No, I'm not in Oklahoma City chasing Sonics' owner Clay Bennett, nor am shooting "man-on-the-street" interviews with Oklahomans on their opinion of Kevin Durant.

I'm here for the Women's College World Series, which is one of the most fun (funnest? Was I really an English major?) events I've covered.

In fact, I wrote an article about my last time here back in 2000 for Sportsshooter.com that you can read here.

Washington won behind Danielle Lawrie's no-hitter, but the best photos I shot were of DePaul catcher Jackie Tarulli-Fisher diving for a popped up bunt attempt by Washington's Alicia Matthews.

I think this first frame captures more "peak action", but is slightly "front-focused". That means the sharpest part of the focus isn't on the player's face, but forward of her (towards my lens). If you look close, the focus is sharpest on the softball:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 300mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 200, 1/1600 sec., f4.0)

The second frame is a bit sharper, but a little less "peak action". Also going for this one is the background is "cleaner" as the fence is gone from the top of the frame.

Still, both are pretty compelling. It will be interesting if and how one of these will play in the newspaper. After all, it's a DePaul player and not a Husky:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 300mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 200, 1/1600 sec., f4.0)

Which do you prefer?

Athletes sometimes speak of being "in the zone".

No, not the diet from the '90's.

The phrase refers to being in a physical and mental space where everything comes together and the results are perfect.

Of course, photographers aren't going to score 80 points in a night like Kobe, or shoot 10-under par like Tiger. Heck, most of us run the 40-yard dash in just under a minute, and that's usually only if there's a pizza waiting for us at the other end.

But still, we have our occasional good days. And I have plenty of bad ones, including the days I can't even do the basics of my job like spel correctely.

On Saturday, I had one of those good days. Shot three games (one softball, two baseball), and good images found their way into my lenses at each of them.

My schedule was hectic, with a UW softball game at noon, followed by one at 2:30, if they lost the first one (which they didn't, thankfully). Then, headed to Safeco Field for the 3A boys baseball finals at 4pm, and the 4A finals at 7pm.

Postseason games are loaded with emotion, which can make shooting pictures easier, obviously. But I still find a lot of challenge in making a GREAT photo out of these "loaded" situations, and too often I come away at the end of the day less-than-satisfied with my results.

But as I said at the top, I was in a bit of a zone, or a bit of a zone found me.

Either way, I'll take it, and so will my editors.

UW softball game down to a single play in the top of the seventh inning that broke open a tie game and sent the Huskies to the College Softball World Series.

With two runners on, Husky Lauren Greer lined a ball back up the middle, and from my spot shooting above the centerfield fence I knew that Washington's Dominique Lastrapes would try to score from second base.

In these cases, focusing on the catcher is a solid strategy, since that's who's getting the throw to the plate.

In this frame, Lastrapes (in purple), collides with the Alabama catcher and the ball comes loose.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens + 1.4x extender = 560mm, ISO 200, 1/1600 sec., f4.0)

Next, Lastrapes loses her footing during the collision.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens + 1.4x extender = 560mm, ISO 200, 1/1600 sec., f4.0)

Finally, Lastrapes is sent sprawling towards home plate as the ball squirts away.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens + 1.4x extender = 560mm, ISO 200, 1/1600 sec., f4.0)

What happens next is a little crazy (and sent the Alabama coach into a frenzy about the Huskies interfering with a live ball as they headed towards the plate to congratulate Lastrapes).

The ball squirted behind the group of Huskies and as the 'Bama player goes to retrieve it, she has to get around the Washington players.

It's at this point that I realize another runner is heading home (Washington's Dena Tyson), so I focus back at the plate and get this celebration shot of Tyson after she slides home safely to give the Huskies a 7-5 lead. This is first of a series of nice frames, but I think it's the best in terms of pure joy:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens + 1.4x extender = 560mm, ISO 200, 1/1600 sec., f4.0)

Next, she celebrates with teammates and the disappointed Alabama pitcher provides a nice contrast in emotion:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens + 1.4x extender = 560mm, ISO 200, 1/1600 sec., f4.0)

The player jumping behind Tyson (Nichole Mooyen) makes this photo nice:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens + 1.4x extender = 560mm, ISO 200, 1/1600 sec., f4.0)

This one's not as strong, but has more faces:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens + 1.4x extender = 560mm, ISO 200, 1/1600 sec., f4.0)

After the game, I noticed two UW players going for the water cooler, and snuck around to be in the right position for the celebratory "dousing" of coach Heather Tarr, who is taking her team to her first World Series:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 16-35mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 200, 1/1000 sec. @ f4.0)

Each of the celebration photos is strong enough to be a lead photo on our sports section, but as luck and planning would have it, UW softball was going to be a secondary (read, "small") photo on the cover.

