High school swim poster. Help me improve it.

[Dermit]

So I took a little break from shooting football and shot high school swim yesterday. This swim team's senior's parents want me to make a poster for each of the seniors. I've never shot swim which presents it's own challenges. Any tips on shooting it would be appreciated. I have access to practices so I can setup a lot of the shots. But I need to know the tricks to shooting it. Especially the different strokes.

So here is the first stab at the poster. I will be making 13 of these, one unique one for each senior. But the frame work/font/borders will stay the same on all of them. So i really want to get the basic frame down to something that really works. This is a proof/quick workup to show the parent in charge. In the end I will spend a little more time fine tuning. But I need to know what could be done to improve, or maybe even just to try different.

http://www.pbase.com/image/103724553.jpg

[butcha27]

I love it ... not sure I'd change much at all!

[dshankar]

I don't really like the font for "DAHL" but other than that, its awesome!

[Dermit]

I don't really like the font for "DAHL" but other than that, its awesome!

Thanks!

Is the font too blocky? I know it's bad to use too many different fonts on the same poster and the last swimmer's name/high school name fonts match and I like the font for the high school name. Any suggestions what might work better?

[EOSBoy]

It's fine as it is, the only nit-pik that I have is the white behind her. It's bright and that's the first thing I look at. I suppose you could clone in the water behind her.

[asysin2leads]

I would change the name at the top, but that's it. Great job!

[Phil Light]

I really like it. I'm sure the girls and the parents will love it. I think the water droplets are a nice touch. The only thing that bugs me is that it almost looks like that lane divider is connected to the girls head on the left. I also agree with the previous comment about the white behind her.

[Dennis_Hammer]

I do senior posters for several sports for several high schools. I find the posters are more visually impacting with a few more pictures. How about one diving in at the start and maybe if you can catch one where they won a race the celebration at the finish or some other significant moment in a race. Not sure what it would be I have yet to shoot swimming.

[Carjo]

...and maybe if you can catch one where they won a race the celebration at the finish or some other significant moment in a race. Not sure what it would be I have yet to shoot swimming.

You could set that sort of shot up, if need be - you don't necessarily need to be at a competitive meet to do it. It's worth trying, I think. :)

[Dermit]

All great ideas! Thanks everyone. Yes, before I submitted this the white in the upper left was a question in my mind as well. I have the underlying picture data all the way to the left. The white is just from a gradient fade. So maybe i should kill the fade and just have the water back there.

I also agree about more images in the collage and I would normally do this. But the budget is small for the parents so to keep cost down I agreed to do this as a two image collage and the prints are only 11x14. This keeps my printing cost and my time down... and yes, it's killing me not to add more images. I've done little league with bigger budget and I do add more images.

[dshankar]

Thanks!

Is the font too blocky? I know it's bad to use too many different fonts on the same poster and the last swimmer's name/high school name fonts match and I like the font for the high school name. Any suggestions what might work better?

I suggest making the font less wide/"blocky." Or even use the high school name font.

[xochi2]

What will you charge for this "14 x 11" poster? Curious.

[Dermit]

I suggest making the font less wide/"blocky." Or even use the high school name font.

It is the same font as the high school name. I just stretched it wide because it was such a short last name. I'll have to play with a few settings and see if I can get it to look less blocky. Thanks for the suggestion.

[Dermit]

What will you charge for this "14 x 11" poster? Curious.

I'd rather not talk about the arrangement too much but it's a combination of money and advertising for my company at the school so it's a little more complicated than just a monetary amount per poster.

[Dermit]

I've also decided that I either need to bring everything in from the edges, or add more border because if they mat/frame these there's not much breathing room around the edges.

[Aaagogo]

remember you need to add bleed measurements, safety would be about 1/3 to 1/4 inches from the border.

I would suggest that the athlete's first name be in larger characters, then last name in small.

I see 3 difference font faces, perhaps reduce it to only 2, change "swim and dive" to the school font.

maybe clone stamp more water and lower the opacity into the area behind the head.

