to the players, and far enough away from the backboard rectangle that identifies the sweet spot.

  • Setting up the remote camera.
  • Confirming camera placement.
  • Final set up from the back.
  • Final set up from the front.

Remote Camera Focus

Mike anticipated that he would be grabbing most of the action a bit below the rim. He put his remote camera, a Sony a9, in full manual focus with focus assist turned on and asked a colleague to stand on a 6 foot ladder that was placed in the lane a couple of feet away from the rim – to mimic a player driving the lane. He manually focused on his colleague and to ensure it wouldn’t move – he taped the focus and zoom rings down.

When to Set up the Remote Camera

Since Mike was dealing with a school and a busy gym, he had to do the bulk of the setup at 7 AM before school started at 8. After school, they had three games before the main event, the Varsity game, which started at 7 PM – 12 hours later! Mike did all the mounting, taping, and pre-focusing work before school, then went back to the camera during a short window before the games started to do a final safety, focus, and remote check. After the final check, he turned it all off and then turned it all back on just prior to the Varsity game.

Setting up the Remote Camera – Details, Details, Details

Remote Camera Settings:

Mike used a Sony a9 with a Sony FE 16-35 f/2.8 lens set at 20mm and f2.8. His shutter speed was 1/1000 which he recommends as a minimum shutter speed for the action. He would have preferred to shoot at f/4 to give him a little more depth of field flexibility, but as is the case with many high school gyms, the lighting was not great, so he opened it to f2.8 to keep his ISO at 6400.

PocketWizard Set Up

Mike placed a PocketWizard Plus III that was in Rx Mode on his remote camera and connected it with a PocketWizard remote camera cable (13369-S) to the camera’s remote camera terminal. He placed a second Plus III in Tx Mode in the hot shoe of his main camera – a Sony a9 II. Both radios were set to the same Channel/Zones.

Making sure the Camera Doesn’t Sleep

Mike set his Sony a9 sleep setting to the maximum setting of 30 minutes. Once he turned it on, he had to make sure that he triggered it at least every 30 minutes. which obviously isn’t a problem during the game. However, it can be a problem when you turn everything on and have a break between games or possibly an extended halftime.

Pro Tip: Using the MultiMAX II instead of the Plus III would give Mike the ability to wake the camera from sleep mode remotely and using the PTMM adapter would keep the camera awake constantly.

Battery Considerations

Mike has been very happy with his FZ100 battery on his camera by Sony. But he always shoots with the battery grip on all his cameras so that he can always have 2 fully charged batteries at the beginning of every event. But since his set up began 12 hours before game time, he turned the camera off after it was set up in the morning and then turned it back on just prior to the Varsity game for final testing.

Pro Tip: PocketWizard’s 13369-S remote camera cable for Sony’s camera has twin heads – one to plug into the camera and one USB head that can be plugged into a portable battery for even more battery life!

Getting the Shot – It’s all in the Preparation

  • Moment captured with handheld camera.
  • Moment captured with remote camera.

These two images are an example of a shot taken with his handheld camera which then also triggered the remote at the same time. As you can see in the handheld photo, there was a ref in the way and the shooter’s left arm blocking his face. The image from the remote camera got a clean view of the actual action.

The Best You Can Do is to Be Ready

Mike was disappointed in the lack of real action in front of his remote camera all game long. Despite his pre-game research, he felt the best drives happened on the left side of the hoop! Good example of Murphy’s Law in action! However, he still felt the time spent was incredibly valuable. Mike feels strongly that any time you can gain experience setting up for safety, framing, focus, and exposure is a win regardless of the images. Once the game starts, the action is out of your control so the best you can do is be ready.

Practice Practice Practice

One way to practice your remote camera skills is with a workshop. Summit Workshops and Sports Shooter Academy are examples of educational workshops that offer great hands-on experience in setting up remote cameras for sports. Have you attended a workshop that helped you with remotes?  Let us know in the comments! 

To check out more of Mike’s work, check out his website at www.reactionphotography.com and follow him on Twitter and Instagram.

