How Self-Education Turned an Amateur into a Pro Sports Photographer with Matt Austin

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Matt Austin (00:00):
You can't get lost in the comparison battle between
you and another photographerthat's been doing it for years.
Take your time, learn thesettings, learn how to shoot and
what each thing does, and thenyou get to the point where you
found your style and you're ableto settle in and say, this is
what I do.
Everybody's going to find theirown way.

(00:20):
Don't get lost in the, well,this person's been doing it for
15 years and his pictures are somuch better than mine or her
pictures are so much better thanmine.
And I've only been shooting forthree months, six months, 12
months, doesn't matter.
You're still shooting.
What's yours is yours.
Find your style and stick withit.
Hey, hey.
Welcome to the BeginnerPhotography Podcast.
I am your host, RaymondHatfield, and each week I

(00:41):
interview one of the world'smost interesting photographers
to learn what it really takes tocapture beautiful images so that
you can start to do the same.
In today's rewind episode, weare chatting with community
member Matt Austin, aboutshooting everything to find your
thing.
But first, the BeginnerPhotography Podcast is brought
to you by Clouds Spot.
With Clouds Spot.

(01:01):
You can impress your clientswith a beautiful gallery that is
easy to view, share, anddownload on any device.
Not every client gallery systemcan say that.
With Cloud Spot, you can controlimage size at a watermark, and
of course, download limits aswell.
So grab your free foreveraccount over@deliverphotos.com
and only upgrade when you areready.
Today's guest and communitymember, Matt Austin, is one of

(01:24):
those people whose journey hasbeen so incredibly fun to watch
from watching him share photosof his daughter soccer game that
he took with just a point andshoot camera, to now having been
a staff photographer for severalprofessional and
semi-professional sports teams.
Matt not only is a talentedphotographer, but he's somebody
who takes action on the thingsthat he learns within the

(01:46):
beginner photography podcastcommunity.
And it has been amazing to be apart of his journey and seeing
that if you set a goal, you canmake it happen too.
So in today's episode with Matt,you're gonna learn how to
experiment to learn.
No matter what camera you have,I think you'd be surprised at
how capable it is when you learnwhat all the buttons and dials
do.

(02:06):
You're gonna learn how to buildconnections and ask for help,
from being a part of a simpleFacebook community like the
Beginner Photography podcast, toasking for more direct
mentorship and how to push pastthe imposter syndrome to take
advantage of the opportunitiesthat come your way.
And as I said, Matt is in ourFacebook community along with

(02:28):
thousands of other photographersjust like you, looking to grow
your skills.
So we would love to have youcome join us by heading over to
beginner photo pod.com/group andhope to see inside.
With that, let's go ahead andget on into today's interview.

Raymond Hatfield (02:45):
You know, Matt, over the past, like two
months, your life has reallytaken off in terms of your
photography.
and I feel like just in your.
Relatively short time in thegroup.
You've been in there for almosttwo years now.
You've gone from, shootingbasically everything, anything
that you could get in front ofthe camera to now working with
like multiple sports teams,being in the arena, being, front

(03:08):
row to all of these big events.
and just being able to watch youkind of take off has been real
fun lately, but I want to know,cause I don't, I don't think I
remember.
I don't think you told me thestory.
Like, what was it that got youinterested in photography in the
first place?

So there was for years.
I have, you know, obviouslygrown up.
I grew up in Auburn fan.
there's my little flag.
There is the flag.
Um, yeah, for those of you onthe podcast, that are listening
and not watching on YouTube,it's orange and blue, as it
should be.
and one of their video guys washe did all the basketball stuff
for a while and the basketball,I guess the quality of the

(03:44):
content was just, I mean,through the roof, it was always
fantastic.
There was never a bad video thatcame out.
And there's still isn't, but hestarted doing a twitch stream,
and it, it basically just wentthrough his editing process and
how he would go through and howhe choose clips and how he shot
certain clips.
And I was like, man, you know,makes me want to get out and

(04:04):
shoot, I think I had like a coolpics camera or something like
that, like a little point andshoot.
And I was like, This is awesome.
I'm going to get out and startshooting soccer this season.
This was going into COVID.
I mean, literally right beforeeverything shut down.
and so we had a couple ofweekends where our youth teams
were playing and, I decided thatI'd take my camera with me.

(04:26):
So I, spent a couple of weekendsdoing that.
And it was literally just.
Go out, turn the camera on, hitthe button, make sure you're
focused on whatever, and didn'treally know what I was doing.
and then COVID happened and theband that I was playing in had
to stop playing and everythingelse.
And I was like, man, I gotta,find something to do.
I've got to have something todo.
So I was like, all right, we gotthis stimulus check coming.

(04:47):
Yeah, I'm going to take it andI'm going to buy a camera.
So I bought a Canon T6 and thatfall.
And I ended up actually turningthat into, I'm going to start
taking pictures of the soccerleague.
And, you know, I want to turnaround and boost our Facebook
and start us an Instagram and doall this other stuff.
And all of a sudden it just tookoff from there.
And I was doing the team photosand I was doing the high volume

(05:09):
stuff for them and, upgradedagain this past spring.
And ever since then, Goes backto all of the connections that I
had at Auburn University withthe photographers and the
videographers and literally tothis day can pull up Instagram
and say, Hey, I've got aquestion, how would you frame
this or how would you go aboutlighting this and they will
literally, I mean within 30minutes I have a response from

(05:30):
one of them saying, I would doit like this.
and ever since then, it's just.
Things have clicked, and I've,you know, no pun intended on
that, but things have clicked,and I've understood, I've
started to, you know, you'reable to visualize shots right
before it happens, and, but itall goes back to sitting at home
one night and scrolling throughTwitter, and Jeff Honnell's
going live on Twitch, and I'm,awesome, cool, let's go watch it

(05:53):
and just see what it's about,and, he's recently moved on to
the Texas Longhorns, and CarterGustin's moved on to the Clemson
Tigers, and Shanna Lockwood, whois the photographer, has moved
on to the Atlanta Falcons, and.
here we are.
So

there's kind of a void there that needs to be
filled is what it sounds like.