[Darsk47]

I like it and the lane rope is fine where it is. I shoot a lot of swimming and tend to prefer the shots with lane ropes. (after getting a tip on same from POTN a couple of years ago)

One thing missing is the year/season. These brag cards tend to accumulate and when an athlete gets many from different sports year after year, it's easy to lose track.

[tomd]

One thing missing is the year/season. These brag cards tend to accumulate and when an athlete gets many from different sports year after year, it's easy to lose track.

I agree.

15 years from now, the date reference might be helpful.

i like the poster.:)

[Dermit]

I like it and the lane rope is fine where it is. I shoot a lot of swimming and tend to prefer the shots with lane ropes. (after getting a tip on same from POTN a couple of years ago)

One thing missing is the year/season. These brag cards tend to accumulate and when an athlete gets many from different sports year after year, it's easy to lose track.

Oh yes. Good point! Thanks for that one, will do.

[mattograph]

It's fine as it is, the only nit-pik that I have is the white behind her. It's bright and that's the first thing I look at. I suppose you could clone in the water behind her.


+1. Fantastic work though. As a dad, I would be tickled pink as is.

[Dermit]

remember you need to add bleed measurements, safety would be about 1/3 to 1/4 inches from the border.

I would suggest that the athlete's first name be in larger characters, then last name in small.

I see 3 difference font faces, perhaps reduce it to only 2, change "swim and dive" to the school font.

maybe clone stamp more water and lower the opacity into the area behind the head.

Yes, I realized after a bit that I need a bleed area. Got it.

Is it typical to have first name big and last one small? I've seen baseball and football posters like this where the last name is big. Is swimming usually different... or is it a reference thing?

I only used two fonts. The last name and school name is the same font but I used all caps for the athlete name and a mix of caps and lower case for the school name. Maybe I should used the same style for both?

I think i will either not fade the water on the left, or play with solid colors, maybe a turquoise gradient fading light to dark as it goes right to left. I'll try a few and see what pops the best. I agree that currently that white area is an attention magnet and don't like it there either.

[kauffman v36]

dermit, i hate to go slightly off topic in your thread but i just remembered somethings thats been bugging me. im currently shooting HS football games and going to try and sell prints to parents. the one thing that i searched high and low for was the price i should charge parents for prints. nobody wants to say and therefore im going in blind. i kind of understand why you dont want to but how many of the people on POTN do you actually know?

anyways, great poster. id leave it as is. i think the white fade differentiates from the swimming picture.

[mattograph]

dermit, i hate to go slightly off topic in your thread but i just remembered somethings thats been bugging me. im currently shooting HS football games and going to try and sell prints to parents. the one thing that i searched high and low for was the price i should charge parents for prints. nobody wants to say and therefore im going in blind. i kind of understand why you dont want to but how many of the people on POTN do you actually know?

anyways, great poster. id leave it as is. i think the white fade differentiates from the swimming picture.

Perhaps he has a competitor that reads the forums. Send him a PM.

[Dermit]

dermit, i hate to go slightly off topic in your thread but i just remembered somethings thats been bugging me. im currently shooting HS football games and going to try and sell prints to parents. the one thing that i searched high and low for was the price i should charge parents for prints. nobody wants to say and therefore im going in blind. i kind of understand why you dont want to but how many of the people on POTN do you actually know?

anyways, great poster. id leave it as is. i think the white fade differentiates from the swimming picture.

Alright, alright. Here's the deal. I shoot HS football for mostly two schools, sometimes a third. This swim gig is at a school I've never shot for and so I am trying to get in. Now i know from experience and from these forums that you should never go into anything with too low of prices because it will be very hard to raise them later. True. I believe this. My initial quote was for $75 for each 16x20 collage/poster. I always do 16x20 or larger because I like to fit in more than two images typically. Well, this is going to be paid for out of some school budget and dividing their budget by the 13 seniors left them with $35 per senior. So I agreed to an 11x14 with a max of two images on the collage and the minimum order was ten of these. Well with 13 they met the quantity requirement. I also am shooting these for free since I've never done swimming and need to build the portfolio. i know some people are going to come down on me for this but this model has worked out for me with little league and football.

