Jack Flaherty

Jack Flaherty is a local sports photographer. He shoots high school sports including field hockey, soccer, football, swimming, lacrosse, softball, basketball, ice hockey, and gymnastics. Jack does some college sports, and has recently started coming to field hockey games here at Monmouth and taking pictures. What he does is he comes to the games, shoots, and uploads them on his website: http://www.jackflahertyphotography.com/photogallery.html. They are for sale there: 8x10 are $15, 11x14 are $35, and 16x20 are $60. I have started talking with him after the games, and he told me he spends roughly $20,000 on photography equipment each year. His newest lens he is using cost him $5,000.

I think he uses canon, but I don't know the names of the each lens or camera, but he has so much equipment. This makes me wonder if all of this equipment is necessary to get good pictures. I always thought that its not the camera that makes good pictures, its the photographer. But, if you don't have a high tech. camera for sports photography, it becomes really difficult to get the good shots. I invested in a 100-300mm canon lens. I am getting good results with this lens when I shoot sports, and the results are getting better the more I shoot. Jack's camera must shoot 10-20 images per second. He holds down the shutter continuously making sure that he doesn't miss anything. At our game yesterday he shot 2500 pictures. I looked at them all, and sometimes he has 20 images that are almost identical.

I really wonder if he has a unique skill for photographing sports, or what if, with the best possible equipment, anyone can shoot sports if they just hold down the shutter. What makes a good sports photographer? Is it someone who captures every possible moment of the game, or the ones who capture the pivotal action shots and emotional moments of the game?