Safe, Sore Arm and Happiness

This is my first post to this “sub” forum. I hope you enjoy the pix but please contribute any criticisms or suggestions; that’s how we learn and grow. Also, as for the quality of these posts, I’m hoping you all can assist me in a perplexing situation (see follow-up post). Anyway, I look forward to participating in this great place.

“STEALING HOME” I could see that the third base coach was just itching to send the runner so I set myself up to frame the catcher and the runner at home plate. The next pitch was a past ball and the catcher flipped the ball to the charging pitcher. The batter scrutinizing the play and the pitcher’s glove at the right edge were bonuses to the shot. The sun was very low, thus the warm tones (some have said “hot”). I played with the K temperature in ACR but decided I liked the tone as shot. I created a mask and gradient overlay to blur the back ground because the fence was really distracting IMO and used the same mask to selectively sharpen. Josh was safe by the way!

D70; Nikkor 70-300mm 1:4-56 D ED at 75mm
1/1250sec, f5.6; matrix metering, aperture priority; iso 200; RAW

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“THAT’S MY BOY” Forest, my son, pitches some, but usually plays shortstop or first base. Given the choice, he would always be on the mound. BTW, he pitched the whole game and we won 16 to 3! It hurts my arm just to look at this picture. Again, low sun and warm tones that seem to work for me anyway.

D70; Nikkor 70-300mm 1:4-56 D ED at 122mm
1/400sec, f5.6; matrix metering, aperture priority; iso 200; RAW
View attachment 12468


“OUT OF THE SLUMP” We have one girl on our team and she is one go-getter. She is our catcher (best in the league) and I can count on one hand the number of pitches that got past her. She’s a good hitter but had been in a 2-3 game slump. In this game she smacked a triple and stole home the next play. That’s when I snapped this shot. Again, as a matter of taste, low sun and warm tones. I applied selective (LAB) sharpening to the eyes and some cleaning and whitening of the teeth (I think she was eating sunflower seeds) in PSCS.

D70; Nikkor 50mm 1:1.8
1/500sec, f3.5; matrix metering, aperture priority; iso 200; RAW
View attachment 12469

 

Thank you sir! Ya, the first shot sure has a lot of elements working together. And as I said, two of them were serendipity. I can take credit for the positioning, framing and exposure. Ya know, even the cropping in PS was dictated by the postions of the catcher, pitcher's glove (what you see is all that was in frame) and the batter.

 

Paul; thanks for your comments and taking the time to critique. I totally agree with you on the black framing on the first shot. It is the result of laziness on my part when posting. Josh’s (the slider) parents wanted an 8 by 10 (inches) print of it because they had a frame they wanted to use. The elements of the picture, dictated by the postions of the catcher, pitcher's glove (what you see is all that was in the camera frame) and the batter, would not allow for a 4/5 ratio crop. Thus, the black uneven border to bring it to 8x10 for his parents. Lazily, I used that version to upload for this presentation.

Not looking where you are throwing is an old baseball pitcher’s ploy to unnerve the batter. See, it worked on you and you’re not even at bat. In all honesty, I’ll fully admit the second shot is simply a blatant example of a proud dad taking a picture of his son.

I played back and forth with the cropping on the third shot. I went with what I did seeing it as the essence of simplistic framing (a happy face, no more, no less….. nothing going on outside the frame… just happiness). But, I can certainly relate to your point of view and may revisit that shot for reframing.

Again, thank you for taking the time to critique.

 

Thank you Ma'am!
I'm still having major issues with my postings looking so much "crappier" than the JPEGS look befor I upload them to my pbase site. The subject of a separate post perhaps in the technical forum.

Random House College Dictionary
crapy (adj.) having the quality of being viewed through a pane of frosted glass.

 

May the ghost of Abner Doubleday haunt your dreams :evil: