Just A Man With A Camera

If you read my post from earlier in March, you would know that I had a gig coming up to  be the ringside photographer for Souris Valley Wrestling, a local independant wrestling company. It may be a small show but it was an very exciting oppourtunity for me.  Photography and professional wrestling have been two of my passions for the majority of my life, so the oppourtunity to finally combine the two was very exciting to me. The big day finally came on April 10th. There was a lot of anxiety going into it about whether I knew what I was doing, and if my gear would perform well enough. Considering it was my first time attempting to shoot wrestling, I'm happy to say that I think it went pretty well.

It was definitly a different kind of shooting experience for me. One of the things I have often struggled with when shooting events where there are paying customers for a show, is that I often feel like I'm in the way.  This often happens to me when I am shooting bands. People paid good money to see the show, not have some guy get in the way. Luckily, my wife was there to remind me multiple times that I was being paid to get in the way.

The first of five matches for the night was really felt like I was just getting my bearings. I knew where they women would be entering from, but I found myself in what I thought was the wrong position for their entrances. During the match I stayed further back and zoomed in to try and catch action but wasn't feeling like I was really getting exactly what I wanted. I needed to get closer to the ring, but that anxiety of getting in the way as well as a bit of my good old fashioned social anxienty was keeping me further back than where I should have been. However, as the next couple of matches went on I got more and more comfortable getting right up there even if it was from one particular corner that I think my brain thought was safe. I got some fun images of men and women flying through the air and doing all kinds of crazy cool shit. As intermission hit I felt like I was starting to sink into this role. 

...and then the weapons came out. Just when I was getting the hang of getting close shooting wrestlers inside the ring, I was learning to chase them around the outside of the ring and keep my distance. Like some kind of wartime correspondant, I wanted to be near the action, but had no intention of catching a piece of shrapnel from one of the exploding doors that each man was blasted through.

I think by far the most challenging part of the night came from the main event, it was a 3-way dance between a trio of increadible luchadors. It was fast paced. They were flying all over the ring. Oh and did I mention that there were three of them to try and keep track of? The tag match earlier in the night may have had more competors, but they were easier to keep track of. These three were all over the place. It didn't help that by this point in the evening my legs were starting to get mad at me for not doing any kind of stretching or warming up, because I had basically been doing lunges, squats, and power walking around the hall for the last hour and a half.

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The evening came to a close, and as my wife and I made hour and a half-ish drive home, the anxiety of "did I even get anything good?" started to creep in. Did I get any decent action shots? Was I able to capture enough(or any) emotion? Did these entrances look good? All these little things creeping into my over stimulated brain. 

However, over the course of the following week I rolled photos out to the promoter match by match, and with each positive reaction all that anxiety was washed away and  replaced by excitement. The promotor and the wrestlers were happy and excited with what I did, and I have already been asked back for the next show. It was validating. I went in feeling like I had no idea what I was doing, started the editing process feeling like I didn't have enough good images, and finished patting myself on the back for job well done all things considered. It was a very challenging event to shoot because the action was fast, unpredictable, and I often found myself feel like I was out of position for big moves or an entrances. However, that's just how the learning processes works and I'm grateful that I found a company willing to take let a guy whose never done this before take a stab at it. I learned some lessons about what to do, what not to do, and how I can improve next time. Most importantly, I had a blast doing it!

Recently I purchased a new-to-me WWE Elite Legends Ted Dibiase figure, with the explicit purpose of getting some photos of it to try and sell at an upcoming market that I will be attending, and where the Million Dollar Man himself will be a celebrity guest. Not only am I hoping to sell a print or two, I want to get one for myself to have him sign a piece of my own artwork of him. He came included with two different heads, two sets of hands, his Million Dollar championship belt, and a briefcase. The accessory he didn't come with was cash, and I thought that the Million Dollar Man needed a little money to throw around. To remedy this I first looked on Amazon to order a small pile of fake bills in the right scale, but I quickly found a very easy tutorial on how to print your own money that scales correctly with action figures of this size.

