Picture of the Day: August 9, 2008

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Our photographer, Vincent Laforet, had never shot fencing before today. Even though he fenced as a youngster, he’d never, until today, pointed his camera at the sport. I’ve selected this picture as Picture of the Day as an example of a sports photographer seeing the “bigger picture” and taking a visual step back in order to make a superb photograph. The picture itself is of the type that any amateur could potentially shoot—it’s shot on a short lens of a similar focal length to the point and shoot cameras that all of us own. In that regard, it’s an achievable image for many of us—it is not utilizing costly super telephoto lenses that many sports pictures necessitate. The success of the image is in the details.  It’s perfectly composed where the eye is drawn to the action first, and is then naturally allowed to absorb the entire scene. There is a discreet, but important positioning of the Olympic rings in the bottom left, which gives the picture a sense of time and place. This too, is an action picture. Note the timing of the image, where the attitude of the fencers’ bodies is captured at a precise peak moment (imagine if you will, the fencers in a “non-moment”—the image would immediately die a boring death.) And lastly, the background is kind too. Nothing distracting, nothing superfluous, just a dark canvas with a strip of lights to bring it to life.—Simon Barnett, Director of Photography, NEWSWEEK