Well, I've already, I've already gotten the other
photographers now that havetaken over at Auburn and
they're, you know, we're allmutual follows now on Instagram
too.
So

that's awesome.
It seems like a relativelyshort, timeline into
photography.
When you watch that Twitch, wasphotography any part of your
life before that time?
Or did you see this and you'rejust like, Hmm, maybe I'll give
this a shot.

it was one of those, you know, it seems like
it would be fun to do.
I was taking pictures with myphone and, I'd go out with my
daughter and we'd go to theplayground and I would, use
Filmic Pro on my phone and,ended up actually switching my
phone over to pro mode at onepoint on the camera and was
messing with different things.
So like I've always.
I've been a phonetographer for along time.
Uh, for a while I would hashtagthings photographer FAUX.

(06:54):
Um, and, you know, I mean, it'sjust as a joke at that point.
But, looking back now in thelast year, how much I've learned
and how much I've actually beenable to take over and, do these
things.
Actually having a camera hasbeen very helpful.

Yeah.
Oh yeah, for sure.
I kind of want to know like whatthat process was like as far as,
so obviously you bought thecamera because you were
interested in the photography,but how quickly did that turn
into, Trying to learn as much asyou could because, I know some
people just buy the camerathinking that the camera is
going to be the answer, and thenthey quickly find out, Oh, wait,

(07:31):
it's not.
There's more things that eitherI have to learn or buy.
But it seems like with you, youcaught on relatively quickly to
that.
so I guess I'm trying to figureout like, where were you
learning photography there inthe beginning enough to just get
you kind of to like thisbaseline?
Does that question make sense?

Yeah, it does.
and honestly, like The day Iordered my camera, the day
before I had ordered my camera.
So like I found this deal oneBay.
It was like 330.
I asked my wife how much I couldspend.
And she was like, well, you gotto spend like 300, 350.
I was like, all right, cool.
So I, you know, went tosearching and found this and it
was the one with like all of thepurple filters and all the stuff

(08:08):
that like, you're never going touse really.
I think it had like a 32gigabyte SD card that came with
it.
but it was one of those thingslike.
You know, I got the one with,it's got two, two lens that had
the kit lens, had 75 to 300.
and you know, the day I orderedit or the day I decided I was
going to order it, I was like,all right, cool.
Let me get on my podcasts andfind, photography.

(08:28):
And I think this podcast was thefirst one that showed up that I
actually like listened to and Iscrolled all the way back to
episode one.

Jeez.
And I was like,

all right it was you and Callum and it was like,
I'm All right.
They're introducing themselvesand kind of giving their
background, I appreciate it.
Cool.
Next one.
And that's not a knock on youguys.
I promise.
But like the

first episodes were pretty rough.
I get it.
I get it.

it was when you started getting into the, the
exposure triangle.
And, uh, one of the things waslike, well, you know, for the
first month or two, I shot anaperture priority and this is
what I set and this is how I,you know, so I did that.
And then I started looking atthe settings that would come
from that.
I'd look at what the shutterspeed would be set at and the
ISO and all that.
And, you know, one day I waslike, all right, I think I have

(09:11):
enough of an understanding ofit.
Let's give it a shot.
and I had my camera for aboutthree or four weeks at that
point.
And, I had a lot of really bad,like underexposed, a lot of
overexposed blown out skies and,shadows that you had to bring
way up and all that kind ofstuff.
And then, all of a sudden itjust kind of clicked and it was
like, holy crap, I understand itnow.

(09:32):
it's like math or science orchemistry or, you know, any of
that kind of stuff where it justlike, none of it makes sense.
Then all of a sudden thingsjust, Oh, I got it.
I understand it.
I know what he's saying.
And then, I finally reached apoint where, I upgraded because
that T6 wasn't going to give mewhat I needed in a low light
environment.
Like I would go out and shoot atnight at the soccer fields under

(09:54):
the lights, and try to takepictures of a practice.
And I only had one lens that Icould do it with.
And it was the nifty 50, youknow, and even at 2.
8, I was having to drop myshutter speed down to like 1
50th of a second becauseanything over 2000 I.
S.
O.
Was just As noisy as could be.
Looked like a TV from the 90swhenever you hit a channel that
you didn't have.
It was just static, basically.

(10:15):
Um, so, I had some money come inand I was like, Alright, called
my wife, I was like, I'm goingto shoot, you know, we're
shooting this wedding up inMichigan.
I think that was this past June,it was, you know, in like March
or April, and I was like, I'mgonna go buy, I've been looking
at a 6D because it has thearticulating screen.
And simply because of that.
Otherwise I would have gone with5D, but it didn't have a mark,
you know, the articulatingscreen.
And I was wanting to do somevideo stuff with it and all

(10:37):
that.
I actually ended up, I calledthe local camera shop and I was
like, Hey, do you have a 6D Mark2?
And he was like, no, we don't.
And I left work.
I was like, screw it.
I'm going to ride in.
And if they have it, they haveit.
And if they don't, then I'vespent 15 minutes driving over
here and you know, a little bitout of the way.
And I walked in and he was like,Yeah, we got one.
Who told you we didn't?
And I was like, I don'tremember.

