Climbing Photography for "Chicks Climbing & Skiing" in the Red River Gorge
Stoke. Encouragement. Beta. Guacamole. These were just some of the things that were shared at the recent Chicks Climbing and Skiing clinic in the Red River Gorge this September. I had the opportunity to work with and capture photos of a bunch of these awesome ladies putting their skills to the test at MFRP.
I was asked to capture a variety of images, to show not just climbing, but the experience. I took it upon myself to stay out of the way and be a, "fly on the wall," as much as possible, so as to not upset the dynamic. I felt that as a male in an all-female group outing, I needed to be social enough to make the ladies feel at ease when I would be taking pictures, but to not detract or distract them from the experience that they had paid to enjoy.
We met the morning of at the parking area and hiked out to the Nursery wall. This was great for me, as top access to this particular section of cliff is about as easy as it gets. This let me get a lot of content from the ground but also from above.
Later, I followed a few of the stronger climbers in our group over to a larger wall, and captured some action images of lead climbing. This almost didn't happen though– originally I was to drive to another climbing area to shoot photos of another set of ladies. Quickly thinking, I asked the guides what they would prefer– more images that were the same (shot from the ground) but of a different group, or try to get some action images on a more impressive rock wall. It was made clear that action images were needed more, so I stuck around MFRP, and went to Fruit Wall for some lead shots!
