Grande Prairie Atom Tourney
Here are some shots from the Atom A and AA tournament in Grande Prairie this weekend, Nov. 22-24. Enjoy!
Jasper Tournament – Rumble in the Rockies
Here are some pics from last weekends Jasper tournament. This was our first tournament of 2013-14 and our first using our all mac setup. Everything worked smoothly and it’s always fun going to Jasper. The lighting in their arena is a bit tricky but I think we did ok with it. Enjoy.
Stony Plain Minor Hockey Photos
This is the second year in a row that we’ve done the Stony Plain minor hockey team photos and once again we had fun doing it. There were challenges this time (as there always is on every shoot), but I think things turned out good. The wall behind the players had a big distracting mural on it so we got to use our new backdrop and stands and our new lights as well. If you go to our twitter you can see some photos of the whole setup @slapshotsphoto
Team photos only come once a year but most every sport gets them and they are a lot like doing school photos so it’s a good thing to get into. Once you create systems for doing it you can easily apply them to different things. Anyway, if you are thinking about getting into it send us any questions you might have.
Swan River Rodeo
Here are some pics from the Swan River rodeo. Enjoy and all the riders and community members, feel free to copy the pics. To anyone else interested in using any of the pics from this site please contact us by email, thanks.
Hockey Articles
One way to get a press pass and be able to photograph some really high level hockey is to write hockey articles. If you write for a website you might not be able to get NHL press credentials depending on the website and the city you write in but you can get a press pass for CHL or other junior or college hockey. As you can see from the site I’ve taken a lot of WHL photos and that was mainly through writing for THW.com. If you want to check out the site and read a couple of articles that I wrote go to http://insidehockey.com/author/dustin-twin and http://thehockeywriters.com/author/dtwin/
Aside from going to the games for free you can also make a bit of money for the articles and can do things with the pictures as well. Not to mention that if you are in the photography business it looks good to have some pics that most people can’t or don’t get. Here are a couple that I used with my articles, enjoy!
AAA Spring Classic May 2013 Edmonton
Here are some pics from the spring AAA classic in Edmonton. Enjoy!
Oil Kings – Warriors Game 5
I lost a memory card so I only have a few pics from the game. This Thursday the WHL finals start and I will get some pics of Portland and, of course, Edmonton.
Calahoo Minor Hockey
We did two tournaments in Calahoo, Alberta this year and at least one the year before. It is a great arena and a great hockey town. The parents and staff at the arena are all very nice and helpful and the fries and gravy is awesome. A lot of people talk to me about ‘politics’ in their towns among coaches and parents and I have seen it a few times in places as well but Calahoo is one of the places where I didn’t notice anything like that and everyone was working together good. Anyway, we had fun and would definitely go back and so this feature minor hockey gallery is dedicated to all the awesome players from Calahoo as well as their families.
Red Deer Rebels VS Lethbridge Hurricanes
This was the last Rebels game I caught this year. The team had been through a lot of injuries and tough times this year. Watching them down the stretch they didn’t have enough to put together a string of wins but they were always competitive and won enough games to keep their dedicated fans having something to cheer for.
I got my main lens back after being hit by a puck by a Red Deer player at an Oil Kings game so I took a lot of pictures. I’m pretty sure it was Charles Inglis on a dump-in but on the plus side Charles had a great season in Red Deer after some people writing him off as a discipline case. Anyway, I basically had two home teams this year, the Oil Kings and the Rebels. The Oil Kings are looking like a team that’s going to have some success in the playoffs while Red Deer has played their final game of the 11-12 season.
Anyway, enjoy the pics and check back for playoff pics from Edmonton.
Taking Minor Hockey Photos
Since starting our budding empire of photography, without really being categorized or having a niche, one thing has been clear. In Canada, hockey is big business. For example, some of the top pros make 8-9 million dollars a season, and on top of that they get multimillion dollar endorsement deals. So whip your kids into shape young is the point. OK, maybe not. The real point is that even at the lowest level of hockey, the starting point, there is money to be made as a photographer. If you can get invited to photograph minor hockey tournaments you can make 1000$-2000$ a weekend, no sweat. OK, some sweat since there is some equipment involved, and stairs, and arenas, but it’s still a good gig. We are talking about the first few years of hockey here. For two reasons, one, everyone wants pictures when the game is cute and the kids are cute and they haven’t yet crashed the car or skipped school. Two, they are not yet moving at breakneck speeds and shooting slap-shots that could take out a camera, or worse, a photographer. The subjects are a lot more co-operative.
SlapShots Photography 