Often when I am trying to setup a small space to shoot, the lighting is problematic at best. For that I have purchased a Neewer Vision 4 300W portable strobe. With the Parabolic Softbox I can quickly turn any space into a studio.
Getting back into photographing roller derby
April 29, 2023 - Double Header at the Haig Bowl Arena with bouts between Montreal’s New Skids On The Block vs the Queen City Lake Effect Furies and Montreal’s Sexpos vs Tri-City Thunder
Read MorePère Lachaise Cemetery
Recently I returned from a trip to Paris and was able to spend some time wandering around Père Lachaise Cemetery. Covering over 100 acres and one million internments since its inception, it is the largest cemetery within central Paris. I had hoped to spend the entire day wandering, but unfortunately rain forced me to leave early.
Digital images are also available to preview.
Hasselblad 500CM, 150mm Sonnar F/4, Kodak Tri-X 400 B&W film was used for all the black and white images.
Hasselblad 500CM, 150mm Sonnar F/4, Kodak Ektachrome E100SW was used for all the colour images.
I edited this image to a 8x10 as I was unable create a proper composition with the pillar in full showing.
Memorial to the Dead
Beaver Fever 2017
TriCity Roller Derby hosted their 3rd Beaver Fever Tournament and provided roller derby fans with 3 days full of amazing games.
Flickr Collection
The flickr interface seems to be stuck in the past and hasn't been updated in a long time, but is still an easy way to share images.
Individual Albums on Facebook
Game 1 - Ithaca vs Muddy River
Game 2 - Royal City vs Roc City
Game 3 - TriCity vs Toronto
Game 4 - Winnipeg vs Maine
Game 5 - Royal City vs Ithaca
Game 6 - Muddy River vs Roc City
Game 7 - Winnipeg vs Toronto
Game 8 - TriCity vs Maine
Game 9 - Royal City vs Muddy River
Game 10 - Toronto vs Maine
Game 11 - Roc City vs Ithaca
Game 12 - TriCity vs Winnipeg
Feel free to tag and share these albums. Please retain photo credits.
Workshop: Art & Form Posing Series
The West Toronto Photography Group on Meetup.com has a wide range of workshops, hosted by Phil Sutherland. On May 18th they had another installment of the Art & Form Posing Series, this time featuring Jenna L. She is a former ballerina and the posing ability of dancers never ceases to amaze me.
One of the thematic elements in this workshop used a long swath of red fabric to wrap the model. The fabric then stretched off to the sides. A few of my favourite images follow.
High Key setup with a light to the left of the photographer at about a 45 degree angle. We were also running a smoke machine to add a 'hazy' filter.
Lights on either side and slightly behind the model with a light to the front far left at a rather sever angle. The effect really uses light and shadow to highlight the pose.
All images are of Our Ladies of Pain jammer Silent Spring as she slips past the pack on the inside of the track
Royal City Roller Girls Home Opener
The RCRG held their 2017 home opener on May 27th at Centennial Arena in Guelph. The Violet Uprising took on the Killer Queens in an exciting and hard fought bout.
The 1st game was Our Ladies of Pain hosting the QCRG Queens Court. These Fresh Meat teams put in an amazing effort filled with hard hits and riveting jams.
Bellydance Blossom Festival
The 2017 Bellydance Blossom festival was held over 3 days at the Harbourfront Centre in Toronto Ontario from May 5th to May 7th. Workshops were held by Mohamed Saleh, Dr. Mo Geddawi, Hany Morgan and Mohamad Haiek.
There were both exploratory and collaborative performances over the 3 days. I was able to photograph all but one of the performances.
I have posted images from each performance I attended to a single album to Facebook.
https://www.facebook.com/pg/PDV.Photography/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1547134118692819
Individual photos may be posted to instagram as well.
Royal Brawl 2017 Invitational Tournament
The very first Royal Brawl Invitational Tournament was held this past weekend at the Centennial Arena in Guelph. Hosted by the Royal City Roller Girls, this WFTDA sanction event featured some fantastic flat track derby over 2 days.
Featured Teams
Capital City Dollinquents
Capital City Dolly Rogers
Rideau Valley Roller Girls Vixens
Royal City Brute-Leggers
Royal City Rum Runners
Tri-City Thunder
Winnipeg Roller Derby League All-Stars
I've posted albums on Facebook. Free free to tag and share.