(10:57):
so he pulled one out of thedrawer and I was like, do you
guys have a battery grip?
He was like, yeah, we have somein the box.
He was like, I think I actuallyhave one that's open.
If you want it and it'll beabout half the price of a new
one.
And I was like, perfect.
Let's do that.
and he ended up giving me areally good deal on it.
Cause he'd known he, like, I hadbeen in there for three or four
months.
like it was in the case and itwas just like, Like, you know,

(11:17):
like the angelic, the angeliclight shines down on it.
And you hear the, like the halomusic and all that.
and so, he had known I'd been inthere looking at it, looking for
one and waiting on it, waitingon it, waiting on it, waiting on
it.
I only got the money to get it.
And, he was like, I'll do it fora grand.
And I was like, bet, say less,you know, and then at that

(11:39):
point, at that point I've gotLet's see my 75 to 300 and then
my nifty 50.
And that was it.
So we go for this wedding andhad to rent, I rented a 24 to 70
and a 70 to 200.
And at that point, I went andshot a three v three tournament
Father's Day weekend of thisyear.
And at that point, it was like,all right, have to figure out
how I'm going to get theselenses.
Now, these are the lenses that Ineed, not want.

(12:03):
I need them at this pointbecause it was really a want
more than a need.
But, if I get these, then I canreally boost what I'm going to
do.
I can really, I can control my,exposure from 70 millimeters to
200 millimeters, because the 75to 300 is a variable aperture is
four to 5.
6 or four to six or something.
I don't remember exactly what itis, but like, I'd have to set my

(12:25):
ISO to auto.
And then I'd get some picturesthat were purple, white balance
would be,

they were so grainy.

Yeah.
and so I got this and I mean, itjust all of a sudden clicked
even more.
And I was like, all right, cool.
awesome.
Even better.
and ever since then, like, Ihaven't really, I have not shot,
like I have seniors and familiesand, lifestyle and weddings and
all that on my website becauseI, I will still offer them, I'll
still do them, but like thepassion is I want to be behind

(12:55):
the glass at a hockey rink.
I want to be, you know, on thesidelines of a soccer game or a
football game and take picturesof the action, because there's
always something going on andyou don't have to fake a moment,
you know what I mean?
There's no, there's no posinginvolved.
And that's, one of my weakestpoints with all of the other
kinds of all the other stuff.

yeah, with sports, it seems like, you're
going to get that emotion nomatter what, like people are
playing to win.
And when there is that, Desire,I guess people are just going to
naturally react.
And those are the photos thatyou're going to get.
And those are going to beawesome photos.
so you shot a wedding, you gotinto photography for your own
soccer league and the youthsoccer league.
I remember when I came down toAtlanta and we were talking, you

(13:34):
had mentioned, doing, not teamphotos, but you did something
with like some interestinglights and whatnot as well.
So tell me about that and wherethat came from.

so that whole thing, the board, the soccer
board is me and my wife and somereally good friends of mine that
have actually become closerfriends through all of this.
And, you know, it's one of thosethings we were like, all right,
we're going to start doing that.
we're going to bring this travelteam back.
we're going to do it.
You know, COVID hit, we wentfrom like 350 plus kids to 93

(14:04):
kids.
we thought we had lost a lot.
and then all of a sudden, springrolled around.
We had 250 kids and then fallrolled around this past season.
We had 325 kids and it's justabsolutely grown.
But we decided, all right, we'regonna start looking at bringing
back.
We call it select.
That's UFC blazers.
We're gonna bring this back.

(14:26):
We're going to rebrand it.
We're going to give the, parentsand the kids and all this, the
opportunity to vote on what theywant the name to be.
And, you know, we ran a poll andran a form where we took
submissions and all this andactually designed the logo and
all that.
got on and found a uniformsupplier and ordered these
jerseys and, you know, we havesponsors now.
And so like, now we look like aactual club, a professional

(14:49):
club.
And, even our recreation playershave sponsors on the sleeves and
all that.
So I was like, all right, wehave to showcase this.
So let's do that.
If we're going to do a uniformreveal, let's do a uniform
reveal.
And we're just going to go allout on it.
so we actually ended up gettinga church sanctuary.
we left all of the light, weturned all the lights off, just
enough that you could see comingup to where it was.

(15:10):
And I had a, I had a key light,and then I had, you know, for
playing in the band to have allthese RGB lights.
so I was able to actually tunethem to the colors of the
jersey.
and then I used a flash triggerand all this stuff and you know,
just played around with it untilit finally felt like, all right,
this is right.
All right, this is exactly whatwe need.
and just these harebrainedschemes that we come up with and

(15:33):
these crazy things that wedecide to do, somehow we made it
work.
And ever since then, it's justlike, we were told by one of the
state representatives, like,We've never had a youth club do
these.
These look awesome.
And I was like, thanks.
This was a, took about a week toplan and 45 minutes to set up
and figure out before weactually got the first shot.
But, you know, that's the onething that I will say is like

(15:56):
any of these ideas that I haveor anything that I would use,
working for a professionalsports team, doing something
like that, or a college team orwhatever, doing something like
that is like, I have the abilitynow to practice with these kids.
And the parents are like, yeah,man, we're all in on it.
Let's do it.
And then they share the picturesand then their friends share the

(16:17):
pictures and then it gets, youknow, I shared it on Twitter and
tag.
can I think of his name?
He it's this account, you knew,watch that I follow and they
retweet a bunch of stuff.
And like, there was one MaxScherzer was wearing like a
match.
He was wearing the away matchJersey and the, home cap or
something like that in the edit.
And like, Uni watch retweetedit.
And they were like, man, what amistake for the editors and like

(16:39):
all the like, but I shared itwith them.
And then now it's been seen by,you know, 2000 people that are
nowhere near us.
And, you know, it's just, it'sthese crazy things that we
decided to do.
And then all of a sudden theyjust take off and, you know, I'm
fortunate to be able to practiceand that's when I get my
practice in that's all right.
I'm going to try a differentlighting for this.
This is fully experimental andit, Somehow we make it work, you

(17:04):
know, like I said, play aroundwith it enough and play with the
settings.
All right.
I know whenever I'm walking intothis environment, this is what
I'm shooting at.