So, it was off to baseball to try to make an even stronger photo since that was planned for the sports centerpiece (read, "big") photo.

(But not before talking to the sports designers, begging and pleading to no avail to have UW softball be our centerpiece).

So, down at Safeco, near the end of Issaquah's upset of Auburn, I had to make a decision on where to position myself.

As the majority of the seats in Safeco were empty and there were banners hanging from the front of the dugouts, I chose a spot where I was looking back towards the outfield where the backgrounds would be cleaner.

I decided that the 400mm lens would be too tight, and put an extender on my 70-200mm zoom, giving me just a bit extra length.

The negative to this is that I lose a stop of light in order to gain the focal length, AND, the lens is harder to keep in focus.

But again, the "zone" saved me, and the Issaquah players jumped, then piled, then fell in a heap right towards me:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 70-200mm/f2.8 lens + 1.4 extender, ISO 640, 1/640 sec. @ f4.5)

The only thing I didn't like was that the player at top is cropped out a bit. In the following frame, his right hand is in front of his face, and that ruined the frame.

Auburn, the losing team, is also in our readership area, so I moved two photos of their team's dejection. The first featured that strange but fun baseball tradition of "rally caps" ("turn them inside out and your luck will change!):

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 400, 1/1000 sec., f2.8)

and:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 640, 1/640 sec., f4.5)

Having spoken with my editor that night (Fred Nelson) and knowing they were likely to stay as the centerpiece, I moved on to the 4A game between Snohomish and Richland.

In this game, I would be focusing mostly on Snohomish, since they are more local than Richland (from the Tri-Cities). Snohomish didn't put up much of a fight, but there was some nice action, including this Snohomish player diving for a ball in the outfield:

Early in the game was this play at the plate, where the Richland runner was tagged out at home plate. It's a nice action photo (the impact is so hard that the catcher is blurry in the photo), but it's not a story-teller as Richland won the game handily:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 640, 1/640 sec., f2.8)

And this photo of a Richland player picking off a Snohomish player is nice because you can see both of their faces:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark IIn, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 640, 1/1000 sec., f2.8)

Dejection was hard to find at the end, as the game was pretty much all Richland, all night. But this moment in the dugout told the story from Snohomish's end:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 70-200mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 1000, 1/320 sec. @ f2.8)

As Ice Cube says, "It Was a Good Day".

Sure, it was a perfect storm -- exciting plays, lots at stake for the teams involved, decent light, me actually concentrating on my job.

There are plenty of days when the ref's butt obscures the touchdown, or I choose to focus on the wrong outfielder when the ball is lined into the gap. But finding "The Zone", "Blind Luck", whatever. I'll take it every once in awhile.

Here's the sports cover from Sunday's paper:

"Press Conference".

Just seeing the words on a photo assignment sends chills down the spines of photographers everywhere.

That is, "chills of despair", not "chills of excitement".

Photographers think we hate them because press conferences are 1) staged, and 2), boring.

But I think the real reason we dislike them is that press conferences are just plain tough to shoot.

Think about it. One or more speakers at a podium or dais, with the only action being...speaking (well, occasionally there is the rising to go to the microphone, or sitting back down, but you get my point).

Trying to make a compelling photograph out of an otherwise visually "boring" situation is a challenge.

On Thursday, I was assigned to shoot a press conference in Everett regarding the condition of Washington State University (and former University of Washington) women's basketball coach June Daugherty.

On Wednesday, Daugherty suffered a cardiac episode eerily reminiscent of that of a former player of hers, Kayla Burt back in 2002.

My assignment was unusually detailed. In most cases, the photo assignment has the basic info: who, what, where, when, why. Also included is a brief (and I mean BRIEF) description of the subject and story, and some contact info.

This assignment included the following:

"Who: News conference updating condition and recovery of June Daugherty, WSU women's basketball coach who had cardiac arrest on Tuesday

What: June Daugherty's husband and assistant coach, Mike Daugherty, will be at the news conference along with Kayla Burt, former player for June at UW who also had a heart condition that ended her career. Also there will be Daugherty physician, Michael Rohrenbach.

