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Blowup
Roman Manière's camera never flinches. He's shot
you all, and apparently, you noticed as we get closer to one
of paintball's fist truly embedded photo-journalists.
 Strolling
around a paintball tournament today, you almost get the impression
that the sport's maturity was innate. That the industry was
always there, that the 50 or so camera operators had always
been filming, that the 100 or so photographers had always been
taking their pictures, and that the dozens of DVDs and worldwide
paintball publications had always existed. "I discovered
paintball in a generalist magazine with a report on paintball
players, all dressed up in camouflage and playing in the woods."
That was ten years ago, and if you had told him back then, that
he would become a professional paintball photographer, travel
the world 100 times over, and be at the head of one of the fastest
growing specialized magazines in the world, he would never have
believed you.
You see, if the French-born Romain Manière definitely stumbled
into paintball, he might have also stumbled into photography.
Maybe Mr. Manière wasn't the serious studious boy his parents
had hoped for. And studious he was the least. Kicked out of
every school in the area, his father finally had enough: "either
you find something you want to do, or it's the army!" He
was eighteen, and there was just one thing he wanted to do,
skateboard. He had done it since he was eight. |
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He was good at it. But this was long before
'the rise of the extreme', before skateboards, BMX, snowboards, yet
alone paintball became household names, and before Tony Hawk ever
thought that he would one day be able to make money at it. He had
to think about something else, fast. The second thing that he had
ever enjoyed was taking pictures, when he was a boy-scout. "What
the hell, I had to try something", and his father told him that
if he was accepted to a photography school, his first year would be
paid for.His natural skills were quickly recognized, and they pushed
him towards a photo-journalism specialization in one of the most prestigious
Parisian photography schools. It was difficult letting go of the subculture
that he reveled in, yet he had no problem adapting to content constraints
of the first jobs he landed, shooting everyone from Johnny Depp to
Nicolas Cage in Cannes during a few film festivals. "I really
learned a lot about people, about the industry, about the need to
fight for what you want." He graduated from ping-pong championships
to tennis tournaments to one magazine that finally led him back towards
the light: a French extreme sports magazine called XL.
 He
was sent to all four corners of the world to cover ski, snowboard,
windsurf, kite surf competitions. But it was still tough making a
living taking pictures of Extreme Sports. There weren't enough publications
at the time, and he was forced to take other jobs, report on other
activities for general publications. This led to a report on an 'obscure'
activity called paintball, and its potential link to neo-nazis and
fascist cells in Europe. He discovered that there were no more fascists
in this discipline than anywhere else, and became fascinated by a
sport that was on the brink of becoming mainstream. He found a sport
that was different from all others, "with skateboards, you know
exactly what's going to happen, they attempt something specific, maybe
they succeed, maybe they don't. With paintball, there's absolutely
no programmed attitude." Between '96 and '99, he sold paintball
reports to practically every publication in Europe, and discovered
the specialized paintball press. He sold pictures to the UK's PGI,
the US-based Paintball Sports International or APG, or France's Paintball
Magazine and Paintball 100%. He decided to become more involved in
the industry, and co-originated Pock magazine in 1999, "a magazine
that was to become Facefull two years later".
Unfortunately, internal conflict and the inability to sustain a national
market in the discipline made him rethink his strategy.
He decided to launch Facefull, the first truly international
paintball magazine ever, in 2001. "It was the first time the
team was right, and the market ready". Being at the head of a
magazine this size and with this reach might have been a thought he
had entertained one day, but as the thousands of players that he immortalized
over the years will tell you, Mr. Manière has never been happier and
his element that on a paintball field, as far away from a studious
office as possible, covered in paint, a cigarette hanging from his
bottom lip, and his eye peering in the lens, anticipating your next
move.
INTERVIEW
You've never shot him once, but he's shot every single one
of you. One of the best snap-shooters in the industry is finally ready
to talk.
Romain Manière, 31, Editor-in-chief of Facefull
Magazine
You were one
of the first paintball photographers, you discovered paintball with
the rest of the players and the world, did you have to invent something?
I didn't invent anything. I applied what I had learned in a photography
school, movement, applied technical photography, basically. At that
time, there were no professional photographers in the sport, so it
was easier for me to pull better pictures than the rest. But for the
movement, or to make the sport live, it was up to me... and others,
like Luis Salcedo, someone who influenced me a lot.