Right.
Right.
what was it about that revealthough, because I remember when
I was talking to you, like, Andjust seeing you right now, like
the joy in your face when you'rethinking about these photos, it
was like, this was so much fun.
And I think at the time you saidthat you were still using the T6
and it was still like with likethe nifty 50 or something like
it wasn't even with the gearthat you had today.
But what was it about thatexperience or that shoot that

(17:33):
solidified within you that thisis really what I want to do.

It was the artistic side of it.
I believe, knowing that what I'mworking towards is.
you know, eventual goal is tohave a career as a sports
photographer.
and knowing that taking a job,if I'm with a team, if I'm with,
knock on wood, eventually wantto be with Auburn University or,
you know, Atlanta or somewherelike that.
So I don't have to move too far,but, if at all, but these are

(18:01):
going to be the things that aregoing to be the big drivers.
These are the big, you know,hey, we're rolling out new
uniforms this week.
we need to get pictures of it.
We need to go do it, you know,go shoot a quick video of it.
and 90 percent of the people onthat Twitch stream, that's what
they did.
That was, you know, Clay, it wasClemson's videographer.
It was Texas videographer.
It was Oregon's videographer.
It was, you know, all thesecolleges and 90 percent of what

(18:23):
they're doing is uniformreveals.
so it's one of those things Iknew that I had to have in my
back pocket if I wanted toactually do this and actually
make it.
Something, but the artistic sideof it and the creative side of
it and getting to have fun andlike, I mean, that's really what
it is, man.
That whole thing was just fun todo.
It was an experience.
It was kind of a headache, butat the end of the day, when I

(18:45):
saw the, final product, I waslike, yes, yes, yes, this is it.
and you know, all of that wasshot.
It was shot on my 60 with thenifty 50.
I didn't have a 24 to 70 or 70to 200 at that point.
I had a 50 millimeter 1.
8 lens because that was the bestlens that I had at that time.

So after you do that, and then we have a
conversation, you're like,you're right.
Sports photography is definitelythe thing that I want to pursue.
That's it's like I came homefrom Atlanta and then
immediately, like, that'sexactly what happened.
Started getting messages like,Hey, I started putting in, my
resume for this place or thisschool, or, this club.
Like, where does this come from?
After talking to a lot of otherphotographers in the group,

(19:25):
there's this overwhelmingfeeling of imposter syndrome,
people who are like, I've onlybeen shooting for three years,
you know, am I ready to take ona wedding?
And here you are, you're like,I'm going for it.
I'm going for it.
Whatever it is, if I want it,I'm going for it.
Where does that come from?

I mean, let's not get twisted here.
I've only been shooting for twoyears, like not even two years.
I still have, you know, impostersyndrome is not something that
just goes away.
But, um, you still

applied and then you got it.

Right.
Well, I mean, it's like, it'sone of those things.
I don't even remember applyingfor applying for half of the
stuff that I've gotten.
One of them I know, like theColumbus Rapids, I know I got
that job because I was in theowner's pocket the day the team
was announced.
plus we have a club partnershipwith them.
So like our youth program andtheir, their program, like where
we work together on things.
So like, I already had thatlittle in there, so I took

(20:15):
advantage of that.
It was, you know, how already Iwas already in the pockets of
the owners at that point.
But the hockey thing they hadannounced, it's the same
ownership group that hadannounced the baseball team last
year, and I was actually lastOctober, the VP of
communications.
Who's the one that I workeddirectly under for the hockey
team.
Is the VP of communications forthe baseball team as well.
And so I was looking back andjoking with him the other day.

(20:37):
I was like, Hey man, you know, Isent you an email last October
and he was like, no, I was like,yeah, man, I tried to get on
with the baseball team as aphotographer and he was like,
Yeah, man, that was October.
I was in hockey mode.
I wasn't really in baseball modeat that point.
I was like, that's fair.
That's completely fair.
Um, but I mean, it's one ofthose.
think I decided that like youcast a large enough net and you

(20:58):
just throw it out there.
Eventually, you're going to pulla fish in.
And I have been lucky in thelast two months and have pulled
in a whole bunch of fish that Ididn't know were out there.
That I did not think was goingto happen.
And all of a sudden it'shappened.

I mean, are you thinking to yourself, like,
not to downplay your skills, notto do any of that, but like, is
there this feeling of like, Whatam I doing?
if I show up, am I going to getfired?
Like, what if I go to the wrongplace?
I guess I'm just trying to getin your head because I just know
that so few people would bewilling to take that risk.
And obviously for you, it paidoff.

(21:31):
And I want to know, like, whatis the thing that allows you to
do that?
Because I think.
If more people were like you,then they would be able to get
to do the things they want todo.
So, do you have advice forpeople who are thinking about
doing something?

