The Big House and strobe lights
In this view from the catwalk, workers assemble the Big House floor at State Fair Arena in preparation for the state high school basketball championships, in Oklahoma City, Monday, March 2, 2009. BY NATE BILLINGS, THE OKLAHOMAN
The Oklahoma State Basketball Tournament begins tomorrow with Class A and B high schools at the Big House. For those of you who do not follow high school basketball, the Big House is the nickname given to State Fair Arena in Oklahoma City for the state basketball championships. Class B through 4A play at the Big House, while the 5A and 6A championships are at other arenas. This year 5A and 6A are at Lloyd Noble Center in Norman, Okla.
The yearly ritual for photographers at The Oklahoman is to go down to State Fair Arena and check our strobe lights. Sports photographers often install strobes lights that can be triggered remotely at arenas for basketball games when the available light is too dark to stop the action in photographs or the light is just plain ugly. The Big House is too dark to shoot without some sort of flash.
Oklahoman staff photographer Chris Landsberger cuts cable to connect a strobe light in the catwalk at State Fair Arena in preparation for the state high school basketball championships, in Oklahoma City, Monday, March 2, 2009. BY NATE BILLINGS, THE OKLAHOMAN
We also have lights in the Ford Center, Gallagher-Iba Arena, and the Lloyd Noble Center. Those arenas are just bright enough to photograph with available light, however, we often use our strobes for remote cameras or when we just want the photos to look better. Instead of taking pictures at 1600 ISO or higher, we are able to shoot at 200 ISO with the strobes installed in the ceiling. The lower the ISO, the better the quality. The downside to using the strobe lights is you can only get one shot about every two seconds while the lights recycle. Without the lights, our cameras will shoot between 5 and 8 frames per second.
On Monday, Chris Landsberger with a little help from me went down to State Fair Arena to check our lights and reinstall the the cable that links all four lights together. There are two radio receivers attached to the cable. The radios receive a signal from our cameras and then fire the strobe lights (there’s one in each corner) in sync with our cameras.
A view of the spookiest part of the catwalk at State Fair Arena, the walk from the stands to the ring around the ceiling of the arena, in Oklahoma City, Monday, March 2, 2009. BY NATE BILLINGS, THE OKLAHOMAN
I’m not a big fan of heights, but the State Fair Arena catwalk doesn’t bother me as much as the one at the Ford Center. Perhaps that is because the Ford Center’s catwalk is more than twice as high. However, the catwalk at the State Fair Arena is very dark, dirty, and sways back and forth when you walk on it. Not very reassuring.
Look for our photos from the championships for the next couple of weeks in The Oklahoman, on our photo page NewOK.com, and on this blog.
We’ve also got a gallery of some of the pictures from past state tournaments. You can check that out here.
-Nate Billings
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