Shamil Tanna

Whilst looking through the internet at something completely unrelated to photography I stumbled across a photographer called Shamil Tanna. It would seem to me that he mainly photographs people, celebrities from popular culture. He has also done a piece on Ecuador.

I was drawn to his work whilst looking at an article about Great Britain's, number one, female javelin thrower; Goldie Sayers. The image of her in this article was taken by Shamil Tanna and since I am basing the start of my project around my athletics club I decided to do some research into him. Whilst his images of sports stars are different to mine it seemed like a good place to start some research. His images of 'sports stars' are taken, majority, in the studio and in a very 'un-sporty ' environment.

These two images are of former England cricketer and journalist/commentator Geoffrey Boycott. Both I would imagine taken at the Headingley, the cricket ground where Boycott made his name with his home county Yorkshire. The two are good examples of environmental portraits and work well together as a set. I love how the light has evenly lit everything in the shot.

This is a studio shot of Tottenham Hotspur forward Giovanni Dos Santos. This for me works well as it clearly illustrates that he is a footballer. At the same time it could work well as a fashion shot for Nike due to the t-shirt and the ball.

These are two photographs that I can very much relate to mine. They are environmental portraits of 'regular' people playing sport. They seem to me to be lit by the floodlights and separate flash units. The subjects seems to be positioned right underneath the lights due to the ring of lights surrounding the subjects. It is almost like a spotlight, like the subjects want to be stars and in the spotlight. I think these are two successful images.

These are two photographs of two british athletes. This image is of interest to me as it matches my idea in that the athlete on the left is British javelin thrower Goldie Sayers. Both athletes are in their environments; therefore it is an environmental portrait. The lighting used is very strong and harsh. It shows both athletes 'looking towards' something, as if they are looking towards what they want to achieve, to the future, to future competitions and tournaments. This is a very successful way of portraying athletes as all athletes want is success and to achieve great things.