I mean, my advice would just be Do it, just do it.
I don't know if you remember afew years ago that I say, and I
say a few years ago, this islike a decade ago, the Shia
LaBeouf.

Oh yeah.
The green screen.

Uh, and like, just do it.
so what the worse they're goingto say is no, like my mentality
for the last few months has beenlike, I sent you all this stuff,
like I've applied for rugby,Atlanta, I've applied for
Atlanta Falcons, I've appliedfor, the best baseball team name
of all time.
The rocket city trash pandasfrom Huntsville, um, have
applied the Savannah

pandas or the Savannah banana bananas.

They're actually coming to Columbus here in a few
weeks.
And I'm a mutual follow withtheir team photographer.

Sweet.

Um, but like, you know, it's one of those, just do
it.
And the worst they're going tosay, you know, the worst
anybody's going to say is, well,no, it's not a good fit right
now, but guess what?
You're no worse off right now.
After they say no, your feelingsare going to be hurt.
But for every no, eventuallysomebody's going to say, yeah,
come on, let's do this.
But when they say no, you justhave to know that, you know,

(22:47):
like with me, I'm, I still havea full time job.
I'm 55 hours a week in theoffice that I'm working in right
now.
And, I'm no worse off ifsomebody says no.
Somebody says no, okay, well, Iguess I'll still get up and come
to work on Monday, you know,like you just have to have that
mentality of people are going tosay no, just have to know that
you're no worse off than youwere 15 seconds before they said

(23:09):
no.
Still in the exact same spot.

Yeah.
First of all, I love that.
I think a lot of people aregoing to.
Love that.
I love that.
I want to know now when it comesto the whole sports photography
side of things like now you gotthe job right now when it comes
to the sports photography sideof things, like what changes for
you because you went from andI'm just guessing here snapshots
of kids playing soccer at theyouth league and now that it's

(23:34):
more of a professional or it'speople who are taking.
These sports more seriously.
What is your goal for thesephotos?
Like, what are you trying tocapture?
Are you trying to tell a story?
Is it the emotion?
What is it that you're goingafter?

it's a combination of all of it.
I've had conversations actuallytwo weeks ago, had a phone call.
With a guy that shoots forsports illustrated, Eric rank,
send him a message, didn'texpect anything to come from it.
Hey, I'm, I'm working on mysports portfolio.
Here's the website link to itand send it to them.
And I was like, just let me knowwhat you think.
He'd sent me his phone numberand he was like, Hey man, I've

(24:09):
actually got a few minutes ifyou want to give me a call, all
right, cool.
You don't have to do this, butawesome.
so I called him and I mean, heabsolutely.
Ripped it to shreds and not, hewas like, exposures are spot on.
Edits look good.
You're not capturing what youneed to capture.
You want more faces.
You want more emotion.
You want more, just raw, in themoment stuff.

(24:31):
Okay.
So the next, you know, I wasgoing in to a hockey game and
shooting 2000 pictures.
Literally, I think you use theterm spray and pray.
that's what I was doing.
Anytime I would shoot soccer,anytime I would shoot hockey was
spray and pray.
and then I had that phone callwith him and I went into the
next weekend.
the first night that I shothockey for them, I shot 1800

(24:52):
pictures.
After the phone call with EricRank, the next night I had
another night to go shoot and Ileft that night.
I had 750 pictures.

Yeah.

Because I was going to be, I went in, I'm going to
be more selective.
and this was literally likebefore even going through and
culling the, the ones that areout of focus or the ones that,
you know, I missed the momentand was late on or anything like
that.
Like I went in, all right, I'mshooting, I'm aiming for more
faces.
100%.
This is what I'm going for.
and you know, ever since then,like I've even recently now

(25:25):
that, you know, the three vthree tournament that we went to
this last weekend at 1600 plusphotos to go through, but I had
shot for six teams from our cluband six other teams that were
playing other games.
So I knew going in, I'm going tohave a lot of pictures because
I've got 12 teams.
I'm shooting 12 teams of six.
I've got 72 kids.
that whose parents are going towant pictures of their kids

(25:46):
battling on the field, they'regoing to want their faces.
and, the approach has to change.
Yeah.
Um, but it's, definitely morealong the lines of, give me the
emotion of the celebration,After a goal is scored, give me
the emotion of, thinking you'vewon a game and then turn around
and find out you've lost andI've.

(26:06):
In the last two weeks, I've hadthose.

Yeah, when it comes to getting more emotion,
like, you kind of need to be inthe right spot, because when it
comes to sports, people areturning all around, you don't
know, except for I guessbaseball, but like, people in
different positions, you don'tknow where they're going to be
on the ice or on the field, whatdirection they're going to be
pointed, how do you ensure thatyou are in the right spot?
Is that still something that youhave to work on?

(26:30):
Learn and practice with

it is, I've been fortunate with hockey the last
couple of games that, playerscored a goal and they have
literally turned directly towhere I am.
Uh, and I don't think like, Iknow it's because they haven't
seen me and I approach themafter the game, I'm like, Dude,
I'm so glad you turned the wayyou did for your celebration
because I would not have gottenit otherwise.
And actually one of them justsaid his profile picture to the

(26:52):
celebration I got from him lastWednesday night.
Um, he had just scored.
It was, four to nothing game andhe put one in and he turned
around, literally I'm in thecorner in the cleanest piece of
glass, like even with the goalline and he, turns around and
just.
Pumps his fist and all that.
And I was like, right on it.
I walked up to him after thegame.

(27:14):
It's like, I know we lost, Iknow it sucks, but check out
this picture I got of you.
And within like three days, hehad already changed his profile
picture.