As a paintball photographer, you're pretty much like a player...
Yes, the really unique aspect of this sport is that you're able to
get on the field. In fact, this sport will never really be taken seriously
until you keep photographers off the field. Right now, the rules are
still way too lax. You have cameramen filming breaks standing in the
middle of the field. I'm glad that the NXL took upon itself to keep
photographers in the sidelines. There's also way too many people who
don't really belong there, and I'm not the only person saying that.
This year in Orlando, it really got out of hand, you couldn't take
a picture of a break without getting three to four cameramen in there.
I guarantee that it won't be like that much longer. You look at other
sports, soccer or athletic games, as a photographer, you're told where
to stay, what to shoot, they don't even let you run in the sidelines!
Do you think that it's unique to be so close to the action,
to be practically a combat photographer. You must feel exactly what
the players do.
In a way, you get so into the game that you can forget to
take pictures, you get really involved quickly when you're on a field.
You have to remember that you're here for one thing only: take pictures.
You have to be careful, especially for your equipment.
Of course, you don't necessarily want to get shot, so you're really
living the game. To take good pictures, you sometimes have to get
in a player's direct line of fire. So you're in the game! One of the
greatest soccer photographers was the first to run with the ball,
to run in the sidelines, everyone thought that he was crazy. But his
pictures turned out to be the best, because he was in that same movement,
in that same action, he was a part of it, and so was the picture.
The rest of them had static images. I try to get in the game as much
as possible, to understand it. There's a lot of photographers who
wouldn't do what I do, because it ruins your equipment. In one season,
my equipment loses 80% of its value.
You anticipate.
Yeah, you also have to pick a side at the start of the game. That's
really important. It's a strategic choice. For the first four years,
I tried various things, now I'm able to anticipate where the action
could be... I'm able to analyze a game as well as a player, and that's
what gives me a great advantage.
You're the first one to have coined sentence: "with paintball,
every player has their own ball'.
In every other sport, you have only one ball, one football, one puck...
whatever. With paintball, each player has his set of pucks, of footballs...
With soccer, if you follow the ball, you probably won't really miss
any action, whether was with paintball, simultaneous actions in the
four corners of the field make it quite difficult to apply one single
rule. Paintball's a hard sport to shoot, because you can never really
be sure that if you stay in one spot, you'll have a great shot. Sometimes,
the action will happen around another bunker, so you have to move...
constantly.
What's a really good paintball picture?
When a paintball player looks at it and knows... he's right there
in the shot, it's not static, he's seeing the action unravel. It's
getting Rocky Cagnoni, jumping over an obstacle but getting a paintball
impact on his leg. The exact moment of impact, or right before...
In sports photography, one third of it is luck. In paintball, it's
even more than that. Sometimes, you shoot, hoping that the player
will cross your camera's sight, and that one of these pictures will
immortalize him perfectly.
Your own kind of sweet spotting?
If you like.
 Where
do you find visual beauty in paintball?
First of all, there's the paint. It's just like mud for motorcycle
racing. You have all the phases, static, running, movement, reloading,
shooting, marshals, marker problems, for me it's one of the richest
sports to photograph because there's so much variety. You never know
what's going to happen. Another thing that's unique to this sport,
less and less unfortunately, is that if you're not a very good team,
you still might get to play excellent teams, and world-famous players.
You can take pictures of... I remember one game, the French team Jaguars
against Avalanche. Odds were really 100 to 1 in favor of Avalanche,
but they ended up losing, it made for some great pictures. Paintball
is a sport where teams, no matter how good or bad they are can lose,
due to circumstances, technical or human.
And I imagine that the change from forest to concept fields
transformed the visual aspect tremendously.
Woods games were always hard to shoot. Not enough light and
I've always disliked camouflage, due to my country's history maybe...
I remember photographing a player in Birmingham next to a tribune
of fans, on a concept field. It was like going from prehistoric times
to the future. I went from shooting 10-12 rolls to three times as
much, because everything happened a lot more quickly. You didn't have
the problem of getting branches in the middle that hindered visibility.
Everything changed.
Concept fields made you rediscover paintball?
Yes, and my favorite type of concept field, visually, is
Hyperball, because you have the spray. Players constantly get splashed
from ricochet wet paint on the obstacles.
