A Unique Proposition In Tennis Photography
I knew that we would set up the Tennis Photo Network in 2012, when we had enjoyed a tremendous week at the Olympics shooting the tennis at The All England Club in Wimbledon. That was the week we started to discuss the idea seriously and we knew we had a great plan that was going to become increasingly relevant as media ownership moved from the traditional media owners into the hands of the brand owners, tournament organisers and sponsors. The writing was on the wall (tablet, laptop and social media) that the world we knew was changing and the need for photos would grow and the way they are used would change. We also knew that our single sport specialisation would put us in a very strong position on the global tennis stage.
We started discussing our plans at every major tournament when we could grab some time away from shooting and editing to talk about the opportunity. It also turned out that despite our different nationalities we all had one country in common – Australia. Ray and I both live here and Juergen is a citizen, so it seemed like an obvious place to base our business. However, we are all originally from Europe and I have spent a great deal of time in the USA, so we are really a global organisation from day 1. Tennis is a strangely global/local sport and becomes the focal point of each country in turn for one or two weeks and then moves on to the next place. We recognise that when the tour arrives in a country, the opportunity for sponsors and tournament organisers is a short one, requiring a huge amount of work and concentration in a concentrated period of time – we believe we can be of huge help to the stakeholders in every country the tour goes to. We also knew that we would need more photographers for the big events and so we have gone about building up a network of shooters across the world. Our first full associate is Lucas Wroe, who is based in Melbourne and despite his lack of years has shot the last eight Australian Opens and has a fearsome understanding of technology. There will be more but we will make our photographers earn the right to be part of our gang!
Ray, Juergen and I are all very different types of photographers, with different styles and different areas of expertise. This works well when we combine our pictures or need to provide specific types of images. Obviously, each one of us believes that they are the best but our mutual respect is far bigger than our individual egos. We all love photography and we all love tennis, so it was an obvious decision to launch a tennis photo business and we hope that our enthusiasm will be infectious for our clients.
We are going to start pitching our business very soon to many organisations and stakeholders in the global tennis village and a whole lot of sponsors as well. We hope that they will see the benefit of a specialist, client focused agency who delivers to brief, on time and on budget. We also believe that once an organisation starts working with us, they will be absolutely convinced they made the right decision, because our media understanding and content focus is way way more sophisticated than that of a bunch of general sports snappers. Big talk I know, but we truly want to be the best in the market and we will strive to be that!
Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you would like to find out more about what we can offer. I look forward to hearing from you.
Tennis Photography By Tennis Photo Network | International Tennis Photographers Tennis Photo Network