That's too funny.
So I guess that comes to my nextquestion, which is all about,
getting photos to people,because that's obviously an
important part of this.
How does this work in terms of.
Sports for you.
So you're, taking the photos,and then they're your photos.
And then you edit them, and thenyou post them on your online
gallery.
And then you send people a link,and then they can buy them from

(27:45):
you.
Or is this through the team?
How does that work?

They buy them through me.
Obviously, you know, the teamand the ownership and all that.
so the way the internship worksspecifically with, with, I can
use both Columbus teams becauseit works the same way.
anytime there's post or anythingthat needs to go out, they get
whatever picture they need.
we recently had two birthdays onthe hockey team on the same day.
And, the VP of communicationtext me.

(28:09):
He was like, Hey, do you have apicture of this player and this
player?
And I was like, Yeah, actually Ido.
And I sent him to him and he waslike, All right, cool.
And then, you know, happybirthday to, these two players.
And it's the pictures that Itook of them.
but as far as the players go,like, and I don't even do it
like super expensive, I do itlike a dollar a pop for a
digital download and they justeat them up and they'll go in

(28:30):
and, four or five times going inand spending 10, like that's 50
right there that I didn't haveyesterday, you know, and, so
right now that's, that's how Imake the money is like They buy
the pictures directly throughme.
But the team has access, theoffice has access to post
whatever images they need.

and that's the same with, are you still working
with, your youth league as well,as far as like for parents and
stuff?

Yes.
I'm actually the president ofthe youth league.
so that's how I was able to pullthose strings, but it was one of
those things we post them.
we actually, actually do 75percent of the profit back to
the league.
And, I use pixie set, you know,there's really not a wrong way
to go through.
I know you use cloud spot, don'tyou?
and you know, I mean, all thesedifferent platforms now is
basically drop ship.

(29:16):
so we send them the link andsay, look, order them.
They deliver straight to yourhouse.
We cut out the middlemancompletely.
We don't get a box of picturesand have to say, all right, hey,
pictures are at the fields.
Come pick them up.
You don't even have to leaveyour house.
You place your order there atyour front door.
and the parents have loved thatbecause that's one less thing
that they have to even thinkabout.
And, there's issues just likethere is with every, everything,

(29:39):
you know, Hey, we never got ourpictures.
our package was never deliveredX, Y, Z.
And I call them up or I sendthem an email.
Hey, here's the order number.
Here's the address.
It was supposed to go to, thisis what they put in.
I checked the tracking numberand it's in Kansas city,
Missouri somewhere, and itshould be in Phoenix city.
Alabama and, and they're realquick.
They send, you know, send itright back to the lab within
three hours.
I've got a, order is processingalready.

(30:01):
but yeah, everything, goesthrough there.
Everything goes through myonline galleries.
and I mean, literallyeverything.
The only thing that won't is thepictures I took this weekend
because the main photographerdoes a Google Drive and so I've
got to go in and uploadeverything to a Google Drive.

yeah.
Cause now you're also working.
for other photographers who arejust too bucked because now
you're, you've become the hitguy for sports photography

there.

So this is just,

can't say that Raymond.

Okay.
That was a,

that was a one off weekend.
We were going to be thereanyway.
And I was just like, Hey, youknow, worst case he says no, but
I'm still down there anyway, hewas like, my daughter usually
shoots with me and she's notable to make the trip.
And he came down from Nashville.
Oh geez.
And so I was like, you know, ifyou have too much, just let me
know.
I'll shoot whatever you can'tmake.
You can.
He's like, yeah, bet I got you.
And he sent me a list.

(30:50):
He sent me the schedule.
we had two games at 10 30, andthen I had a game that is shoot
at 1130, 12, 1231 and twoo'clock or one 30 and two
o'clock.
I had one to one 30 off.

So you could go get yourself some of those,
uh, microwave nachos all thetime.
Those, uh,

I got, they had man, the concessions were so
good there.
I had chicken.

No, from a concession stand, you don't say.

Yeah, man.

That's too funny.
Our

concession, our concessions at our, at our
soccer league is like nachos.
We get Chick fil a biscuits, uh,and we have hot dogs and sausage
dogs and that's it.
Sausage dogs.
we did walking tacos at onepoint and it's Doritos with all
the taco stuff in it.
Yeah.
Those, parents love those.
Y'all gonna have walk tacostoday?
Yeah, we gotta wait on this towarm up, but yeah, we'll have

(31:40):
nine o'clock in the morning,parents are walking up, ordering
walking tacos.
But yeah, the concession standthere in Palm Beach Gardens was
just fantastic.

Okay.
Well, if I ever make it downthere, I'm going to have to
check out the chicken tendersand fries since you have such a
glowing review, this soundsgreat.
I'm always interested when itcomes to like the photography
side of things.
I feel like there's, The twoextremes of photography is that
there's a very utilitarian side,and then there's a very creative
side, right?
And we kind of have to findwhere we are in that map right

(32:08):
there.
where do you think you lie?
Would you say that you're closerto the utilitarian side or
closer to the creative side?

The answer to that question really depends on what
it is.
Are you shooting?
So when I'm shooting, you know,a hockey game, Or, youth soccer
or anything had to be veryutilitarian, have to walk in,
know what the settings are, knowwhat my pictures are going to
look like, and know I'm comingout, what the edit is going to
look like.
when it comes to creative thingslike the, kit reveal that we did
for the kids, like be ascreative as I want it to be.