What does it feel like to be on the field, but not a player
or marshal?
Players actually don't see you, they're playing. But sometimes they
do, and it's quite funny, because they pose for you. At the beginning,
and still now, they'll pose, and you'll know it immediately. Some
players even snap shoot out of their bunker to give me a good angle.
Sometimes they get hit doing it, but that's not my fault. The more
professional a player, the less he's influenced by your presence.
No other interaction?
Sometimes, players ask me stuff, and I hate it. They ask me to check
if they're clean... I hate that, sometimes I answer, but I'm not a
marshal, I'm not an authority and I don't want to be. Some players
also use photographers for the game. I sometimes hear some saying
"he's right next to the Facefull photographer, behind the snake!"
Players can use you. But it's not like the woods, where if you did
flash in the bushes, you were basically indicating where a potential
player was. I did that a couple of times, back when I was still a
novice. Now I see players cheat, and I don't say anything, it's part
of the game.
It can become quite a harsh environment...
But there's other sports where it's hard for the press, desert, the
sand, dust, all that stuff is really bad for equipment... water sports.
I used to get hit by skateboards, rollerblades, all extreme sports
can be hazardous for photographers.
Have you covered every angle there is to cover in a paintball
game?
There's still one thing that I'd like to do... get inside
an obstacle and take pictures from there... A window giving you an
interesting perspective, I've yet to do that, or have the obstacle
made.
For this special photo issue, you've chosen five specific portfolios,
I'd like you to introduce them.
There's a before/after photo spread. Contrary to filming an event,
where you have everything, this let's you imagine, or fill in the
blanks. Two specific moments locked in time, the angles are the same,
but the time lapse varies, it can be a day, a minute, a second...
I had fun taking the player's tent in Lisbon, once a day. This let
me show the evolution, transformed it into more than an object, something
that was breathing life. There's a break where you see a player, and
the second picture is taken four seconds later, yet a world of difference
in those four seconds, especially for that player. -There's one called
Face Portraits of people, faces of people... players, spectators,
famous or not, expressions... showing the faces of players who are
always covered when they play.
You've taken a lot of portraits, from Ed Poorman, to B-Real
or William Shatner.
I don't like to spend a lot of time shooting portraits. I
like taking them as naturally as possible, when they're not really
expecting it, in their own environment. For B-Real, the first shot
was posed, the second one was really natural, he didn't even know
I was shooting. I really like the Poorman portrait I did, in black
and white, I shot it in two minutes. I spent more time setting up
the studio. William Shatner wasn't as much fun, because he was so
used to it, he knew exactly what he wanted, he told me that I couldn't
shoot his profile because he didn't look good. One of my biggest influences
of portraits in the paintball industry is Chris Dilts (P8NT magazine),
he is excellent at finding the right moment. He's a bit like me in
that he probably doesn't take too much time preparing it, and he doesn't
like to talk much, so he goes straight for what he wants. He's got
expression, and it's the real strength of P8NT. He also has proximity,
and is able to get inside people's lives, spend time with them and
basically disappear. They forget that he's even there... you get really
good shots this way.
You've also chosen a portfolio called 'out'
Pictures of people the instant or right after they're shot.
Between the moment a player is hit and he leaves the field, that's
what this spread is about. The expressions vary, between the guy who's
hurting physically from getting multiple impacts, you know it hurts.
The guy who's angry and who throws his pod on the ground, there's
always something happening when players are eliminated. There's some
players who can get eliminated and still be proud, because they shot
a player, or they did something. But when they get eliminated before
their moment of glory, they start looking at their shoes... Ryan Greenspan
(Dynasty) always has the same expression when he gets shot.
How did you get the idea of your Matrix portfolio?
When I actually thought of it, I felt like an idiot for not
thinking of it earlier, since I'm originally from the skating world,
and that's where that idea was first seen. I saw it in a skating magazine,
and realized that the same decomposition of movements applied to paintball.
And story?
Matrix and series of pictures all at once. I sometimes have
a lot of series of pictures around the same action. So I decline the
different angles, and style of photography to get the idea across.
I have a lot of space constraint in the magazine, with this one-off,
I wanted to show as much as possible, something that even spectators
would have a hard time seeing. Hope they enjoy it. |
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