Using the PocketWizard Pedal to shoot the NYC Marathon

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The New York City Marathon is the largest marathon in the world and runs through all 5 boroughs of the City. In 2019, there were over 53,000 runners and it was the goal of event organizers to capture 1.8 million images, hopefully capturing every single runner – at least once! To meet that goal, they hired over 70 photographers and placed them in 22 locations.

One of those photographers was PocketWizard’s own Lenny Christopher. Lenny is a professional photographer and videographer and brings that experience to both our support and marketing teams.

Take Care of Your Hands

Lenny has shot many races before, and he said, “Taking 20,000+ images is hard on your hands!” We agree – can you relate? That fine muscle control of half press followed by a full press while holding the camera gets tiring. Now imagine that you are going through that same motion for over 7 hours.   

Using the PocketWizard Pedal to Activate the Shutter

Lenny employed the PocketWizard Pedal to take the strain off his fingers. He connected a PocketWizard Plus IIIe to the Pedal and attached a Plus IIIe to his camera with a remote camera cable. With this set up, he could switch between using his finger and his foot to control the shutter.

Using the PTMM Adapter to Activate Focus

Using the Pedal alone wasn’t quite enough for this unique situation. Lenny needed the ability for fine control of focus since he wanted a shallow depth of field and his subjects were on the move. That’s where the PTMM Pre-Trigger Switch came in.  This cable is a pre-trigger adapter and offers a switch to turn pre-triggering on or off.  When turned on, the camera wakes up and behaves as if you were half pressing the shutter and the camera (set to continuous focus mode) will constantly refocus. With the PTMM Adapter and the PocketWizard Pedal, Lenny could control the shutter and focus simply and easily without tiring his hand.


Benefits using the PocketWizard Pedal and PTMM Adapter

  • Lenny took over 27,000 photos over a period of 7.5 hours. Using the Pedal helped to relieve the strain he would normally feel in his hands.
  • It was a cold morning and Lenny was happy to be able to wear gloves since he didn’t need the fine motor control of his fingers. 
  • The PTMM Adapter kept the camera awake and constantly focusing so Lenny could keep one hand on his monopod for stabilization and one to zoom for quick composing and framing of an image, while using the foot pedal to actuate the shutter. The end result was increased speed and stabilization.

Pro Tip: Reviewing Images

When the PTMM cable is on, the camera behaves as if the shutter were being half pressed. As a result, you are not able to review images. You can use the on/off switch to disable Pre-Trigger for quick image review. When you are ready to continue shooting, flip the switch to turn Pre-Triggering back on.

Two Items to Add to Your Kit

The PocketWizard Pedal is a great way to free your hands when capturing an image.  And, in a situation where your focus point is changing, the PTMM Adapter is an indispensable tool to keep the focus activated. How will you use yours?

 

E Release Test drive

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Daniel Schenkelberg is a professional photographer based in California who has a passion for motorsports. His experience and dedication to the motorsports community is unmatched and gives him great insight for how to set up an epic shot for eye-popping shots whether it’s captured with a handheld or remote camera. Daniel likes to use remote cameras triggered by PocketWizard in order to get an unusual perspective close to the action while staying safe.

The Super Bowl of Off-Road Racing

In September, Daniel made a trip to capture the Crandon World Cup in Wisconsin – often called the “Super Bowl of short course off-road racing”. We gave him an early version of the E Release to see how it would perform.

Typical RF Challenges

Something that Daniel knows is that setting up remote cameras isn’t always foolproof – especially in a crowded and RF noisy environment like a racetrack. The radios communicate with radio waves and radio signal interference can impact the success of a remote camera set-up causing missed shots. A set up done early in the day, might not work later in the day once the environment fills with cars, people, and more electronic equipment. Some things that can interfere with signal transmission include:

  • Metal objects
  • Concrete or rock objects
  • High water-content objects (People and trees are mostly water!)
  • Electronic “noise” (In a racing scenario, there might be high voltage ignition systems that create electronic noise not to mention a sound system or television crew.)

The E Release is more Resilient to RF Interference

Because of the track set up, Daniel had to set up his remote camera a little further than he usually does – about 250 feet away – almost the length of a football field. The non-ideal conditions and the distance might trip up another radio trigger – but not PocketWizard. The truth is that the E Release upgrade has new technology that makes our PocketWizard radios particularly resilient to RF interference and noise.