If it's possible to get Mike Daugherty and Kayla in one frame, great. Also try to get updated face shots of all three principal people there and any graphic things that have to explain her condition."

Normally, photo assignments aren't this direct in their instructions on HOW to shoot the assignment. I think sometimes, as photographers, we get a little bent out-of-shape when we feel like people are telling us how to shoot something. Why? Because, after all, we're the ones with the cameras.

At worst, as a group we photographers can be prima-donnas who drive everyone else in the newsroom crazy with our "artiste" attitudes.

At best, we work as team players who understand that are role is just ONE cog in a larger machine that presents a story to our readers.

I TRY to keep in mind the latter, although I'm sure my bosses can find many examples of me acting like the former.

As usual, I digress.

The room at the hospital was a fairly large sized conference room, but definitely not an auditorium by any means.

In this wide shot, you can see a table for the main characters, and a lecturn and microphone for whomever's turn it was to speak. Some of Daugherty's former players sat in the front row, and reporters, cameramen, and hospital staffers comprised the rest of the people in the room.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 16-35mm lens, ISO 1000, 1/100 sec. @ f3.2)

There were only two still shooters, myself and Joe Nicholson, who was working for the Associated Press.

I thought it odd that the neither the Seattle Post-Intellegencer nor the Everett Herald decided to shoot the event. Even though it was "just" a press conference, Daugherty is a well-known figure who has been covered extensively in recent years.

The room was fairly evenly lit by overhead flourescent lights, and the television crews put up some tungsten "hot lights" that provide a continuous source of light aimed at the front of the room where the speakers would be.

Though the assignment requested a shot of what was anticipated as the three main people at the press conference (husband Mike Daugherty, former player Kayla Burt, and Dr. Michael Rohrenbach), a fourth doctor, Dr. Mahesh Mulmumudi, was also there. He's the doctor who performed the implant.

The way the table was set up, it was hard to get all four in the same frame -- there was too much space between them. So I decided to work on pairs of people, with Mike Daugherty and Kayla Burt being my main focus. After all, the Daugherty's had seen Burt through her battle with the same type of ailment, and the same procedure performed on her years ago.

In one of the first frames I made that I liked, Dr. Rohrenbach confers with Mike Daugherty.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 70-200mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 1000, 1/160 sec. @ f3.2)

Following that, Mike Daugherty put his arm around Burt in comfort and I shot that from a similar angle.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 70-200mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 1000, 1/160 sec. @ f3.2)

During most press conferences, the television cameras are stationary on tripods near the back of the room, while we still shooter scurry around the floor like little rats, trying to find different angles while trying to 1) stay out of the way of television, 2) not tripping over wires and most importantly 3) not totally disrupting the entire proceedings.

So I moved around trying different angles, and shot both "wide" and "tight".

Here's a wide-angle shot of Mike Daugherty at the microphone. One advantage of a wide-angle lens is that you can put the subject in the foreground and the background really falls away from the subject and creates isolation.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 16-35mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 1000, 1/100 sec. @ f3.2)

On another frame I used "selective focus" (choosing an area to focus on, while intentionally leaving a part of the foreground or background out-of-focus) while shooting a telephoto zoom lens.

In it, I was able to catch a nice moment of Mike Daugherty reacting with Kayla Burt in the background as they listen to the life-threatening danger that June Daugherty had been only the day before.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 70-200mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 1000, 1/125 sec. @ f2.8)

One thing every photographer looks for is "props". The hospital had provided two models of human hearts in case the doctors needed them to help explain a medical point. I tried to incorporate them into a picture of Mike Daugherty with little success.

As you can see, there was too much distance between Mike and the heart for the lens to give them both enough sharpness for the picture to communicate effectively.

In the first, you can see that Daugherty has a strong expression, but the heart appears as just a blob. And, he wasn't looking at the heart, so it wouldn't have been a very truthful photo.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 70-200mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 1000, 1/125 sec. @ f2.8)

In the second, the heart is sharp, but Daugherty is a bit too far away to be recognizable. As it turned out, neither doctor used the heart to demonstrate, so it wasn't that important.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 70-200mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 1000, 1/125 sec. @ f2.8)

Dr. Mahesh Mulumudi took to the lecturn and showed the defibrallator and I made the following two photos.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 70-200mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 1000, 1/100 sec. @ f3.2)

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 70-200mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 1000, 1/100 sec. @ f3.2)

I cropped into the latter frame to provide a close-up of the device. This way, it could be "paired" in the newspaper with a different, larger photo and yet would still be informational to the reader.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 70-200mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 1000, 1/100 sec. @ f3.2)

At the end of the press conference, I anticipated that Burt and Mike Daugherty would share a hug -- after all, it was such an emotional press conference -- Burt having had to face the same challenge as June Daugherty was facing now.