I have been using photoshop and doing collages for a long time so can bang one of these out in about 30 to 45 minutes a piece... once I get the first one designed. On top of this I will get ad space in their school paper for free which works out for me since I do senior portraits and family portraits for my main money making photography... as well as weddings.

I am also expecting to get re-orders of prints from parents on some of these which will be at normal print prices. These things do well with re-orders as the Christmas season approaches.

So, yes, I am getting in on a razor thin profit. But if experience tells me what this will lead to then it will work out in the end.

[BaumannPhotography]

http://www.pbase.com/image/103724553.jpg

Bump up the size of the school logo and name, let it overlay part of the image. This will add another layer off depth, which will make it even more appealing. The water drops are good, but will need to be pulled off more realistic to get me to notice them right away, also more would be good. Even having drops on the font would make it neat, but possibly cheezy. The fade to white is okay with me but I would try another color or possibly a texture. Also as stated before try something different with the font on top, seems to stretched and compressed. Also in the orange bars on top and bottom I would try to overlay some smaller images, nothing to fancy or noticeable at first but I nice detail.

Nice job!!!!

[Dermit]

OK, here is an edit incorporating some of the changes. I faded to a solid blue instead of the white. Not sold on it over just having the image under bleed all the way through. But on a total bleed through I did not like the lane line continuing all the way through her head.

I made her last name smaller and a mix of upper/lower case like the school name. I made school name and logo larger. I added the year. I like it better than the first one, but will still tweak since I have some time. These don't need to be all done until November. But I like to fine tune since they will all be based on the same framework and probably be reused for other swim shoots in the future.

http://www.pbase.com/image/103802570.jpg

[kauffman v36]

dermit, pm sent.

[tomd]

This looks great.
Just an idea, what about adding a few more water drops? Especially on the top. The droplet over the letter "a" looks like it's part of the letter (like an i).

[butcha27]

speaking of water droplets .... i'd love to know how you did them?

[Dermit]

speaking of water droplets .... i'd love to know how you did them?

Ah, I'm no expert and am open to a better way but here's a run down of what I do... if i can remember. I am at my day job with no Photoshop access so this is from memory.

Create a new layer above the layer you want to add the water on top of.
Make a circular selection.
Fill the selection with a black to white gradient using the gradient tool and make the gradient go from the upper-left to lower-right of the circle selection.
Change the layer mode to overlay.
Add a drop shadow and make it so the shadow is showing on the lower right of the circle. Size and soften to taste.
Add an inner shadow, make it also on the lower right of the circle but it will spread inward, into the 'drop'.
Create another new layer on top of this layer, in normal blend mode.
Change foreground color to white.
Pick a small hard brush.
Add a small highlight in the upper left of the 'drop.
Ctrl-Click on the water drop layer to select the circle if it is not still selected.
Change the active layer to the one below the 'drop'.
Use liquify tool to 'bloat' the area that is under the drop to make it look magnified.
An added option I did was I added another layer above the 'drop' layer but under the highlight layer and flood filled it with turquoise color. Change this layer to color blend mode. Then clip mask it to the layer under (Use Alt-Click on the border of the two layers in the layer palette). Change opacity of the turquoise layer to taste. This adds a little 'water' color to the drops.
Another thing you can do is on the 'drop' layer you can take it into liquify and use the 'finger' tool (top left) and shove parts of the drop around to make it look more oblong, kidney shaped, etc.

My problem with this is that sometimes the overlay mode shifts the colors of the underlying layer too much, or to a 'weird' color.


tomd,

Yes, I will probably add more water drops, but not a lot more. Don't want it too distracting. And I'll probably have to vary the locations of some of them since the swimmer's names will be different sizes... something I would rather avoid if I can strategically locate the droplets.

