Capturing Moments: Basketball with 1950s Camera Gear

Wednesday 9th of October 2024 is a historic day for Women’s basketball in Finland, as Peli-Karhut from Kotka will compete in their first ever EuroCup Women game, this is also the first time a Finnish women’s team has participated in this format of the competition and also the first time in decades when a Finnish women’s team is playing in a European club competition.

So, as a photographer, I also wanted to make this game something special to remember – now I know I am no baller, so I won’t be playing in the game. But as a photographer, I can try make my images/content from the game to appear special.

Now naturally there are clients and possibly players who want to have the shiny, no grain and edited images for websites and social media.

But that does not stop me from taking my Voigtlander Bessamatic with the Zoomar 36-82mm f2.8 camera/lens with me to the game to capture the images in the style that can only be captured by a 1950’s camera. The Zoomar 36-82mm f2.8 lens is the first ever zoom lens made – so it adds to the special features of the equipment that I will use for the game.

First time I took this camera to a basketball game was in 2021, and in 2022 I covered a lot of EuroBasket 2022 in Prague/Berlin with this camera. This year I have taken it to football matches as well – I did contact the Finnish F.A to ask if they would have been interested in getting some ‘old school’ photos of the Nations League between Finland and England at the Olympic Stadium this coming weekend… but no luck there.

At the EuroBasket 2022 the camera/lens did get a lot of attention from fellow photographers, these days it’s not quite so rare to see a film camera at a game, which is just brilliant!

Just in case any players happen to read my little post before the game – feel free to ‘strike a pose’ for the quirky looking camera .. and just remember, the photos won’t be online tonight from the 35mm film (but they will be tomorrow!!)

And for any photographer enthusiasts who might venture to read this post – check below for the follow up post in a day or two to see the results.

Nothing quite like shooting sports with an old school camera!