So, I moved towards the side of the room where they were, and waited to see if they would hug. I didn't want to crowd them if they did, but was shooting with my wide angle lens to capture the rest of the room if they were to embrace.

They didn't, and here's the series I shot as they got up.

Finally, I also made some frames of Mike Daugherty which didn't make the final edit, although they will be put into our photo archives. I think they have storytelling emotion, but for this assignment, I need to concentrate on the relationships between all the parties, as that was the theme of the day's story, which you can read here.

Press conferences seem easy, but I think they can be very challenging.

Within our photo department, we work hard not to take assignments "easy", but instead to work hard to make storytelling photographs with visual impact.

One of the challenges of covering sports is that deadlines often leave us trying to figure out the result or storyline of a game before it ends.

Such was the case on Saturday night, as the Seattle Storm opened their WNBA season at home against the Houston Comets.

The game tipped off at 7pm, my deadline was 9pm.

Here's the scenario: the Sports department had planned to use the game as the centerpiece, meaning it would be the main story on the page.

Games normally last just around two hours, so it was going to be close as to whether the game would be over before we had to make a decision on the sports cover picture.

As it was a Saturday night, it also meant that we have a nearly double-sized circulation, and and need to design the pages and have a "place-holder" photo in place for which we can substitute a photo from the game itself.

Since this needed to be done by 7pm, I was asked to make an "early" photo, and transmit it before tipoff.

Storm openers are nothing like baseball's Opening Day, and so the opening ceremonies consisted of a little fog, some green lights, and not much else.

The players came out of a small curtained area with the fog and the lights, but they had to dodge a chair that was in the way and the spotlights didn't pick them up until they were well on their way onto the floor.

Not a lot of "Wow!" factor, but the fans were happy, even if it lacked a lot of visual appeal.

In fact, aside from the green fog, I'm not sure it was any different than the introductions at their regular season games.

Here's the mediocre "place-holder" photo of the pregame introductions that I moved just around 7pm. To take advantage of the spot lights, I shot "ambient" light and didn't use the strobes.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 16-35mm lens @ 30mm, ISO 640, 1/200 sec., f2.8)

Here's how the page looked (keep in mind that most readers did not see this early edition of the paper, as it is printed fairly early for delivery to outlying areas):

During the first half, the story line for the Storm was the play of Iziane Castro Marques, who had 18 points early in the first half. I worked really hard to get a good photo of her.

But just my luck, as soon as I realized that she was having a phenomenal game, the Storm substituted at point guard, and Castro Marques didn't see the ball much again for the rest of the half.

And using the strobes at KeyArena, my chances were few and far between.

Here's the mediocre photo of Castro Marques:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 70-200 f2.8 lens, ISO 200, 1/250th sec., f5.6 with strobes)

In the third quarter, the Comets made a big run, and took a 22 point lead over the Storm. I figured the story line was written -- Storm gets routed in their own building on opening night.

When Sue Bird expressed her displeasure at a foul call, I thought I had a photo that would tell the story of their loss. So, I went up the photo workroom and transmitted back to the office, as I thought the outcome was solid.

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 300mm f2.8 lens, ISO 200, 1/250th sec., f5.6 with strobes)

After all, what team comes back from 22 points down halfway through the third quarter, and further, what pro team would let a team come back from that deficit?

Welcome to the WNBA, I guess, because the Storm rallied and Houston let them back into the game.

Because I was transmitting, I didn't see a lot of it, but I could hear the roar of the crowd and went back out to see if I could make a "victorious" photo in case the Storm actually pulled out a victory.

Betty Lennox is one of those emotional players whom photographers just love. She's reminiscent of players like former Husky athlete Nate Robinson, who just let their feelings loose on the court.

Her layup at the end of the third quarter helped cut the lead, and she hugged teammate Lauren Jackson:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 70-200 f2.8 lens, ISO 200, 1/250th sec., f5.6 with strobes)

As the game headed to the fourth quarter, I was emailing my photo editors, telling them that the outcome was in doubt, but that I was trying to send photos for either a winning or a losing outcome for the Storm.