[disneydork06]

very nice work. love the poster idea. btw come visit us on the az potn thread. swim is a very hard sport to shoot. I've learned from a friend to try and shoot low for some of the strokes. but i do like the angle you got here for the freestyle swimmer. since you have some pw with you you could always try and strobe a kid from above and get a darker look to the swimmer. A friend did this up at nau with a butterfly swimmer. of course our pool up there is indoor and not many in the surrounding phx area has indoor pools for the schools.
for the poster, it's a great idea but to me on first glance, the first name kinda gets lost with the last name. maybe some more separation somehow. not sure how i would change it though. but that's the only thing that caught my attention.other than that i really like the work.

[Dermit]

very nice work. love the poster idea. btw come visit us on the az potn thread. swim is a very hard sport to shoot. I've learned from a friend to try and shoot low for some of the strokes. but i do like the angle you got here for the freestyle swimmer. since you have some pw with you you could always try and strobe a kid from above and get a darker look to the swimmer. A friend did this up at nau with a butterfly swimmer. of course our pool up there is indoor and not many in the surrounding phx area has indoor pools for the schools.
for the poster, it's a great idea but to me on first glance, the first name kinda gets lost with the last name. maybe some more separation somehow. not sure how i would change it though. but that's the only thing that caught my attention.other than that i really like the work.

Thanks for the comments. Yes, I've been told to shoot lower and I will try that on the next shoot (Wednesday) and see how that works.

I don't understand the part you are talking about with strobing from above to get a darker swimmer. ? Are you saying trying to purposely create stronger contrast shadows on the swimmer? Not sure I follow where you are going with this. As far as I know all the pools I will be shooting at are outdoor.

I agree about the first name getting lost. This was the main reason I originally had the last name big and blocky.... so the first name had more 'background' area to be more visible. But most people commented then about the last name being too blocky and too big... so this is where I am at now. Maybe I just need to do something entirely different with the name altogether... Will play tonight when I get home.

I'll try and drop by the potn az section. Do you guys do any get togethers, or what?

[disneydork06]

Thanks for the comments. Yes, I've been told to shoot lower and I will try that on the next shoot (Wednesday) and see how that works.

I don't understand the part you are talking about with strobing from above to get a darker swimmer. ? Are you saying trying to purposely create stronger contrast shadows on the swimmer? Not sure I follow where you are going with this. As far as I know all the pools I will be shooting at are outdoor.

I agree about the first name getting lost. This was the main reason I originally had the last name big and blocky.... so the first name had more 'background' area to be more visible. But most people commented then about the last name being too blocky and too big... so this is where I am at now. Maybe I just need to do something entirely different with the name altogether... Will play tonight when I get home.

I'll try and drop by the potn az section. Do you guys do any get togethers, or what?we do on occasion have a get together. only problem is that we're all over in the valley. a lot of east siders and west siders.

so the photo. I guess it's a little hard to explain...but I might be wrong and that it can only work in a darker environment than the phx sun :-/ but if you strobe the person from above with a strong flash you can create a kind of ring of light around the subject. you just underexpose the total scene so that the flash would have to be the main light for the shot. like i said, i've seen this done once at school for the school paper. I'm almost guessing but I've also seen this done for some school sportraits. really brings a unique look to it when the bg is darkened or even blacked out when you're shooting at an event.

[Dermit]

we do on occasion have a get together. only problem is that we're all over in the valley. a lot of east siders and west siders.

so the photo. I guess it's a little hard to explain...but I might be wrong and that it can only work in a darker environment than the phx sun :-/ but if you strobe the person from above with a strong flash you can create a kind of ring of light around the subject. you just underexpose the total scene so that the flash would have to be the main light for the shot. like i said, i've seen this done once at school for the school paper. I'm almost guessing but I've also seen this done for some school sportraits. really brings a unique look to it when the bg is darkened or even blacked out when you're shooting at an event.

Oh, yes. Now that makes sense. In your other reply you said it was to get a darker look to the swimmer, not the background and that was making no sense at all. But underexposing the background and lighting the swimmer, that's something i know all about. I know the look and how to do it but don't like it for all types of shots. For these action shots i want it to look more 'normal' like at a meet and less like a sportrait. But i can see where that look would look cool for other applications.

