One of the rules of good blogging is coming up with clever titles for your posts that invite the Internet to read on, and with recent humdingers like “Weekend in Victor” I think I can safely claim the title of industry expert. Fortunately every once in a while the hard work is done for you, like coming home to discover that someone has anonymously mowed your front lawn (this happened today!), and this is one of those times. On the weekend Adelaide played host to the largest roller derby event ever seen outside the Northern hemisphere, and they called it the Great Southern Slam – a snappy name that has Simon Bills Blog written all over it. Naturally I was on hand with my trusty 40D to breath in the atmosphere, the energy and the assortment of unusual characters that head along to something like this.
You wanna know what’s hard to do? Take photos of roller derby, that’s what. It was held at the Wayville showgrounds with no natural light coming through so it was super dark, for the photographers out there I shot on manual all day ISO3200, f/2.8, 1/200th, and that was just about right. Sure, there’s a bit of noise with the 40D (left the 5D2 at home as I wanted the faster shutter speed and better focussing of the 40D) but I don’t think it detract from a gritty sport like this one. In addition to the lack of light, it’s difficult to isolate the action, there’s so much happening it’s super tough to get a shot that’s not too busy. My third excuse is that shooting from the outside of the ring I was always shooting people facing slightly away from the camera, if I was able to make my way into the middle I’m pretty sure I would have taken some Pulitzer prize winners.
There was a great vibe about the day, the girls play hard but once it’s over it’s all smiles and hugs. The next three shots show how hard they play (there were several girls getting about in wheelchairs) but the forth one shows the softer side.
And then there’s the officials. The first one shows everyone’s favourite roller derby evangelist doing a great Simon Cowell impression. Then we’ve got the media (Derby News Network to be precise), and another guy who was getting around in some sort of official capacity.
I wasn’t able to make it for the final on Sunday so I’m not sure who took out the title, but the Adeladies were looking pretty sharp on the Saturday so hopefully they got the job done.
