Jason Buscema

I’m always trying to capture peak action when shooting for Sideline Studios, but as any pro photographer will tell you, it’s not easy! For some reason the athletes don’t consider the best angle and lighting for me to get the shot… I don’t know why. I’ve tried asking the refs to stop the game so I can re-shoot the shot I just missed but that never seems to fly.

At the last Santa Fe Christian versus La Jolla High School football game, I finally captured a pretty nice sequence of shots of David Knoth catching the ball and running into the end-zone. To capture this sequence, I dropped the 400 2.8 lens and used the 70-200 lens on a Canon 1D Mark III body. Perhaps it was because I had my little helper with me for this game. Enjoy.

Golden Gardens – Shilshole Bay – Seattle, WA

Last month we were in Seattle visiting family and attending and shooting a cousin’s wedding. The wedding ceremony was at Golden Gardens (Shilshole Bay) just NW of downtown Seattle and right on the Puget Sound. I hadn’t been to Golden Gardens since my college days at Seattle Pacific University and needed some time to scout a few possible photo opp locations for the happy couple. I actually wanted to get a photo with the couple on the train tracks but decided against it for various reasons.

The trains run pretty slow but I didn’t want to be the one responsible for killing the couple on their first day of marriage, especially since they are family… Emily’s family. Not such a good idea right?

In my travels to find an easy way onto the train tracks for a possible shot, I wandered through the pedestrian tunnel under the train tracks and found what I thought to be some pretty cool looking graffiti. I especially liked the colors, the blue mushroom and the frog troll prince guy. I ended up using this graffiti train tunnel as a backdrop for one of the wedding photos which I will post later.

Seattle is home to some very cool and very funky people who produce some very cool and very funky art. It makes for a fantastic place to shoot in addition to the scenery of course… well, when its not raining.

Enjoy!

I’m selling one of my workhorse cameras I’ve used, gently, over the years. It’s a near mint condition Canon 1D Mark I classic body.  This camera has been babied, never dropped, never used in the rain, non-smoker, etc. I am the second owner. It has only 58,462 actuations on it w/ the latest firmware. Serial # 168xx.

For the past three years, this has been my primary camera for covering basketball, volleyball and night football games for Sideline Studios. It’s still has the fastest sync with a flash at 1/500th. The photos are tack sharp!

Comes w/ body cap and 1 off brand battery (Delkin/Lenmar) which holds a charge much longer than the Canon brand batteries. Looking to get $475 obo (price includes PayPal). More photos available upon request.

Taken in Volterra, Italy June 2009 using a Canon 5D Mark II and a 24-70 2.8 lens. This photo consists of 5 different images stitched together. The shots were taken hand held with very little post processing, if any. This was my first trip with the Canon 5D Mark II camera and it took some getting used to.

This past month I had the privilege of photographing a wedding in Glendale, CA for a good friend of mine. Let’s set the record straight before I continue… I am not a wedding photographer! I have photographed now five weddings over the past few years but it isn’t a profession I’m looking at getting into anytime soon. I have the utmost respect for the professionals who make a livelihood of it. It is no walk in the park.

This particular wedding consisted of a very small ceremony at the groom’s mother’s home in Glendale and a fantastic reception at the groom’s father’s home in Pasadena. Both venues were a photographer’s paradise and it helped that both the bride and groom are stunning subjects. In between the ceremony and the reception we did a quick shoot at The Langham Hotel in Pasadena. My wife, Emily, came along with me and she proved to be a tremendous help making sure I didn’t miss any key shots, helping pose the subjects, etc. Posing is my least favorite part of shooting weddings. I’m more of a sports photographer as you can tell from my work at Sideline Studios, so unless the bride and groom are running, I’m a bit at a loss.

At the reception I setup a “photo booth” type thing and gave guests a wireless trigger. This was a it hit with the guests and we ended up with over 700 shots. The photos become more interesting as the night, and the booze, continued on. I often saw groups of people in front of the photo booth setup for a long period of time shooting away.

Below are some of my favorites from the day as well as my basic camera setup.

Main camera setup:

• Canon 5D Mark II
• Canon 24-70 2.8
• Canon 70-200 2.8 IS
• 550ex w/ Quantum Turbo pack & diffuser

Photo Booth setup:

• Canon 1D Mark II
• Canon 16-35 2.8 II
• Pocket Wizards
• Canon pre-trigger release cable
• Alien Bees B800
• Alien Bee large rectangle softbox
• 13′ Matthews C Stand w/ counter weight & sandbag

This past weekend we took the boys to two different parks on two different days. That’s big time in our household! On Sunday we went to the park up the street from our house and Isaac had free reign of the play structure. I just got my Canon 5D Mark II camera and figured this would be a good time to test out the HD video capabilities the camera possesses. I’ll tell you, it’s not super intuitive like you may expect from Canon.

This video was shot obviously using the Canon 5D Mark II camera and the 70-200 2.8 non IS L series lens. Sorry for the shaky video. I wonder if a IS lens would work in video mode? 

This is one of my very first test videos taken w/ the Canon 5D Mark II camera and the Canon 15mm fisheye lens. It’s a little interesting shooting video with the camera but hopefully with some practice I’ll figure it out. I must admit I had to break out the manual to figure out how to do it which isn’t a good sign for starters. I need to spend some time and read up about if it’s possible to auto-focus during the recording of a video. My guess is no. 

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I had the opportunity to go out on a friend’s yacht yesterday off the coast of San Diego. Initially we hit a bank of fog but within 45 minutes the fog burned off and it was a killer San Diego day. The water was very calm and flat and there was no wind. Truly incredible.

Around 16 miles out at sea we found ourselves in a large pod of dolphin. They were all over the place and I quickly grabbed my camera. I had brought along my Canon 1D Mark II, and both a 70-200 2.8 lens and a 17-35 2.8 lens. I wish I had a 300 or 400mm lens with me, although shooting that tight on a moving boat would prove to be a bit of a challenge.

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