A month or so ago I did two courses on Linkdin Learning that focused on composition. One thing that the instructor really tried to hammer home was the idea of working the shot. Don't just go with the first photo or setup you shoot. It's hardly a new concept to me, but since I took that course it has been a phrase that has bounced through my head whenever I am shooting. So I wasn't happy with that first shot, so I kept working it.  For the background, I use a computer monitor with that image on it.  So I moved him closer to it, farther from it, centered him better, and just played with the figure and my camera distance until I found the framing that I liked. Anyone who knows what that background is will recognize the WWF New Generation archway so I wanted to make sure even a little part of the WWF logo was in the shot as well as the colours of the top of the arch. However even once the positioning was in place it was still missing something. So to fill it the empty space around him and emphasize the fact that he is the Million Dollar Man, I took bursts of images where I would drop money all around him. I took well over a hundred bust images, sifted through them and found what I thought was the best looking ones.  Then I stacked them all together in Affinity photo blended the best parts all together into one cohesive image where money is raining down all around him.

In the end I am really happy with how this image turned out.  It satisfied that stuck feeling that I wrote about in my last post, I made use of something I learned in one of the courses I've recently taken, I felt productive making props, and it produced an image that I am confident enough with that I think I can sell a copy or two of.  Hopefully this is a positive sign of things to come, and a turn around for how I've been feeling lately.

For this week, my wife was in need some some photos for her Bookstagram page where she talks about what she's been reading.  She ordered us some string lights and lightbackdrop for us to run them behind and we were both very happy with the results! It was a good excuse to get out the studio lights and get some practice in.

This came from my trip to a local independant wrestling show that I wrote about in a previous post. Of all the images I took that night this was the one I was most proud of.  The look in his eyes and the blood on his face tell the story of a fighter who was taken to his limit but still came up short because the new champ is being handed the belt behind him.

After what felt like a long absense full of creative blocks, I sat down to shoot some toys to try and get some new prints for some upcoming markets. This Mewtwo took a little bit of work to clean up in post, but I really like how the colours from the lights matched his skintone, and complimented the background I found. I just sent this off to get a couple 8x10s made to test at my next market.

March 28

I'm going to be honest, I'm not crazy about this picture. In the moment I just needed something to keep myself on my weekly schedule and I was just kind of working the idea I had out.  Ultimately I ended up with another image that I am much happier with and am getting printed right now and that process is going to be the subject of my next full blog post so I'm not going to get into that here. That is going to be another one that will be for sale at upcoming markets, as well as what I am going to get autographed by the real man who is represented in plastic form next month at Popcon YXE. 

I feel stuck, and I feel like this has been a long winter. Spring really can't kick into gear fast enough. My wife and I may have gone on a nice warm vacation in January, but mentally and creatively I have just been feeling stuck, isolated, and like I have been cooped up in the house for too long. I'm just not sure how else to describe it.  It's not as thought I don't have things coming up that I'm not looking forward to.  Next month, I have a gig coming up shooting for an indy wrestling company. In May I will be a vendor at Popcon YXE and possibly the Regina Catherdral Village Arts Fest street fair, and I have a couple more later in the year lined up. So things are going to be happening, but creatively I feel like I have just been in a holding pattern for awhile.

Right now I feel like this stuck feeling is coming from the toy photography side of things. I have gotten to a point where I like my work, and I enjoy doing creative portraits of these figures. However, I feel like I need to take things to the next level with more dynamic and elaborate sets, and more creative setups. One of the problems is, I sit down at my desk and just get paralyzed not knowing what step to take next or where to even start. This isn't the first time this has happened to me, and not just regarding artistic projects but I've also experienced this with trying to start home repair projects or even just trying to come up with an exercise plan.

I recently read an article on Peta Pixel about photographer Chuck Eiler. He's creates some outstanding work in the realm of toy photography, and as the headline says, it looks cinematic.  Each image is a well thought out piece of art that tells a story of some kind. Not just a character posing, but a memorable concept that catches the eye. The article he states that he approaches every photograph with storytelling at the forefront. He doesn't just wing it (which is the trap that I feel like I have fallen into as of late), and before even starting the process, he makes sure he has a concept locked down.

I've read this article several times, and have come to the realization that I haven't been aproaching this problem in the correct way. I need to treat each photo not as just getting something done and churned out where I feel like I've "winged it". Instead I need to start treating each one as an individual art project. If I need to spend a weekend building a set or props, then I need to spend a weekend building a set and building props. Ideally, gradually those sets and props I accumulate will help to set up further projects and make them easier going forward and potentially make the process easier.  