Friday May 12th, 2017
Game 1 - Rideau Valley Roller Derby -Vixens VS. Winnipeg Roller Derby League - All Stars
Game 2 - Tri-City Roller Derby - Thunder VS. Royal City Roller Girls - Brute Leggers
Saturday May 13th, 2017
Game 1 - Royal City Roller Girls - Rum Rollers VS. Capital City Derby Dolls - Dollinquents
Game 2 - Royal City Roller Girls- Bruteleggers VS. Capital City Derby Dolls - Dolly Rogers
Game 3 - Tri-City Roller Derby - Thunder VS. Rideau Valley Roller Derby - Vixens
Game 4 - Capital City Derby Dolls - Dolly Rogers VS. Winnipeg Roller Derby League - All stars
Game 5 - Rideau Valley Roller Derby - Vixens S. Royal City Roller Girls - Brutelegger
Flickr
A album collection of the event broken down on a game by game basis hosted on Flickr
https://www.flickr.com/photos/goopie/collections/72157683918615536/
ToRD 2017 Quarterfinals
The 2017 Toronto Roller Derby regular season is over and we are now in the traditional Battle for the Boot.
Game One was the 3rd place Smoke City Bandits vs the 4th place Gore-Gore Rollergirls.
Game Two as the 1st place Death Track Dolls vs the 2nd place Chicks Ahoy!
ToRD Double Header - March 4, 2017
The Death Track Dolls looked to cement their place at the top of the league standings when they faced off against the Smoke City Bandits, while the Chicks Ahoy did battle with the Gore Gore Roller Girls at the Bunker.
Smoke Cities Bandit jammer Titmouse battles her way through the Death Track Dolls blockers
Gore Gore Rollergirls' jammer Murdercat gets the cold shoulder from Chicks Ahoy! blocker Francesca Fiueré
Hip Hip Hooray - Feb'17
This Saturday, Feb 25, Hip Hip Hooray Cabaret at the Round featured a wonderful group of talented dancers.
Raqs Mahasti
To see more images, checkout this gallery on Facebook.
Derby on Film
Recently I decided to try my hand at shooting a few rolls at a ToRD match at the Bunker. The lighting setups are better suited to using strobes of some sort. I had a few rolls of Ilford Delta 3200 that I wanted to try out. I was rather surprised by the results. The action shots were blurry as one might expect when using a manual focus camera, but they were interesting.
Mr Whistler & The Derby Nerd commenting on the bout. Taken over the cameraman's right shoulder.
Hasselblad 500C/M, 150mm Sonnar f/4, Ilford Delta 3200 B&W film.
I decided the best way to curate the images I did like was an instagram account. My main instagram account will continue to be a wide variety of images I capture, but this account will only be Roller Derby images taken with a film camera. I will be accepting contributions from other photographers if they wish to provide images but currently it will be only me posting.
The account is Derby On Film. There is not set schedule as to when images will be posted. It generally takes 2-3 weeks to get the film back and then I have to scan and curate the images.
I am open to making prints of any of my images but I have never done a print directly from film. That would be a fun experiment.
Took keep up to date on my work, subscribe to my mailing list!
Paris on Film
I took an old medium format film camera with me to Paris this December and carried it for several of the days I was wandering about. While shooting with it was a much different experience than carrying a DSLR, it wasn't until the film was processed that the difference also showed greatly in the results.
Read MoreA little time to myself
Recently I had the opportunity to spend a few days in Paris. It was a fantastic. I really found myself loving the city, the people and the culture.
As I had gone primarily to take pictures, I've setup a small gallery which are really nothing more then tourist pics.
FanExpo 2016
Another Labour Day weekend comes and goes and with it, a fantastic weekend at FanExpo Toronto. I spent a bit of time attending a few Q&A panels but the bulk of each day was just wandering through the vendor floor taking pictures of some amazing cosplay!
I've pushed daily galleries to Facebook. Feel free to tag and share!
Thursday, Sept 1
Friday, Sept 2
Saturday, Sept 3
Sunday, Sept 4
I've also pushed images to Flickr, to allow embedding in blogs and such.
Thursday, Sept 1
Friday, Sept 2
Saturday, Sept 3
Sunday, Sept 4
Beaver Fever 2016
Tri-City Roller Derby hosted their 2nd Annual Beaver Fever Tournament May 13-15, 2016. This 3 day, 13 game tournament featured sanctioned WFTDA action as well as some other wonderful surprises.
I was fortunate to be able to shoot track-side for the weekend and managed to capture some wonderful moments.
As Facebook doesn't provide a good way to present a group of galleries, and I had felt segmenting each game into its own album would allow easier sharing, here is a complete list of the albums I've posted. Feel free to tag and share. I do ask that you provide attribution if sharing off Facebook. For example, when sharing to Instagram, please tag any image shares with my instagram handle @pdvphotography. For other websites, linking back to this page is preferred. Thank-you.