[disneydork06]

ok, gotcha. was just suggesting that cause when you go for a low angle you also gain more of the people in the bg in the shots sometimes. so yeah, good luck wednesday :-)

[Mike R]

I like it, I don't offer posters for the swim team because I couldn't come up with something nice and also wondered if it would be worth since there are only 6 girls on the team

[mackami]

OK, here is an edit incorporating some of the changes. I faded to a solid blue instead of the white. Not sold on it over just having the image under bleed all the way through. But on a total bleed through I did not like the lane line continuing all the way through her head.

I made her last name smaller and a mix of upper/lower case like the school name. I made school name and logo larger. I added the year. I like it better than the first one, but will still tweak since I have some time. These don't need to be all done until November. But I like to fine tune since they will all be based on the same framework and probably be reused for other swim shoots in the future.

http://www.pbase.com/image/103802570.jpg
How are these for some ideas... (sorry, I don't have access to Photoshop right now)

1) Bring the swimmer's entire body up so that the head overlaps the top border.
This would eliminate the problem of the lane markers running through her head.
It would also allow you to use the water right to the left edge of the photo instead of the blue fade

2) If you were to print this at the final image size and look at the photo from a distance, I would guess that the script over sans serif font would make the last name a bit hard to read. Possibly try using the same all sans serif font for her name at a larger point size. It would really emphasize her name. <As a parent, I like seeing my daughter's name :D > You can balance the composition by increasing the width of the bottom border a bit.

[Dermit]

How are these for some ideas... (sorry, I don't have access to Photoshop right now)

1) Bring the swimmer's entire body up so that the head overlaps the top border.
This would eliminate the problem of the lane markers running through her head.
It would also allow you to use the water right to the left edge of the photo instead of the blue fade

2) If you were to print this at the final image size and look at the photo from a distance, I would guess that the script over sans serif font would make the last name a bit hard to read. Possibly try using the same all sans serif font for her name at a larger point size. It would really emphasize her name. <As a parent, I like seeing my daughter's name :D > You can balance the composition by increasing the width of the bottom border a bit.

mackami

I like your ideas here a lot! Thanks. I will work up a version like this when I get a chance and see how it looks. But in my mind I see exactly what you are talking about and like it. The only problem I see I might run in to is by making the head shot larger it will also encroach into the rest of the image where the action shot is... unless I really enlarge the bottom banner. I will play and see.

[stugotzo]

Looks great. I have another idea, similar to the head overlapping the top border.....

Maybe you could find a way to simulte the water flowing over the bottom border (only in one area, not the entire border), to make it look like the pool water is spilling overa crack in the border.

Just a thought. Hey, my brain is fried here at work too. :D

[mackami]

mackami

I like your ideas here a lot! Thanks. I will work up a version like this when I get a chance and see how it looks. But in my mind I see exactly what you are talking about and like it. The only problem I see I might run in to is by making the head shot larger it will also encroach into the rest of the image where the action shot is... unless I really enlarge the bottom banner. I will play and see.

Glad to help when I can... If you increase the size of the head shot then slide it to the left a bit. I think that you still have enough space without making the vertical edge go through too much of her hair

[WebMonkey]

Dermit, I love it
:p

[dadCameraGuy]

Dermit

i love the idea and i appreciate you sharing your pricing and how you set that up - good info for beginners looking to try something new

i really like much of what you have set up, but have some possible suggestions... mainly i didn't like the space in the upper right so i was thinking of ways to manage that better - so i threw together this concept (based on splitting the photo space in a more diagonal than the horizontal you've got - this might also help get rid of the issue of the swim lane going thru her head.

http://img.skitch.com/20081004-j45qeqxha2356m5i493hxj92s7.jpg

just something to think about

[PhotosGuy]

A little late, but didn't anyone have a problem with the floats growing out of her ear, or is that what you meant, Mitch? ;)

[bbowen0109]

I like it. I wouldn't change anything!

[dadCameraGuy]

A little late, but didn't anyone have a problem with the floats growing out of her ear, or is that what you meant, Mitch? ;)

I wasn't specifically talking about the floats, but there's certainly a lot of empty space there and you're right that they look funny.

would love to see if the original poster changed anything - final result?