(32:37):
Like that's a blank slate.
I can do whatever I want to doand light it however I need to
light it and everything else.
And, you know, so it really, theutilitarian versus creative,
Depends on where you are andwhat you're shooting.
You know, are you shootingaction?
you gotta freeze the action.
and you can get differentthings, but you know, like
Friday when we were down there,like I shot a truck that was
just driving down the streetjust for the fun of it and

(32:58):
lowered my shutter speed to likeone 40th of a second, panned
along with it and got the motionblur.
I'm never going to use that.
That was just to try it out andsee what it looked like.
but 90 percent of the time it's,utilitarian because it's, you
know, trying to nail exactlywhat that exposure should be and
exactly how it should look.

From when you started, shooting, you know,
with the T6, you first got thatthing to like where you are
today, what do you think haschanged most in your
photography?

It's been the understanding of, of how things
work and, I mean, again, I goback to the science of what
photography is and the, I guess,math behind it technically is,
figuring out what, whateverything is and how all of
that works together, how yourISO impacts what your shutter
speed should be.
Or how your aperture determines.

(33:43):
And like, I was explaining thatto somebody, had brought his
camera down there this weekendto one of our parents.
And he was like, man, I've gotall this stuff and I have no
clue how any of it works.
And I was able to actually showhim right there on the street
because I hadn't, I had mycamera with me and I told his
wife to go stand about five feetaway and I said, all right, I'm
going to do this at 2.
8 and I'm going to take apicture of her and then I'm

(34:04):
going to go and I'm going to, orI'm going to close it all the
way down to 22.
And you're going to see.
that depth of field change.
And that was the one thing thathe was having trouble
understanding was how theaperture changed things.
So I was like, just, I'm goingto show you these two pictures
and you're going to see thedifference.
And he looked at it and he waslike, yeah, that makes a whole

(34:24):
lot of sense.
but I mean, it's constantlywalking around with a camera in
my hands for six months.
My wife got tired of it.
My daughter got tired of it.
I always have my camera with meeverywhere we went.
Well,

you make these pretty nifty hand straps, so
it's very easy and convenient tocarry a camera around.
I understand that.
Yeah.

Right.
And I still use them.
It's the only thing I use.

Me too.
I always, uh, I still alwayskeep this thing.
and this isn't a plug oranything.
It should be a plug.
I take that back.
This is a plug.
These are the best camera strapsI've ever had, that you make.
think about it oftentimesbecause when it comes to, camera
straps, I feel like so manytimes there's like, they try to
pack in like 15 different usecases, right?
Like you can use it as a sling,you could do it as this, you

(35:05):
could do all these differentthings.
And I think to myself, I don'twant any of that, I'm okay with
having multiple straps, but Iwant them to do one thing really
well.
And that's what yours does.
And of course, it comes inDodger blue.
And it's easy on easy off withthese Pika design anchors right
there.
So shout out to you and it alsocomes

in army green and neon green and, and pink and
black.
Oh

my God.
Do you make these things whileyou're at work?

Teal and red.
Yeah, I did.
I make all of it.
I did all of this stuff is allat work stuff.
Again, here 11 hours a day.
I have time to kill 90 percentof the time.
So we get an order.
This is what I make.

I got one last question for you here, Matt.
I know that now we've, gone farover our time here.
I want to know more about, likewhy, and I asked this to
everybody, which is really like,there's so many groups online,
as you said, you have found, youknow, uh, photography community
on Twitter, you have found aphotography community on,
Twitch, on Instagram.
What was it about the Facebookgroup That you found and that

(36:07):
you enjoyed and you just kind ofreally dove in head first.

the Facebook community is, is one of those
things that in the first coupleof weeks, had posted some stuff
and I was real unsure about it,you know, I mean, it's your
first time, you know, it's myfirst time with an actual like
DSLR camera, other than like.
I've had point and shoots for mywhole life.
Anytime I bought a camera, it'sbeen a point and shoot because I
haven't had a need for a DSLR.
and even in March of last year,didn't have a need for a DSLR.

(36:32):
I was taking decent photos on myphone, but wanted to do
different things.
So, you know, I went that route.
and now, I started postingpictures in it and like, just to
shout out the, few that really,helped was, you know, Jim giving
feedback and, Kim Irish andMagnum

Mangum,

but all of those, the people like that, that chime
in and like, check this out,look at this specific resource,
check this video out orwhatever.
And even Jim, like me and Jimare texting each other all the
time now, like, Hey, check outthis shot that I got.
he sent me a picture from his,his Madison photo wall.
and he was like, dude, Madisonthis morning was awesome.
He sent me, it was a picture ofthe Capitol building and at the

(37:13):
rotunda.
And I was like, yeah, dude, thatthing is incredible.
and you know, so even now, likeme and Jim are still bouncing
ideas off of each other, like,Hey, check out this shot that I
got this weekend.
I sent him, I sent him one ofthe pictures that I got this
weekend.
He was like, yeah, dude, that'sawesome.
and so, you know, it's such asupportive community, but such
a, I'm not going to use the wordcritical, but such a community

(37:33):
that is willing to say, Hey,maybe don't try this, but try
this instead.
it's a very constructivecriticism if there ever is any,
but just the people that I'vecome to know and the, the
friendships and stuff that I've,created or have been created
through this.
is something that's, verybeneficial and something that's,

(37:54):
been very helpful, in my journeyas a photographer, I guess.
And, I'm very glad that I've,joined this group and have been
there for Shoot, almost twoyears now.
We're three months away from twoyears now, Raymond.
Yeah, that's crazy.
And, it's one of those groupswhere the people are genuine,
and there's not anybody therethat's gonna, you know, that's

(38:14):
there to stroke their own egos.

