Image of the Week: Cross-Country Runner Alexandra Krieg, Middlebury, Vermont

This week's shot is of Alexandra Krieg, a cross-country runner at Middlebury College.

I had been assigned to photograph Alexandra as part of a story profiling the school's running program. The editors wanted an action shot (preferably with a motion blur) featuring some beautiful Vermont outdoor scenery. I scouted a few trail locations nearby and settled on a grassy meadow with a huge willow tree.

To get the deep blue sky I wanted, I underexposed the ambient light by about 1 stop and filled in the willow tree and Alexandra with two White Lightning monolights powered by a portable battery pack off to camera right. The light on the tree used only a 7 inch reflector while the light on Alexandra was fitted with a 30° honeycomb grid to minimize any light spill on the ground. Both strobes were gelled with full CTO (Color Temperature Orange) filters to warm the strobe light to match the late afternoon sunlight color. I used a fisheye lens from ground level to create a dramatic perspective and open up the composition.

Have questions or comments? Send me an email.

Technical Data

Cross-Country Runner Alexandra Krieg, Middlebury, Vermont was photographed with a Nikon D300 and a 10.5mm ƒ/2.8 Nikkor AF lens. The exposure was 1/80 sec at ƒ/8.

Other Images of the Week