Map showing location of Daniel (lower dot) and his remote camera 253 feet away.

More Shots than Ever

Using the E Release, Daniel came out of the event with some epic shots. His feedback was short and sweet.


“The radios were incredibly reliable. I came home with more shots than I have ever captured before.”

~ Daniel Schenkelberg

Thanks for taking it on a test drive Daniel! We don’t want you to miss a single shot!  You can check out more of Daniel’s work on his website and get your daily dose, be sure to follow him on Instagram @danielschenkelberg!

If you would like to learn more about how to set up your own remote camera, check out this quick video.

E Release now Available Worldwide!

Users of the PocketWizard Plus III and Plus IV can now benefit from the E Release! Check out our E Release landing page for more information.

Remote Camera Set-up

Ultimate Bike Selfie

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We recently saw an amazing picture of a rider on a mountain bike trail in the UK. The photo was a selfie taken by the rider, James Vincent. He used a remote camera set up that was enabled by PocketWizard. I reached out to James to see if he could share how he set it up. 

The Bike Selfie – Born of Necessity

As well as getting paid to take photos of other mountain bikers, I spend a lot of my time testing bikes and kits for Singletrack Magazine and it’s pretty unfair to ask your riding buddies with regular jobs to sacrifice their precious weekend rides to muck around taking photos of various test kits. My need to take bike selfies is born out of necessity rather than some vain egotistical desire, or at least that’s what I tell myself anyway.

Don’t Use Cheap Triggers (You Might Crash)

This is actually the second remote trigger setup I’ve developed. Initially, I tried using cheap triggers, but they weren’t latching, and when you’re dropping in to a steep chute or jump, the last thing you want to be thinking about is moving your thumb to an awkward position and pressing a button repeatedly to get the shot.

Use the Right PocketWizard Cable

PocketWizard BT1/BT3 Cable

Fortunately, the PocketWizard Plus III has an input for an external trigger cable and using a button trigger cable (BT1 or BT3) with a little bit of tape to lock it “on”, I could send a continuous signal to the receiver unit that’s hooked up to the camera so that I was free to focus on riding the section cleanly.

 

The Selfie Set-up

You will need 2 PocketWizard radios set to the same channel. Put one on your camera and mount the other on your bike. Pop your camera on your trusty tripod of choice and frame the shot, then set your focus on the feature before switching the camera to manual focus mode (the last thing you’ll want after all this is to miss focus). Get in place and when you are ready, press the remote trigger, lock it down with the tape, and get your hands back to a comfortable position just before you drop into the feature. Once you hit the jump and clear the section, remove the tape.  Simples.

Use Relay Mode to Pop a Flash in your Selfie

Want to pop a flash? You will need a third PocketWizard radio attached to your flash with a flash sync cable. This Channel needs to be set 1 Channel higher than the other 2 radios in order to work. This is called Relay Mode.

PocketWizard Cable Inspiration

Inspired?  Our Button Trigger cable is just one of the specialty cables we offer to help you pull off your own epic selfie.

 

3 Tips to Improve your Sports Photography

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Spring sports are in full swing!  We asked our friend and sports photographer Robert Hanashiro to share some of his tips for capturing that epic shot – you know the kind…not just capturing peak action, but the spirit of the game. We hope you enjoy this guest blog by Robert, and if these three tips get you hungry for more, check out the Sports Shooter Academy that is happening next week in California.  

Sports Photography by Guest Blogger: Robert Hanashiro 

I admit it. I am a big fan of NCIS. The long-running series about a Naval criminal investigation team revolves around former Marine “gunny” Leroy Jethro Gibbs, a steely-eyed no-nonsense team leader played by Mark Harmon.

As any fan of the show knows, Gibbs has a list of 36 rules that not only influence the lives of him and his team but are also life lessons unto themselves.

I hold a sports photography workshop in Southern California where we take students, working photographers and aspiring sports shooters to cover various events. Sports like college baseball, football, track & field, water polo, soccer and basketball, mixed in with horse racing, surfing, boxing and beach volleyball make up the Sports Shooter Academy schedule.