The thing is, It's not like I haven't done this in the past, it just feels like I haven't done any of it lately and most of the attempts I have made at it have somewhat fallen flat for me and didn't turn out the way I was envisioning them. That being said, as I have been writting this, I came to realize I did have a piece turn out recently that perhaps I should be giving myself a little credit for. I came up with the idea of Vegita standing over a defeated foe (in this case Goku), crafted a crater out of foam(then let it sit unused for several months), found an appropriate background, and eventually followed through on it. It feels small and somewhat insignificant, maybe because it is a small not-so-elaborate setup. But it was does fit the criteria of what I'm trying to accomplish. I just wish I could push myself to expand on this further.

It has just been a struggle getting out this slump and breaking through the barrier that my mind has seemingly created for me.  It's about trying to find focus, locking in on an end goal and following through. So that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to start at square one, make a list of the things I need to do, and just start crossing off that list until I have a completed project.  It may sound obvious and simple, but sometimes it's difficult to get your body and mind to start moving on those simple things. The plan is to start with building props and accumulating items that could fit in a the lab of a mad scientist. Starting with an idea for a photo I have involving the Universal Frankstein's Monster. It's also a potentially versatile set that in the future could stand in for an number of science labs or science fiction settings. Following that I have something in mind involving the Gillman from Creature from the Black Lagoon, but one thing at a time. What I don't want to do is get too gung ho about making more elaborate sets and then be back at square one, because I didn't end up actually seeing any individual project all the way through. 

I love professional wrestling. Not everyone gets it, and that's fine. Personally, I don't understand the cult-like dedication people have to their particular sports teams. I fell in love with wrestling around the year 2000 when I was 15. I lost track of it around 2006 when in a pre-streaming world I couldn't keep up with it anymore because I didn't have cable (and admittedly was tired of being made fun of for enjoying it by my then girlfriend as well as other friends and family). But in late 2015 through Youtube list videos and old highlights, my new girlfriend(and now wife), and a friend who was simultaneously redsicovering the sport, that spark reignited and by 2016 I was back with a vengeance making up for lost time.  Not only was I catching up on what I missed in my 10ish year gap, but also learning about what I missed pre-2000 and everything else I could get my hands on. 

What many people don't realized is that it's one thing to watch a show on TV, but there's nothing quite like going to live show especially if you can get close to the ring. I've been to other live professional sports and nothing is quite the same as live pro-wrestling. I have had the priviledge of being able to sit ringside for a few WWE and AEW shows, but something I have never taken proper advantage of is going to my local independant promotion, Ringside Wrestling. Pre-covid my wife and I went to a handful of shows, and at the time I always thought it would be a fun challenge to do photography for them. However at the time there were a few problems with that: I don't know anyone connected with them or how to reach out to them about the oppourtunity, I had no appropriate gear, and at the time even if the first two criteria were met I did not have the confidence to do it. 

If you read my last post, you may remember that I have a photography gig coming up. It's with a different small indy company who has a show coming up, Souris Valley Wrestling. A friend and local business owner who is one of the show sponsors encouraged me to reach out to them when they put out a call for a photographer. At first I wasn't sure if I should throw myself out there, but when I look back at those three things that would have held me back a few years ago, they don't exist anymore. I have a referal and potential in with the company, I have the gear, and eventhough I have never done it before dammit I actually think that I can do this. So I reached out to the promoter on Instagram, and after a short back and forth, I got the gig! I am excited to say the least. As a lifelong wrestling fan, I am stoked to be ringside with my camera for the first time.

A problem is, while I know my gear is good for action I have never put it to the test. That's where Ringside Wrestling comes back into the picture. Last weekend they had one of their monthly shows. It's been more than a few years since we attented, so it felt like the perfect oppourtunity for me to get off the couch and support a local comany as well as test some of those camera settings that I've never touched but am going to need.  Even though I was there just a spectator, I was close enough that I could try and get some shots, and for the most part I think it went well. 

I thought the high ISO performance was excellent. I was shooting at 3200 ISO to be able to reach a fast enough shutter speed to freeze action, and I think it looked very good and with little noticeable noise. Honestly, I am still not used to ISOs that high looking as good as they do. The ProCap modes on the OM1 are a godsend. They start capturing images into the buffer after half pressing the shutter and when you fully press the shutter it lets of a huge burst of images. One drawback is the buffer fills up quickly when you are shooting at 50fps. I could definitly benefit from a faster memory card to clear out that buffer faster. That being said, the 50fps bursts are amazing for capturing action like this, and to provide so many options in post as you can see below.

