On Sunday I had the great assignment, part of the season opening at FC St. Pauli to be. How I reported The professional team cabin was redesigned for the new 2019/20 season. At the season opening on Sunday, fans were allowed to shape the locker room to their liking in certain areas. There was also the opportunity to take a photo in front of the new skull. That was my part. In three hours I took photos in far too small a space under rather chaotic circumstances. It's best if I show you a photo of the circumstances first so that you can better assess the situation.
© Photo by Ariane Gramelspacher
The ventilation in the crew cabin is designed for roughly 11 people. So you can pretty much imagine what the air was like. Nevertheless, everyone present was totally relaxed and super friendly. What was helpful was the absolutely professional work of the security employee Gabi and the best photo assistant you can imagine: Eva Kalla! A big thank you to both of you!
I summarized the result in a quick runthrough
Before the photo shoot, there was a training session on the sacred lawn. The stands were not as packed as those responsible might have hoped. I could also imagine that the performance on the pitch wasn't that exciting - but warming up properly is also part of it.
For me, however, the opening of the season was a celebration from a photographic perspective because I was able to move around freely. And even more important: I didn't have to shoot over any advertising hoardings. The view from grass level is different and makes players and coaches look better. However, you also have to be careful because the lawn slopes away to the sides at Millerntor. If you shoot too close to the turf, you'll steal the players' feet. That doesn't look like that either.
For the photo nerds among us: the cabin pictures are with the Nikon z7 photographed. Thanks to the camera's USB-C connection, I was able to transfer the images directly to the Macbook without any hassle and immediately present the finished photo to those photographed. The connection was absolutely seamless thanks to Capture One and the editing was automatically added to each image. All I had to do was write down the email address for the corresponding image in the IPTC tags. So there could be no mix-ups. However, out of 130 emails sent, 5 were returned because of the wrong address - so if anyone is still missing their picture, I would be happy to hear from you. All other pictures were in high resolution in the email mailboxes on Sunday evening.
I am very happy that I was able to contribute my part to the success of the season opening at FC St. Pauli with the photo campaign. In any case, I received flattering feedback from a lot of people. My favorite comment on the photos is:
If the team plays football similar to the one you photograph, promotion would be assured. At least the 6 points from the derbies 😉
Of course it's unfair to compare a lone fighter with a team sport with opponents involved, but I still have nothing against the 6 points in the derby. After all, the home derby is taking place on my birthday and celebrating with almost 30000 people would be a great gift.
Hmm. Quite honest and personal opinion: I don't like many of the portrait photos.
I watched each one (and lowered the playback speed to 0.25 and diligently pressed pause). I can't really describe what exactly bothers me, but I think what bothers me is mostly the processing or filter you applied. In my opinion, the people look totally unnatural, more like an oil painting, some are even downright disfigured (I won't give you any particularly striking examples out of consideration for the people in question) - but not what they looked like. If your intention was to make oil paintings from the photos - you succeeded. But portraying the people as they were – no.
I think you tweaked the controls a little too much when it came to the intensity of the editing - because I know that I otherwise like your portrait photos. But here, in this case – no, really not my case. As I said, too much like watercolor and artificial HDR, very strange impression.
Hi Stefan, thank you for your detailed feedback. Apart from the fact that there is no accounting for taste and the rough look was a requirement from the client, I think the effect you describe is more likely due to the conversion to video. You are not seeing the original images here, but a screencast of a "slideshow" on my laptop, which I then shrunk and converted to FullHD. The video was more for illustrating the masses and not for individual viewing - but of course it's nice that you made the effort.
Maybe take another look at the official kit release image as it's the same edit. Or you can take a look at Eva Kalla on Facebook, where you will see the picture in better quality.
Apart from that, I would have preferred a second light from behind for better three-dimensionality, but that wasn't possible due to lack of space.