Kyokushin Karate Tournament

Here are some pics from my club's karate tournament last weekend. C&C is welcome!

Please excuse the watermarks - we are selling the photos as fund-raising.

wow, some high kicks there. nice shots.

rick_reno wrote in post #14203648
wow, some high kicks there. nice shots.

Yeah, you should see them pull it off in person! That last kick was spectacular.

Thanks Rick!

joeblack,,
very, very nice series.
i shoot karate, too, so...
i know about backgrounds that suck. LOL
so, FWIW...
look for cleaner BGs or/and
shoot tight and crop tighter!
when i show the resulting captures
to the contracting peeps, it is almost
always images that were "shot tight, etc."
that are the chosen images.
show some more, pls.
B

Love the last shot!

Now you're talkin... Nice stuff.

Nice pics..

Watermark does not bother me. Its there on purpose.
Like earlier said, tighter crops would make some shots much better. Like #4 would look much better when extremely tight. In kata there is no reason to show bg as it does not ad anything to the image. This shot could work better when cropped above the knee to show more his expression. Perfect timing on kiai. Also using longer lense and aperture wide open would help you to isolate the bg and make the fighters stand out more. 70-200 2.8 is great lense for sport. Your shutter speed is good to freeze the action. B&W works also great when shooting martial arts

joonrhee wrote in post #14210167
Love the last shot!

magoosmc wrote in post #14210208
Now you're talkin... Nice stuff.

seaninsa wrote in post #14210408
Nice pics..

Thanks guys!

el mierdo wrote in post #14210133
shoot tight and crop tighter!

Semmonka wrote in post #14212578
Like earlier said, tighter crops would make some shots much better.

Thanks, appreciate the feedback - I will keep that in mind for the next one! I'll try to post a few more.

Ok here are two more, with some tighter cropping.

Nice captures! Kinda hard to get those unless you are familiar with the techniques...

kickmaster wrote in post #14225142
Nice captures! Kinda hard to get those unless you are familiar with the techniques...

Thanks! I used to compete myself but have been on hiatus for several years now...

Also this was my first time taking photos, I'm normally stuck behind a video camera but decided to give it a go. There has been a lot more response to the photos than we've had to video I must say!