One other concern I had was how the focus tracking was going to perform. While it may not have always locked in quite right, for the most part it did the job.  In the photo below, I was started shooting with tighter framing of the wrestler standing on the turnbuckle, and then both zoomed out and panned across as he dropped an elbow, and the focus stayed locked in. However, there were other times where it would hunt to someone that was closer resulting in the subject I wanted to be in focus becoming a total blur. 

Since landing this gig I have been researching what I should be shooting by watching videos from other photogrpahers on youtube, searching out any articles I can find, and reading reddit threads. You can have all the tech in the world but if you don't get the right coverage then what's the point. So outside of technical concerns, something I wanted to test was whether I could take enough photos to capture the story of the match. In some cases, the answer was not so much, but I think the limitation of me being a spectator played a role in that. I think even with my limited mobility (aka sitting or standing at my seat) I was able to do decent job, which has given me confidence going forward. I was able to capture some good action that evening, but my favourite photo of the night was the one below from the ending of the main event.  The new champion being presented with his belt in the background, and the defeated villain with a shocked face full of blood. This wasn't a result of just pointing, firing a burst, and hoping for the best. I saw the moment coming, I locked in, and captured the moment. 

So all in all it felt like a good test of my skill and equipment that filled me with confidence for this upcoming oppourtity.  Will it lead to more oppourtunities going forward? Who knows. I'm not getting my hopes up, because I'm just focusing on being excited for this first shoot.  Not only to take some pictures, but to also be involved in a wrestling promotion, even in just a minor way, for just an evening. It's a new way for me to combine my passions and hobbies and honestly, the idea kind of it makes me feel a little bit like the kid that fell in love with wrestling in the first place.

Can you believe it, I have actually kept up with two of my goals for they year: a new blog post every two weeks, and a new weekly photo posted to my Bluesky page every weekend! Here's a look back at Febuary!

He's the best there is at what he does and what he does isn't very nice.  This little portrait was taken during a weekend where I spent time customizing this Marvel Legeneds Wolverine. It's not much, but I tried to do my quick take on a classic wolvering portrait. If only I could un warp the tip of that right claw. I will always have an attachment to this character. The first X-Men movie came out at just the right time for me being the 15 year old comic book nerd who could grow bushy muttonchops. He was just too cool. When this movie came out and we finally got the yellow and blue suit, I think I could go the rest of my life without another new superhero movie. It doesn't get much better than that for me. 

Febuary 14

Last month I featured a photo of my wife's nails, and I think it's going to become a regularly occuring feature on my page so get used to it. She gets them done about every three weeks, so that is a new subject to attempt to feature in a unique way every three weeks. This last time she asked the nail tech at her salon to make them Arizona Green Tea themed so we found a carton of tea (not the classic can, we couldn't find one anywhere we went that day) and found a creative way to feature them using a mirror. While we were shooting I wasn't sure how I would feel about how it would turn out, but in the edit I found that I really liked this one. It felt like a unique experiment, and I look forward to trying to find creative ways to feature her nails in a photo ever month.

Febuary 21

I love pro wrestling. I love action figures. I love photography. Combining all three just makes sense right? I had not played much with these Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens (two of my favourite modern wrestelers) figures since I got them last year.  It started out with the two of them reversed, but I just couldn't get Sami in the position I wanted. After shooting around this pose I landed here. This was an attempt at recreating one particular moment from their match last year at Elimination Chamber which was, as good ol' Jim Ross would say: an absolute slobernocker of a match. Almost a year later it is the last match Kevin Owens has competed in due to serious injuries.  If it is the end, he went out on a hell of a high note with his best friend in the business. 