Just me.
I'm the only one.
Yeah, I'm the only one allowedto do that.

If your ego is your chin.

So they do.
It's just so comfortable.
This this beard here.
it's that time of year.
It just feels so good toscratch.
When it comes to the group.
I appreciate everything that yousaid there.
But I want to know, for you,like, that's kind of like what
the group has done for you,right?
Like, being able to get thatfeedback, being able to build
those relationships.
There's always new people cominginto the group.

(38:45):
So say, Today, today happens tobe a Wednesday when we're
recording this, which means itis welcome Wednesday, my
favorite day of the week.
like what's something that youwish that if you could have one
thing that every newphotographer coming into the
group could understand, whetherit be about photography or
whatever, what would that onething be?

it's a good question, Raymond.
I haven't had any issuesanswering any other questions
until this one.

I did it.
I did it.
I made him speechless.
This is great.

You succeeded.
Now it's, don't put value incomparing yourself to others.
You're going to find your style.
You're going to find what issuitable for you.
And, you know, Raymond, whatworks for you may not work for
me, what works for me may notwork for you.
And so you can't go saying, andI'm going to use Peter McKinnon

(39:34):
again.
Well, Peter shoots in thisreally dark and moody style, and
this is what I'm going to do,and this is the way to be
successful because it's not,it's not.
and that's not a knock to PeterMcKinnon.
His work is great.
Your work as a weddingphotographer is great.
But everybody's got differentthings.
You know, it's what's thedifferent strokes for different
folks, or, you know, it's, youcan't get lost in the comparison

(39:55):
battle between you and anotherphotographer that's been doing
it for years, take your time,learn the settings, learn how to
shoot and what each thing does,and then you get to the point
where you found your style andyou're able to settle in and
say, this is what I do.
Either you like it or you don't.
And that sounds terrible, butthat's, you know, everybody's

(40:16):
going to find their own way.
don't get lost in the, well,this person's been doing it for
15 years and his pictures are somuch better than mine or her
pictures are so much better thanmine.
And I've only been shooting forthree months, six months, 12
months, doesn't matter.
You're still shooting.
What's yours is yours.
Find your style and stick withit.

I've been shooting for, I guess, you know,
non professionally, I could sayfor like 20 years now, and I
still struggle with that.
So the fact that like, here youare, you're like, this is it,
you know, and you just sharedthat with me.
I feel like That's going to be abig sign for who you will become
in the future as a photographer,because as we're always looking
for growth, I think back to someof my earliest photos in their

(40:54):
garbage.
And then I think to photos thatI took, even like, say, five
years ago, and I thought I waslike, I got this, I'm doing
good.
I'm, uh, five years ago,Professional photographer.
I've been doing it for a numberof years.
I thought I'm good.
I love this but now I look atthose photos that I took five
years ago and I think wow, thoseare garbage And there's always
this progression, that comes sothe fact that you have that
insight I think so early on intoyour journey is really going to

(41:17):
be incredibly beneficial to yougoing forward and Matt, we're at
the end here.
I really look forward to again,keeping up with obviously this
friendship that we have, butyour work as well.
And one day I know that you'regonna be shooting for the Braves
and, I expect some help andmaybe a field pass as well to
come down with you when theBraves take on the Dodgers.
I'll bring you on

when the Dodgers come to town.

score.
I'm going to keep you to that.
I'm going to hold you to that.
Awesome.
Matt, before I let you go, wherecan people keep up with you and
your work aside from the group?
They know that they can find youthere.
Where can we see more of yourphotos?

Instagram, at M Austin photo.
Facebook is Slash M Austinphoto, M Austin photography.
com is where you can find a lotof my, all of my portfolio
stuff.
and I'm, more than welcome to gocheck it out and send me
feedback on it at any time,because I'm still growing just
like everybody else is, there'sstill a lot of things that I
look at and think, wow, I missedthat one.

(42:11):
Wow.
I really messed that one up.
Wow.
That edit looked really bad, butI can't go back and change it
because I didn't save the rawfiles.
There's plenty of places to findme.
Instagram is where I try to staymost active recently.
TikTok, Adam Austin photo, finda lot of stupid stuff on there
that I do.
Today's action item being theone thing that if you implement
will move the needle forward inyour photography is this shoot

(42:35):
manual mode.
That's it.
If you're already shooting inmanual mode, great.
If you're not already shootingin manual mode, take your camera
out this weekend and switch thatdial to M.
By having full control of yourISO, your aperture and your
shutter speed, you can fullyrealize your creative vision.
You know, a silhouette is notpossible in auto mode.

(42:56):
Rich dark storm skies also notpossible in auto mode.
Photographing a white dress or awhite car will turn out gray
when shooting them in auto mode.
Manual mode allows you to fullyrealize your creative vision and
capture the images that you seein your head when you press that
shutter button.
Why wouldn't you want that?

(43:17):
Now if you need help, I get it.
It could be daunting at first.
Maybe you don't know whatsettings to use and when.
Then feel free to download myfree guide called Picture
Perfect Camera Settings, where Ishare my settings for 10 popular
types of photography and sharewith you how to know what
settings to adjust to get closerto your personal vision.

(43:37):
You can download the guide todayfor free by hitting over to
perfect camera settings.com.
That's it.
Perfect.
Camera settings.com.
And that's it for today.
So until next week, remember,the more that you shoot today,
the better of a photographer youwill be tomorrow.

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Episode Transcript

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How Self-Education Turned an Amateur into a Pro Sports Photographer with Matt Austin

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