Here in Middle Tennessee we don’t get much snow for pretty outdoor pictures. Winter can be cold, wet, and dreary outside. So if you are looking to get some nice pix you may want to shoot indoors. And the local school gym or Rec Center is a great place.
Most gyms have lots of overhead lights and possibly some big glass doors to let in some directional light. Combine that with some off-camera flash and remote triggers and you can get creative.
There are some concerns however. Most gyms will have a massive amount of golden light bouncing up from the floor and from the bleachers. So the photos will need to be color corrected in post. In the top photo here, I have taken the image into Photoshop and isolated the subject. I then changed the background gym floor to greyscale. Notice how the subject just jumps out at you.
Another great feature of an empty gym is all the space!. Usually Darius is on the basketball court, but here we have placed him alone on a sea of bleachers. The shot was taken from the other side of the gym with a 200mm lens. Photoshop took care of a seam where two sections of bleachers met.
Of course, one of the reasons we chose a gymnasium is because Darius is a high school senior and a basketball player. Taking the pix in an empty gym lets the photographer gets some action shots at angles you just can’t get during a game.
One last tip for aspiring photographers. Teens and kids always make a cute photo. I brought my granddaughter, Maisie, to the shoot with me and took a moment to get her and Darius clowning together. Sweet.