Game 1: Roc City Roc Stars vs Royal City Brute Leggers
Game 2: Tri-City Thunder vs Rideau Valley Roller Girls Vixens
Game 3: Burning River All-Stars vs Green Mountain Grade A Fancy
Game 4: Calgary All-Stars vs Queen City Lake Effect Furies
Game 6: Burning River All-Stars vs Roc City Roc Stars
Game 7: Royal City Brute Leggers vs Green Mountain Grade A Fancy
Game 8: Rideau Valley Vixens vs Queen City Lake Effect Furies
Game 9: Tri-City Thunder vs Calgary All-Stars
Game 10: Roc City Roc Stars vs Green Mountain Grade A Fancy
Game 11: Royal City Brute Leggers vs Burning River All-Stars
Game 12: Calgary All-Stars vs Rideau Valley Vixens
Game 13: Tri-City Thunder vs Queen City Lake Effect Furies
Beaver Fever 2016 Officials, Announcers & Special Guests
I also post images to Flickr, so here is the collection page. Flickr is just easier to share if you are looking to embed images into blogs and such (Flickr Link).
Neil Gunner publishes photojournalism roller derby book: Into Battle
Photographer Neil Gunner has just released his book Into Battle: The Roller Derby Experience in Photos and Interviews. I've had the privilege of working with Neil these last few seasons while shooting for Toronto Roller Derby at The Bunker, Downsview Park. Into Battle has been a long term project of his that reflects both his style of photography and his approach to story telling.
At over 200 pages of photos and interviews, Neil has presented an in-depth look at what fuels the passion of so many athletes who make Roller Derby such a fascinating sport to watch.
The Derby Nerd, a Toronto based writer and massive fan of Roller Derby, has published an in-depth review of Neil's book on his blog.
Into Battle: The Roller Derby Experience in Photos and Interviews is available to purchase online or at Toronto Roller Derby matches. It is a perfect gift for any sports lover.
Flickr
For many years I've used Flickr to post and share images. After finding a fair number of flickr images being embedded within a website promoting porn, I'm going to remove any images that aren't Roller Derby or Comic Conventions.
I'll continue posting images for Roller Derby, but I'll be posting those same images to Facebook via my page.
As for other images, they'll all be posted here, with the odd posting to Facebook or Instagram for promotional purposes. While I still like Flickr, the lack of integration with other sites is a problem for me at this time.
9th Annual Black & White Spider Awards
Earlier this year I took part in a photography workshop hosted by Alan of Beauty, Fashion, and Glamour Photography featuring Jemma. I managed to capture several fantastic images, but one of my favorites was this one.
I entered the image into a black & white image contest into the Black & White Spider Awards. Earlier this month I was notified that I was a nominee in the Fine Art category.
The full press release is below.
BLACK AND WHITE SPIDER AWARDS HONORS PHOTOGRAPHER PAUL DEVISSER FROM CANADA
LOS ANGELES (2014.10.25) - Amateur photographer Paul DeVisser of Canada was presented with the 9th Annual Black and White Spider Awards Nominee in the category of Fine Art at a prestigious Nomination & Winners PhotoShow webcast Saturday, October 18, 2014.
The live online gala was attended by photography fans around the globe who logged on to see the climax of the industry's most important event for black and white photography.
The awards international Jury included captains of the industry from The Royal Photographic Society, FoMu Fotomuseum, Aeroplastics Contemporary, Torch Gallery, Stockholm City Museum to Fratelli Alinari in Florence who honored Spider Fellows with 298 coveted title awards and 957 nominees in 14 categories.
"It is an incredible achievement to be selected among the best from the 8,508 entries from 73 countries that we received this year," said Basil O'Brien, the awards Creative Director. "Paul DeVisser's "Ballerina" an exceptional image entered in the Fine Art category, represents black and white photography at its finest, and we're pleased to present him with the title of Nominee."
You can view the 9th Annual Winners Gallery at www.thespiderawards.com/gallery/9th
BLACK AND WHITE SPIDER AWARDS is the leading international award honoring excellence in black and white photography. This celebrated event shines a spotlight on the best professional and amateur photographers worldwide and honors the finest images with the highest achievements in black and white photography.
Dark Side Studio presents Spontaneous Order II - Gala Show
On Saturday, Sept 13th, The Dark Side Studio hosted the Gala Show for Spontaneous Order II, a workshop where a group of dancers gather to create and learn a choreography over 3 days. This intensive workshop produces a eclectic dance number that is the result of collaboration among differing minds and dance styles.
Sahra DeRoy & Victoria Dances
The evening featured some solo performances from participants in the workshop as well as the Lavish student troupe and some special guests. Audra Simmons and Heather Labonté also delighted us with a duet.
Images have been shared to Facebook.