“Have you ever been somewhere that feels like a work in progress?”
“Qatar has changed each time I’ve taken the drive around the lagoon-hugging Corniche circular road: new asphalt, new buildings, stadiums, hotels and traffic means the sands are constantly shifting and gives the feeling that the country is preparing for…something. For this most recent trip I was shooting the MotoGP test followed by the first round of the season a week or so later; the timing of which sees us taking photos in mixed conditions transitioning from day to dusk and into the evening.”
“Arriving in Doha you are greeted by a white haze in the sky. As you get closer to downtown from the award-winning airport there are some great skylines, modern buildings, palm trees and turquoise water. Once you make it through the various traffic light stops, endless architectural glass and building sites, things start to get less dense. Heading to Losail I found myself on a brand new 5 lane highway that didn’t exist twelve months previously (a vast improvement on last year when driving around on a mixture of unfinished roads led by a very confused sat nav).”
“After this you start to see open plains of sand, buffeted around by the winds and houses under construction for miles. The country is preparing for the 2022 FIFA World Cup and you can witness the amount of work that is going into this and the travel infrastructure as a whole but it's eerily empty in most places other than the absolute city centre. Vast shopping malls (one with it's own Venetian lake inside it) and luxury hotels exist but with little or no people around to enjoy them.”
“This time, Losail was a busy event for me. For many teams it was the first occasion they were wheeling out their 2020 bike liveries and colours so there was a high demand for team shoots. I had a long list of portrait's, bike and team photography sessions to organise amongst the daily racing schedule. I was feeling apprehensive about the sheer volume of work and being able to plan and organise it all amongst my usual roster.”
“On my day of arrival, I headed straight to the circuit from the airport in order to get set up early and tick off my first photo shoot of many for a Moto3 team as we have to cover the two support classes as well as the MotoGP boys.”
“I am very much the sort of person that plans and prepares for different jobs and, by my own admission, sometimes too much! But it’s my mode and it helps me get the job done professionally. All apprehension goes away once the camera is out and we are rolling.”
“There are so many variables to consider when pulling together a plan for MotoGP; the riders’ availability, locations, ambient light conditions, equipment choices, sequencing the riders and bikes in the various poses and even just physically getting the equipment on location in advance for setting up. And then, somehow, fitting it all in! I’ve included here a photo of me running from the track during one of the Moto3 sessions, I’m heading back to the paddock for a Moto2 portrait shoot I had lined up, and with only a tiny window to get the job done. In this instance I had already gone to the location early and set up my lighting and modifiers so that I could grab them on arrival, take the shot and allow the riders to head out for their session with minimal fuss. During the race weekend it feels like I spent the 3 days from Thursday to Saturday running around like this!”
“As a photographer there is something very distinct and interesting about working at Losail. It’s the only place in the MotoGP race calendar where we get to shoot during sunset and then under floodlights with some of those sessions transitioning through both! Providing a contrast of hot and dusty, to golden sunset, to cold and dark all in the space of an hour. This adds a new dynamic to the planning process especially if you want to try and capture that warm evening light from a specific spot. When the sun gets low in Doha it looks huge, and, if you’re lucky, the sky can fire up red & orange. Unfortunately, it doesn’t last long as the sun moves visibly fast as it crests the horizon and disappears passing the baton over to the ample floodlights around the circuit. Planning your location at the various times across the evening becomes crucial to squeezing the most out of the available light.”
“From this point on it's a battle with white balance, ISO and shutter speed to make sure you’ve constantly got things in check. Unless of course you want to go full art and just lower the shutter to get some crazy light trails! My favourite place to shoot under the flood lights is in the pit lane; using a basic on-camera flash you can get some creative and interesting results. Short flash durations and long shutters in the low ambient conditions generate some brilliant light play that can be addictive in trying to perfect.”
“Out on track and shooting under the floodlights I generally change my white balance to 'Tungsten' and set my ISO to auto with a cap of 5000. From there I tend to shoot as wide open as possible which in the case of my 400mm lens is F/2.8 and I try to keep the shutter speed below 1/1250. These settings allow me to stop the action while keeping noise low and image quality high. I like to showcase the physicality of motorcycle racing in my images, capturing the body language of the rider and bike in their most extreme moments can make for some dynamic images. Losail has some corners that allow you to get close to the riders just as they hit the most extreme lean angles making for some jaw dropping viewing. Another thing to note is that the floodlights are not a constant ‘temperature’ so you find that white balance fluctuates from frame to frame. I try to watch out for these in post-production and correct them by applying the same temperature to each image, keeping a consistant look and reducing colour contamination where possible.”
“Before travelling to Qatar I had sent my workhorse 1DX to Canon Professional Services (CPS) for some much-needed TLC. Honestly, I was blown away by the improvement it made, the AF was rock-solid, and the images were noticeably cleaner. So much so that as soon as I got back I booked the rest of my kit in for the same treatment.”
“It’s easy to forget how much stress we put our equipment through, even just this one trip saw around 4000 images across the changes in temperature, pressure, dust and just generally working outside for long durations. Touch wood; I’ve never had a camera or lens fail on me in the field, but I have definitely learnt the importance of keeping them maintained this time around.
With all of my team shoots done and the free practice and qualifying sessions behind us, the only thing left to shoot was race day. I arrived at the circuit around 2 hours before the first race to prepare. Reviewing the track map, I marked out the spots I wanted to cover and in what order, with the aim of covering the grid, the race as it unfolds and the final celebrations before going all over again for the next race.”
“I always make a basic race day plan because this is one aspect of a Grand Prix that disappears in a blink, there's no time to stop in between races so I find it important to plan things out. For example, what time I go to the start grid, what equipment I will take with me, where early race pack shots are best taken from, what spots I want to cover and where any late in the day battles might play out before needing to head back.”
“That last pass is crucial because it’s all too easy to hang around on track for too long and miss the celebrations in Parc Ferme and the podium. A few times I have been watching a race unfold and trying to second guess where the last overtaking move may happen and been caught out with barely enough time to make it back! Of course, you cannot plan everything and one of the most important aspects is being able to read the race and make decisions on-the-fly but I use my own plan as a frame work that can be deviated from if needed.”
“So, with the team shoots done and three days of free practice, qualifying and races under my belt I had a really eclectic mix of photos to look back on. Some posed, some action, some landscape, some portraits and some pure emotion. This last visit to Qatar had a different feel to it…but then Losail can be as rewarding as it is unique.”