My very first gym portrait

 
Have you ever watched The Ultimate Fighter? If you have, then you've seen all the portraits of the big name UFC fighters adorning the walls of their training facility. I love those portraits, but I almost never shoot portraits myself.

Maybe it's because I'm uncomfortable making that connection with the subject through the camera lens. I don't like staring at people and I like being stared at even less. Shooting portraits pushes me outside of my comfort zone. I much prefer to snap a picture when the person is in their own little bubble, completely unaware of me.

But today I got a little wild and crazy. Maybe it was a leftover adrenaline rush from just finishing Fight Gone Bad. Or maybe it was a subconscious nod to the out-frickin'-standing building-sized promo portrait of Michael Bisping that I passed in Times Square every day last week. Who knows? But after the Fight Gone Bad workout, I saw Dan C. reclining against the wall drinking water from a gallon milk jug. He had just finished the WOD and was a little disappointed with his score (although, between you and me, it was a very very good score. I would kill to get that score, but I digress...) He was sitting on the blue mats leaning against the red ones looking pretty dejected and -best of all- there was no clutter around him. I couldn't resist. I asked him if I could take his picture and he said yes so I snapped a couple of shots while he sat there guzzling water.

My favorite one is the one above. It's the most natural and relaxed shot of them all. My one complaint is that I didn't center the picture very well. I made the mistake of using the lens to get up-close and personal when I should have pulled back a little bit and left room for cropping. With so many pixels, I could have taken the shot much farther back and then cropped in tight without losing too much resolution. Since I started in too close, I had no room to maneuver and, unfortunately, just buzzed the top of his head.

Ah, well..... Live and learn! Next time I won't come in so tight.

For more shots from our Fight Gone Bad fundraiser, check out FGBIII.