Lennox again game to my rescue, with this reaction after a defensive stop:

(Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 300mm f2.8 lens, ISO 200, 1/250th sec., f5.6 with strobes)

We use Blackberry devices to email from the playing floor, since it's too loud to talk on the phone. It's important to have that communication so we can find the appropriate photos for the next day's paper.

Readers looking at the paper on Sunday would find photo of a disgusted Sue Bird that would not really "fit" if the Storm staged a victorious comeback. Conversely, a photo of Betty Lennox pumping her fist in celebration would look strange if they lost by 20 points at home.

So, we communicated, and got a representative picture on the cover of Sunday's sports section.

Tonight's Mariners game against the San Diego Padres is "Felix Hernandez Bobblehead Night".

I'm not quite sure the allure of bobbleheads, but they sure seem to draw a crowd.

However, I think fans must have missed out on a great recent giveaway -- last night I spotted reliever Sean White sporting a backpack I hadn't yet seen at the ballpark.

White was headed to the bullpen before the game, with a pink backpack on his back, wearing it like it was part of his uniform.

The questions were mind-boggling:

What was it? Where did it come from? Why is he wearing it?

On giveaway nights, the team gives bobbleheads to the first 25,000 fans.

Did we miss a night where they give away ONE pink backpack to the first rookie reliever through the turnstiles?

My journalistic instincts kicked in (yes, I actually have them. I think.)

After some tough journalistic digging that would have Woodward and Bernstein proud (okay, I just asked some players in the dugout), I found out the pack contained the gum, sunflower seeds and other snacks for the members of the bullpen to enjoy during the game.

And, apparently it is was veteran reliever J.J. Putz who had brought this particular piece of baseball equipment to the park for White to wear.

Closer inspection seems to indicate that this is a "My Little Pony" backpack (will commissioner Bud Selig insist on a licensing agreement with them?).

I'll have to ask my daughter which pony this is. However, think I can make out the words "Cupcake". I'm not sure I've heard of "Cupcake Pony". "Rainbow Dash" has always been my daughter's favorite.

And for the record, I have nothing against the color pink.

On Mother's Day against Yankees, players from both teams used pink bats in honor of the fight against breast cancer.

I often talk about my search to find the human elements in sports.

When photographing youth sports, the humanity is EVERYWHERE.

In fact, at a Little League game last night, a group of parents and I were trying hard to stifle laughter as we watched a seven-year old hopping up and down on first base, um, "holding" himself, as he obviously had to go to the boys' room.

And this was only in the FIRST inning!

I was only a spectator, and didn't have my cameras, but the player's mom had only momentary hesitation at shooting her son's predicament.

Needless to say, a bathroom run was in order at the end of that inning.

These types of moments are priceless, and make for just as valuable photos as the ones of your kids swinging bats and throwing balls.

Decades from now, these photos will bring back the memories of youth sports better the "official" team photos that you order through the league.

Here are a few shots of my the human side of sports that I captured during a recent game.

This shot was taken with a 24mm lens, and all I did was reach around the fence and take a quick shot as the batter was heading to the plate to hit.

It's hard to criticize a kid for getting bored during the game. After all, don't you parents get bored when your own kids aren't at bat? Hopefully, one of the lessons the kids learn in 78'ers is that making sand piles isn't one of the fundamentals of baseball.

Getting hurt is part of the game. My son got hit in the face by a ground ball that took a bad hop while he was playing first base. I saw that he was hurt, but let him try to manage it himself until I thought he really needed me. I know if I would have went over right then, he would have brushed me off so he wouldn't be embarrassed. So I just kept watching.

He never said a thing, but kept wiping tears from his face, even through his next at-bat, as he led off the next inning. But when he walked out to his position in the field, I alerted his coach to check on him, and sure enough the tears had overcome him. And like a true journalist, I shot pictures before going over to comfort him.

Seems cruel, I know, but I was watching him very carefully the whole time. Part of growing up as a kid is learning when you can manage a situation, and when you need some grown-up help.

On a happier note, a great chance to make a nice picture is at the end of the game, when the team gathers for a cheer. I just raised my camera over my head and shot a "Hail Mary" picture down into the group of players.

Good luck with your own photography as you capture your young ones at play. If you're shooting digital, don't be afraid to take lots of shots (I sure do!), but keep in mind that the experience is much more fun for everyone involved if you don't let the camera dominate the day.