So in the spirit of “Gibb’s List” here are Bert Hanashiro’s Top Three Sports Shooting Tips:

1) Shoot Through The Play (and Don’t Chimp)

Just because the base runner has been tagged out at home plate or a receiver has made an acrobatic catch doesn’t mean the action is over or a cool moment won’t happen. One of the most aggravating things I see when I am out covering a sports assignment is seeing photographers habitually looking at the screen on the back of their camera an instant after a play. “Chimping” — looking at the LCD screen — is a disease that needs a cure. Maybe a slap on the back of the head like Gibbs does when one of his team screws up?

Irvine Valley College Men’s Baseball vs Santa Ana on April 27, 2018.

We all want that instant gratification of seeing a remarkable play we captured— or what we think is a remarkable play. Digital cameras are remarkable tools. But constantly looking at the LCD screen serves no real purpose other than take your eye and concentration away from the game. That remarkable image you captured ain’t going anywhere. So, stay focused on covering that game, you can look at it when there is a break in the action, during a timeout or when the game is over.

2) Clean Up Those Crappy Backgrounds

Camera auto-focus is so good these days that anyone that can afford to buy the latest, greatest camera and telephoto lens can make claim to be a “sports shooter.” But just because that running back or point guard is tack sharp does not make you a real Sports Shooter. One of the telltale signs of someone who is, what I call a “camera pointer” rather than a photographer, is cluttered, distracting, messy backgrounds.

Using telephoto lenses with a wide-open aperture to limit the depth of field is one way to clean up those crappy backgrounds. Another is to look for an elevated spot to shoot from. This serves three purposes. First, it moves the distracting background out of your angle of view, so the field essentially becomes your background. The second cool thing about shooting from a high vantage point is that it gives you a different and often unique look at the game. The third thing is the light is different from above and you can use shadows creatively.

Player dives for the ball during play at the AVP Beach Volleyball tournament Thursday.
Photo by Russell Hons/Sports Shooter Academy

3) Use A Remote Camera to Give the Viewer a Different Perspective

Rigging a remote camera can accomplish a couple of things, the most important is giving your viewer a unique, different look at the sports you’re covering. You can place a remote camera in places that you cannot stand while covering a game, or place it in a spot that gives you an unique angle. The other purpose a remote camera gives a Sports Shooter is providing an alternative angle. For instance, if you’re covering a basketball game, you can use a remote camera on the opposite side of the court so you can literally be in two places at one time.

4/28/18: Behind the scenes with the cast and crew of Sports Shooter Academy 15 in Orange County, California. The Sports Shooter Academy Workshops are sponsored by Nikon Professional Services (www.nikonpro.com). ©sportsshooteracademy

There are several caveats using remote cameras and the foremost is safety. With all aspects of sports photography, “safety first” is always #1. Be very careful where you rig your camera, make sure your camera is away from players, referees, fans, popcorn vendors, and others that potentially could bumping into it. If you are rigging a camera high, use safety cables for both the lens and camera body. If you’re in an unfamiliar venue, check with the management about any rules they have concerning remote cameras.

After you’ve rigged your remote, ask for help to pre-focus your lens by getting a stand-in. I cannot tell you how many remote photos I’ve lost because I wasn’t as careful to pre-focus as I should have been. And always, always, always, get to the game early, even more so if you are planning on rigging a remote. Of course the best method to trigger your remote camera is a radio transceiver made by PocketWizard. (Note: I am not being paid by PocketWizard to mention their products or to write this post!) I have been using PocketWizard radios with great success for about 30 years at some of the biggest events (Olympic Games, NBA Finals, NCAA Tournament, World Series, NHL Stanley Cup) to the smallest (youth league sports).

Competitors in the men’s 3000m steeplechase leap into the water on the first lap during the Steve Scott Invitational at UC Irvine in Irvine, CA on Saturday, April 28, 2012.

Thanks Robert for the great tips! If you’re inspired to learn more, it’s not too late to register for next week’s event, but hurry, there are only a couple of slots open. If next week is not in the cards for you, look for their future academies and start planning now!