Swimming Through the Foggy Glass...

I enjoy shooting swimming, but there is one thing I really, really hate about it, the fog. It has nothing to do with the event itself, but more to do with the timing and time of year and the weather. And, that's where the fog comes in, between it being cold outside and so warm in the pool area coupled with the natural humidity from the water means me walking in from 40 degrees outside and really low humidity to 80+ degrees and 85%+ humidity it mean there's going to be a nice frost on my lens. And that means I'm waiting, at least 30 minutes for my camera gear to thaw out per se, and basically just defog. There is no amount of wiping lenses with clothes that really help either, the moment you wipe off a little condensation another film of it appears before I can get off a shot, it's just a hurry up and wait effort.

So, one my lenses finally defog, I can get to work, after having missed about 3-4 races. Oh well, such is life, make do with what I have all complaining will do is miss me more races. There were still plenty of races left including a couple of relays, which are always exciting. District 5-4A is basically Wylie High School and all of the Wichita Falls ISD schools. Over the last two years this has been the extent of swimming coverage that I've gotten to shoot. Luckily Wylie has a pretty decent swimming team. I'd prefer a championship meet a little high on the food chain though since some of these races only have three swimmers, and some even only have one... basically all they have to do is show up, not false start and swim the stroke correctly and you move on to regionals.

One of the great things about the Abilene YMCA where the swim meets are held is the big picture windows on the east side of the building. Depending on the time of the day (really early morning around sun up is best) you can get some really pretty light. I liked the photo above, partly because it was one of the first ones I show after my lens finally defogged, but also because I'm a sucker for silhouettes. This was the tail end of the really nice light coming in, so I took a little chance and metered on the bright light. Then, looking for something fun that shows that these are still goofy high school kids and are out there having fun is almost as fun for me to find. Overall, I was pretty happy with the overall results I got from probably the only swim meet I'll shoot this year.