Ottawa Race Weekend

Rare is the time that I’m not assigned to take photographs of some sort of goings-on in the city. While some may take it as a sleight when iRun decided to go with their tried-and-true Ottawa Race Weekend Photographer Ian Murchison out of Toronto (fiend!), I took it as an opportunity to explore a personal project I’ve been meaning to get off the ground.

Blatently ripped off Heavily inspired by Dave Delnea’s cyclist portraits in BC, I wanted a crack at capturing athletes in motion using a strobe. Lighting them helped keep the background dark helped isolate the runners. I’m truly amazed by the marathoners. I have a hard time running down the block, so how these athletes do 42+ Kilometres I have no idea. It reminds me of movies like Conan or Lord of the Rings where running is how people transported themselves (without horses or Camels to punch).

I set myself up just shy of the 9k mark which is, conveniently, blocks away from my home in Hintonburg. Runners would be well into the run, but not deathly exhausted. I was surprised at all the peace signs and thumbs up I received – which I wasn’t looking for to be honest – I wanted to capture a sincere moment of someone engaged in a devoted exercise, focused, with resolve. I think I captured that here.

Let me know what you think of the images, it was my first time panning runners with my camera, and the weight of my telephoto lens definitely wore me down after the first 300 shots… though I’m sure it wasn’t as bad as running 42KM 😉

Posted on Monday, May 28th, 2012 at 8:58 am. Filed under: Portraits Tags: Hintonburg, Ottawa_Race_Weekend RSS 2.0 feed.