Photographing Fitness Training

[alix13]

A friend has asked me to take some photos of her during a fitness training session. Just wondering if anyone has any tips at all? I've mostly had experience photographing children.

[RLucas]

I've never done any, except for a couple of posed body builder type shots, but I'll help the best I can.
What kind of gear do you have?
My tastes for shots such as this are pretty contrasty, with some rim or backlighting to emphasize form.

As far as poses go, i can't really help, because I usually go on the fly for this type of thing.
I may also suggest trying to keep it in context, and include some of the surroundings, if it is not too busy. Tight crops in shots such as these, tend to take away from that.
Hopefully someone with a little more knowledge will come in and add to, or correct me.
Good luck, and please share what you come up with!

[alix13]

Luke, thanks for your reply.
I have an Olympus E520 with the 2 kit lenses (14-42mm and 40-150mm), neither of which are particularly fast lenses. I also have an OM lens (50mm 1.8 ) which I like to play around with but takes some fiddling to get the focus right.
The training session is early morning (about an hour after dawn here at the moment) and in a local park. She wants to document the change in the group from when they started training together (they have all lost an inspiring amount of weight - think Biggest Loser).

[karen_s]

I can't help much technically other than to say make sure your aperture is set deep enough to get all the faces in focus, especially if you pose them in more than one row. One other thought is to maybe avoid the wider focal lengths for a group shot. If you were to shoot at 14mm, I'm guessing the people on the ends would look wider than they really are. I don't know the magical length to go for but maybe someone with more experience can chime in on that note. And consider using fill flash if you have off camera lighting options. May not need it but as morning light is often pretty nice, but always good to have options.

Do they have a before picture? If so, it might be fun to pose them in the same way. If not, maybe you could scour the interwebs for before and after shots of people who have lost weight and take note of how they are posed. Maybe one of the biggest losers could bring a pair of their old giant pants and you could use them as a prop in some way. I know it's cliche but my point is a prop might add to the story and point of the shot.

And last but not least, find an uncluttered backdrop if you can and take several shots.

[xxrayna]

you'll want to be careful with lighting. If you have enough light or can get a fast enough lens, I might even try to go natural light. Artificial light tends to "blur" out muscle tone and it sounds like that's the opposite of what you want to do with this couple.

Also, I'd talk to your clients. As an exercise enthusiast myself, I have parts of my body I really like and parts I hate. Find out what it is they love most about their body and then try to emphasize that. Also, don't be afraid to play with angles (I'm sure you know this by photographing toddlers) but when it comes to flattering an adults body, it's all about manipulating the angles.

Good luck!

[OsmosisStudios]

Originally Posted by xxrayna

you'll want to be careful with lighting. If you have enough light or can get a fast enough lens, I might even try to go natural light. Artificial light tends to "blur" out muscle tone and it sounds like that's the opposite of what you want to do with this couple.

If anything that's the opposite: if I throw a harsh, un-diffused flash onto a subject, you get nice hard shadows, which emphasize texture (and, in this case, muscle tone). Using big natural light windows is like using massive softboxes and that'll flatten things out.

[BigFuzzy]

Originally Posted by OsmosisStudios

If anything that's the opposite: if I throw a harsh, un-diffused flash onto a subject, you get nice hard shadows, which emphasize texture (and, in this case, muscle tone). Using big natural light windows is like using massive softboxes and that'll flatten things out.

Agreed, especially if that light comes from the sides or top of the subject.

HERE and HERE and HERE are good examples of side/top lighting to enhance musculature. Yep, all self portraits!