Keep those comments and questions coming. I certainly appreciate your feedback!

Here's the text of an email I received again trying to calculate the the answer to a question I posed in an earlier post:

"If a pitcher throws a 96 mph fastball the 60' 6" from the mound to home plate and a photographer is shooting with a camera that records 8 frames per second, how many frames can the photographer take that have the ball in the same frame as the batter?"

Here's the response I received (and I would love your comments if you have them):

"Mr. Mar,
First, I love your blog, it's one of my daily stops. I'm a semi-pro freelancer and I find it invaluable to be able to look into the daily technical and creative decisions of a full time pro.
I'm sure you've probably had enough e-mail about the bat on ball post but while I liked the answer one of your readers gave it's not the answer to the question you asked. The answer he gave (which is correct for what he was calculating) is the number of frames from the pitcher's release to impact. What you want to know is how long is the ball in the frame if you're taking a picture of a hitter. Depending on how tight you're shooting you probably only see the last 3' to maybe 9' in front of the plate. If you assume that the ball leaves the bat at about the same 96 mph velocity then you can calculate that the ball is traveling at 140.8 feet/sec (96miles/hour*5280feet/mile*1/60 minutes/hour*1/60 seconds/minute) for two times that distance or 6' to 18' (i.e., 3' on the way in and 3' on the way back out). This gives you the ball in the frame for .043 to .128 seconds (6 feet * 1/140.8 seconds/foot = .043 seconds) or more familiarly 1/25 to 1/8 depending on how wide you shoot. So shotgunning at 8.5 fps you should always get one frame with the ball if you're shooting fairly wide but only about 1 chance in 3 if you're shooting tighter.
If you cut it down to a frame with the ball within 6" of the bat you're looking at something like 1'/140.8 = .007 or somewhere between 1/125 and 1/160 and to get within an inch or "bat-on-ball" is something like 1/800-1/1000 so don't let anybody tell you that 8.5 fps (or 10 fps with the new Mark III) makes it easy to get the bat on the ball. Again, thanks for all the great stuff in the blog and I look forward to more.

Jeff H."

Thanks Jeff, for your answer. My question is do your calculations take into account the .55ms shutter delay of the camera (time elapsed between when I press the shutter button and when the shutter opens?)

For the casual sports fan, my job seems like a dream -- going to all the games and taking pictures for a living.

But my job does has disadvantages, and one of them is that I frequently work nights and weekends. And now that my kids are older and playing sports, it can be a challenge for me to get to see their practices and games.

When I am able to attend, just like many of you, I'm also interested in photographing my own kids.

Obviously, one of the great perks of my job is the close proximity and access I get to big-time sporting events. But at youth sports events, I have the same proximity and access as any other parent and like you, I want to capture some memories.

Even though I have access to the top-of-the line digital cameras and the longest, fastest lenses made, I often leave them behind when I attend my kids' games.

For one, I don't want to distract them — their games are just that — theirs. And when I do bring my cameras, I make sure not to interfere with the players, the coaches or the game in any way.

But tonight, for the first time this season, I brought a camera and a couple of lenses to my son's Little League game in Shoreline. His team is called the Mariners, and they play in a "78'er coach-pitch" league (at this age, child pitchers can't throw the ball across the plate very well, and so coaches do the pitching to their own batters).

I purposely left the "long glass" (300mm and 400mm lenses) at home, and instead shot at three lens lengths common to many amateur photographers — 24mm, 70mm, and 200mm.

To make successful photos at a youth baseball game, one doesn't need to have special access beyond the fence that surrounds the infield.

I just take a telephoto lens and shoot right through the chain link fence.

When I do this, parents will invariably ask me, "doesn't the fence ruin your pictures?"

Well, the answer is "it depends" and "sometimes".

It depends on what lens you're using (longer lenses work better) and sometimes the angle of the lens to the fence can provide a little distortion.

The secret is to press your lenses as close to the fence as possible (hopefuly without scratching the front element!). If you keep the lens reletively perpendicular to the fence, a 200mm lens should have no blur. But as you increase the angle of the lens to the fence, the distortion increases.

Remember that telephoto lenses (200mm and longer) do this trick better than do wide angle lenses.

Here's an example of a 24mm lens shooting through the fence:

As you can see, the angle of view is so wide that the links in the fence are plainly visible. Not that this would really matter in this case, since the players I'm shooting are relatively far away.

Here's the same view shot with a 70mm lens.

