Technology and Innovation

Give people room to move. Don’t frame too tightly or you may be playing hide-and-seek with a player darting in and out of the frame. Too tight also confuses your audience. Back up a little and give the players a little room in the frame - don’t forget your standard composition tools like “look room”—leaving space in front of a person in the direction of movement for them to “look” or run into.
• Don’t shout too loudly if you’re using an on-camera microphone - microphones pick up what’s around them. Putting one on the sidelines aimed out into the field will give you the sounds of the field; using the on-camera mic will get you the sounds of what’s going on around the camera. Make sure that isn’t the sound of you yelling, “go Bobby, go!”
• Don’t get cut short - leave some “handles”—a few seconds of footage before and after the action to give you something to edit with. Don’t hit “stop” as soon as the play ends.

Camera Settings
Many cameras have a “sports” program mode that selects a high shutter speed to reduce blurring. Use this if you have it (and conditions allow - it’s probably not going to work on a night game where things are much dimmer). If you don’t have a program mode for sports, try setting your camera’s shutter speed relatively high, 1/125 of a second or so depending on your light and the speed of the sport (ice hockey probably wants a faster shutter speed than something like curling).
Tips
• Anticipate the shot. In a baseball game, we know that the action goes from the pitcher, to the field and the        catcher, to the batter, and context and ap-     then possibly out into
the field somewhere. But also keep an eye on that runner on first - is he going to try and steal? In situations before the action starts, a wide shot allows you to not miss the action and then zoom in quickly when the plays have been established.

Where to Stand
On the stands? Or on the sidelines? There’s certainly an advantage to being on the sidelines — you’re close, everything’s bigger — but the downside is there will be times that you can’t see what happened because of people in
Final Play
With great home videos of his peewee football adventures, my sister now has more than enough footage to embarrass my nephew for years to come in front of every potential date who shows up at the house. But more importantly, those precious memories are preserved and the whole family enjoys reliving them over and over right now. Don’t let your camera sit in a closet, every second that passes you never comes back. Catch what you can. your way. The other option is to be in the bleachers, way up, looking down. This way you see all the action - but Junior’s not so large in the viewfinder and rowdy spectators may shake your platform. Serious videographers will consider doing both - shooting with two cameras, one with an overview, and another close up on the sidelines. If you’re shooting professionally, you’ll want to at least consider three cameras: one overview, and two cameras on the sidelines catching closeups of the action for editing together later.

Football, baseball, hockey, tennis. Swimming, cycling, running and lacrosse. Sports shooting is an art unto itself, and every sport has shooting hurdles to jump. When my nephew made the football team, my sister’s career as a videog-rapher instantly went into high gear. Hollywood has never made a film as entertaining to 10-year-olds as watching themselves make that touchdown over and over and over. I, of course, realized it was politically dangerous to my career if my sister was making bad videos, so we launched a game plan. Huddle up, everyone. Pre-planning
As with any videotaping situation, there are certain things that doing ahead of time will make much better. Some things to look out for before taping your first sporting event:
• Access to electricity—can you plug your camera in? If not, be sure to pack enough batteries.
• Tripod space?—will you have room to set up your tripod? If not, you might want to consider a monopod. Some very clever monopods actually have small tripod legs at the very bottom, making them more stable.