February 28

I came home from work one night on this particular week with the plan that I was going to go out and photograph signage around the city. Any of the few neon signs that look good lit up at night. The barely lit sign of a dieing hotel. But then I was reminded of this place. It's a little dive bar, tucked away in the corner of a strip mall in the south end of Regina. The kind of place that hasn't looked any different since the first time I was there in 2003. The kind of place to that has a charming dank pit type of vibe, where you can go do karaoke, get in a fight, drink the worst beer you've ever tasted served by the grumpirst waitress you have ever met. It's the closest thing this town has to Moe's Tavern. I don't know if this image conveys any of that, but I liked the way the angle of the awning matched the lines of the bricks, following down to the sidewalk, and further to the painted line on the parking lot. Just lots of lines that look like a satisfying pattern to my eyes.

I've got an Instagram problem. Frankly, I've become less and less of a fan of social media in general over the last couple years. But in particular I really, really dislike Meta as a company. Facebook, Threads, Instagram. Over the years I've had a few different Instagram accounts, both personal and for creative projects. At the moment I only have my personal account and the only posting I do is resharing things I find funny or interesting to my stories. The last page I had that was for a creative endevour that was dedicated to toy photography and other related interests. I got to a point where I was getting down on myself a little too much for comparing my work to others, and questioning why other arguably less impressive work was getting more likes, follows, shares, etc. I think about it now and I recognize that it was silly to allow myself to get into that headspace, but honestly one of the best things I could have done was get rid of that page. It reset my way of thinking about what it is that I enjoy about photography. I enjoy taking photos for how I feel about them, not how an algorithm feels about them. So I wasn't really enjoying my time on the platform, and then the last straw was seeing all the techbros suck up to the Trump administration which made me say screw it and I nuked the account.  However, I did hold onto my personal account because I still use it regularly for both sharing other content, connecting with friends and family, and honestly all the cute animal videos (part of how my wife and I unwind every night is by scrolling new photos and videos from the animal rescues and other pet pages we follow). I've thought often about deactivating it but just can't seem to pull the trigger on it. As much as I dislike Meta I just can't completely disconnect from that damn platform and I have kind of just accepted that for the time being.  

BUT here's a problem I seem to continually run into. Ever since I made the decision to both start attempting to sell my work and chasing down the occasional gig,  I have been told that I need to create an Instagram page specifically for my work. Is it a good idea? Probably. Obvously it's a platform that has a massive reach. But I'll be damned if the idea of creating another page for my work and another form of social media to monitor doesn't turn my stomach.  What is it about Instagram that feels like it is so essenstial and does it even work as well as anyone claims it does, especially for photographers these day. When the platform is dominated by reels, what does photography even mean for it? Does it actually drum up business and generate sales? Do followers and likes really even mean anything? It's no secret that photography has become less and less relevant on that platform over the years, as it strives to become Tik Tok(the platform, I have never and will never join).

The real advantage that I have experienced is networking aspect of it. I have found and gotten into multiple art markets because of Instagram and the ability to connect with vendors there. I have a event photography gig coming up(that I am very excited about) which is a direct result of being able to connect with a client on Instagram.  So the logical part of my brain says "yes, it is a good thing to have an active presence there", but in my gut and my heart, I just can't stand it. Especially in the state that it is in currently. So much of it is ads, AI generated reels, and influencer content.

So what is the alternative? Another social media platform that doesn't have the reach that Instagram does? I do use Bluesky regularly, and while I don't see all that influencer and AI content, what I usually get when I say Bluesky is "what's that?".  I have also been trying to currate somewhat of a portfolio on Flickr, but it feels like the problem there is that no one is going to just happen across that the way they will with Instagram. I have recently read about Vero and Foto which sound promising.  Foto is specifically aimed at photography and photographers which sounds very appealing. Something that I really need to do is create a website. A place that is mine where I can show off my work and advertise myself. However,  more and more I'm feeling the pull  to just bite the bullet and set up a new Instagram page, if only for the networking and marketting side of things. But again, the idea of setting up more social media, especially on that platform slightly makes my stomach turn. The way it does not cater to photography any longer really makes it feel like it would nothing but alot of work and attention, for my work to feed an algorithm, train their AI on my work, and for Meta to gain ad revenue from my work.  Now, I understand that this may just be the cost of being able to build a small following and business for free on their platform, but it all still just does not feel right to me. It was not long ago that these things didn't exist. Why do are these platforms such a necessity?

To whoever has made it this far, what are your thoughts? How do you feel about Instagram, and what if any benefits do you see from it? Is there a better solution that I am not aware of and should investigate? Drop a comment down below and thanks for reading!