Notice that even though the angle of view is "tighter", the fence is still obtrusive.

And here's the same angle with a 200mm lens.

You can see that the fence has "disappeared" in the above image. As I said before, you might still see a blur through the viewfinder of your camera, but the final image is okay.

Someday my son will cringe when he looks at the shot below because he's not making the catch. But I'll remind him that at six-years old, it was a decent effort even to try to catch a ball backhanded.

Shooting the action on the field is not the only place where shooting through a fence works. Here's a photo shot through the fence looking into the dugout area. Shot with a 200mm lens again, the fence "disappears". Also, as my subject is closer to my lens, the background blurs just enough to see the other players, but not so sharp that they are distracting from the main subject. I'm also aware here that the sun is behind my subject, so I've set the camera to overexpose the scene.

You'll probably want a photo of your son or daughter batting. Note that having "bat-on-ball" isn't nearly as important as capturing an expression of concentration, and setting the scene.

When shooting your player in the field, it's nice to get "peak action" shots, but keep in mind your goal is to record a future memory, not necessarily to get a shot worthy of "Sports Illustrated".

One key to remember is that all of my shots of youths are shot from a low angle — this allows me to include two important ingredients to my images — shooting from a low angle lets me see the players' eyes under the bills of their ballcaps, and shooting from the height of a standing adult will make the players seem smaller.

Hey, it's sports photography — make the players look big and heroic, right?

In the next installment, I'll discuss "finding moments" at your local youth game.

I've decided this Internet thing is way cool.

Ask a question, get answers!

I think it will catch on.

I posted a recent entry about the difficulty of photographing a hitter and getting the ball in the frame.

My question was this:

"If a pitcher throws a 96 mph fastball the 60' 6" from the mound to home plate and a photographer is shooting with a camera that records 8 frames per second, how many frames can the photographer take that have the ball in the same frame as the batter?"

Of course, back when I was a student and working for my college paper, like most photographers, I skipped classses so I could take photographs.

Thus, my answer to the above question was, "Hell if I know...".

However, a bunch of you emailed and a few left comments answering my query.

"Tim" sent this answer:

"Rod-
I get 3.6523438 frames available between pitcher's release and ball crossing the plate. Approximately.
Welcome back!
Tim"

And then, like all GOOD students, he then "shows his work":

(96 mph times 5280=506880 feet per hour
506880 feet per hour divided by 3600 seconds per hour =140.8 feet per second
60.5 feet divided by 140.8 feet per second=0.4296875 seconds available for shooting
.4296875 times 8.5 frames per second=3.6523438
That assumes no aerodynamic drag on the baseball and doesn't take the amount of time the shutter stays open into account..."

Thanks for a great answer!

Over at Sportsshooter, there is a message board thread about this very topic in case, as they say in academia, you're "interested in further reading".

A couple of things I realized during the last Mariners home stand is that which eye a photographer shoots with has a lot to do with success rate of "bat-on-ball".

For example, I always shoot with both eyes open, but I shoot with my right eye to the viewfinder. When I'm shooting from the first base side of the field, I can't see the pitcher's release of the ball because the eye closest to him is looking through the camera.

When I shoot from the third base side of the field, when my right eye is looking through the camera, I can use my left eye to see the pitcher's windup and release.

By having this extra visual cue, I have an advantage of anticipating when the ball will cross the plate.

One important thing to keep in mind is that to get "bat-on-ball", the batter must be facing you. For example, if my goal is to get Raul Ibanez (a left-handed hitter) with bat-on-ball, I'd better be shooting from the third-base side.

(Canon EOS 1d Mark IIN, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 1000, 1/800 sec., f2.8)

But if my goal is to get right-handed hitting Richie Sexson with bat-on-ball, I'd better just pray, as he's currently hitting only .154 with only 14 hits and 21 strikeouts in 91 at-bats.

(Canon EOS 1d Mark IIN, EF 400mm/f2.8 lens, ISO 1000, 1/800 sec., f2.8)

Sorry, couldn't resist :)

(Did I just use a smiley? Someone take away my Blogging License, quick!)

One lesson to take from this is that whether you're shooting your son or daughter at their local game, or Ichiro or Adrian Beltre at Safeco Field, remember to be facing them as they hit.

Another is that it's hard to get the "bat-on-ball".

Finally, as my good friend as Associated Press baseball photographer Ted Warren says, "The good players only nail that thing one in three times. We're lucky to get half that."