16 Digital SLR Photography Januar y 2020
R
ICHARD PELHAM IS widely regarded as
one of the best sports photographers in
the UK. His career has seen him capture
a variety of sports ranging from football to
boxing to golf and he has attended every
major sporting event, from World Cups to the
Olympics. His new book features a wealth of
historic sporting moments.Your career spans 30 years. How easy was it
to shortlist images for the book?
Deciding which images to include and which
to leave out was the hardest thing I’ve ever
had to do. I’ve always thought that with all the
major sporting events that I’ve captured one
day I could produce a commemorative book,
so I made a conscious effort to build a library
of my work. This was easier with my digital
images as I could store them on hard drives,
but not so simple with film shots. I had a
number of images on film in mind that I
wanted to include, so I needed to retrieve the
negatives out of storage to create fresh scans
and did not realise what a job it would be to
find them! Shots of ‘Gazza’ at Euro ’96, the
Olympics in '96 and Ian Wright breaking
Arsenal’s goal record were some examples of
images I knew I wanted to include but had to
work hard to find. From hundreds of
thousands of images, I had to shortlist it to
around 400 or so, with around 320 pictures
making the final cut for the book.How long did it take to get the book put
together? The creation of the book was a
real team effort; I had some arguments with
the design team demanding how I wanted
the pictures to be used. I felt really bad but
I wanted this book to be something special
that people would love to read and want to
comment on. I think once I got all the
pictures together it took about three months
to complete, including working on all the
words with my writer Nick Szczepanik.In general, what are your favourite sports to
shoot? I enjoy all the sports I cover but if I had
to narrow it down to my favourite three, it
would be football, boxing and the Olympic
Games. At the Olympics, I had a complete
full-on buzz about it day in and day out and
then when it’s finally over I’m completely
drained and come down with a bang,
wanting to do nothing but sleep!You started shooting film but now it’s all
digital. When did digital cameras match the
quality you got from film? When you look at
the old negatives, the quality is terrible. I
imagine it’s because in sports photography we
were pushing the film to its limits, developing
and fixing them in chemicals that were near to
boiling point, then using methylated spirits
and hairdryers to dry them. The digital camera
that really changed everything was the Nikon
D3/D3s, I remember at the London Olympics
that the file sizes were much bigger and the
quality better. Later, the Canon EOS-1DX and
the incredible Canon EOS-1DX Mark II –
which I currently use – really took over.How else has the kit you use changed?
The most obvious development I’ve noted is
that the fast telephoto lenses have become
much lighter. Canon’s latest range of
lightweight telephotos is incredible – I have
regularly used the Canon EF 600mm f/4L III
USM on a monopod all day and it’s perfect.
I’m sure the impact of mirrorless cameras will
change everything again in the near future,
I’ve been using the Canon EOS R for studio
work and the full-frame sensor’s resolution
and colour reproduction is brilliant, plus I find
the Raw files are great to work with.1 ) Frank Bruno loses his title to Mike Tyson in Las Vegas, 1996.
2) Bradley Wiggins wins the time trial at the London Olympics.
3) Andy Murray plants a kiss on the Wimbledon trophy, 2016.
4) Paul Gasgoine's infamous 'dentist's chair' cele at Euro '96.
5) Striker Ian Wright celebrates making Arsenal's history.123WHEN YOU LOOK AT
THE OLD NEGATIVES,
THE QUALITY IS TERRIBLE.
I IMAGINE IT’S BECAUSE IN
SPORTS PHOTOGRAPHY
WE WERE PUSHING THE
FILM TO ITS LIMITS