On the pitch with Canon's cameras for pro sports photographers

Professional sports photography can be as competitive as the sporting events being photographed. With possibly dozens of photographers shooting the same match, you're competing to not only capture a great shot of the decisive moment but then also beat all the others to publication. You'll appreciate any edge that your technology can give you.

Richard Heathcote, Chief Sports Photographer at Getty Images, has been a professional photographer for almost 30 years. He has covered countless sporting events, including all the best-known international football, rugby and general sports tournaments. He was the 2019 Sports Journalists' Association (SJA) Photographer of the Year, overall winner in the 2020 World Sports Photography Awards, and Picture of the Year winner in the 2024 SJA British Sports Journalism Awards.

Richard uses a Canon EOS R1, with an EOS R5 Mark II as his second camera. Here, he shares his insights into life as a sports photographer, talks about his workflow when covering major sports events, and reveals how Canon's EOS R System gives him a competitive edge in his work.

Richard left college in 1996 and freelanced for about a year before joining Action Images as a staff photographer. He moved to Getty Images in 2004, and has been there ever since. "I like the way agencies work," he explains. "There are more opportunities – in general there's only one sports photographer per newspaper, whereas we must have around 25-30 staff sports photographers just in the UK, plus all the freelancers. Agency photographers travel a lot more and cover a greater variety of sports."

As well as receiving assignments, the agency photographers are also encouraged to pitch their own ideas. "If it's something worth pursuing, we're given the freedom to work it into our schedule."

Whatever the sport he's shooting, Richard finds that the autofocus capabilities of Canon cameras significantly increase his hit rate, even in low-light conditions – down to -6.5 EV in the EOS R5 Mark II, and -7.5 EV in the EOS R1. If the subject's eyes are not visible, intelligent subject detection can track the face, then the head, then the body in that order of priority, locking on even if a cap or helmet covers the head or the subject turns away.

The Register People Priority feature (improved compared to the feature originally introduced in the EOS R3) makes it easier than ever to keep the focus on the individual you want, even if other players barge into the frame or you're shooting against a crowd of spectators.

"Anti-flicker is a big thing for sports photography," Richard notes, particularly when you shoot indoor sports with electronic shutter. Fluorescent lights brighten and dim in phase with the electricity supply at 100/120Hz, causing inconsistent exposure or issues such as banding. With the recent firmware update, both the EOS R1 and EOS R5 Mark II continuously auto-detect flicker and alert the user, who can then enable anti-flicker shooting modes that adjust the shutter speed and frame rate to sync with the pulsing of the lights and prevent these issues.

In both cameras, users can also enable a new high-frequency anti-flicker feature that, combined with faster sensor readout, can work the same magic under LED lights, which have different flicker characteristics. Richard says this is a big benefit in sports grounds with LED lighting and also at motorsports venues that have massive LED boards behind the podium – in prize presentation shoots, the high-frequency flicker in these can cause intrusive background banding, but the new feature can markedly reduce and often eliminate this.

Speaking of motorsports, the Panning Assist feature is now further refined for the EOS R1 with the firmware update to provide unmatched stabilisation for smooth, dynamic panning – the camera will use all available IS technologies to steady the image as you follow the subject's movement, resulting in a better hit rate and sharper subjects while the background stays attractively blurred.

Shutter noise used to be a problem in certain sports such as golf or tennis, where it could distract players at a critical moment, but switching to silent electronic shutter brought an increased risk of rolling shutter distortion. Now, faster sensor readout speeds – in both the EOS R5 Mark II and the EOS R1, but especially in the latter – hugely reduce this risk. "The latest mirrorless camera technologies have completely changed how we take pictures," Richard says.

Pre-continuous shooting makes it possible to capture the exact moment an action takes place. For penalty shoots in football, for example, Richard turns it on, setting the camera to continuous shooting and AF on, half-presses the shutter button, and the camera starts buffering images. Then, when the player is about to take the shot, he fully-presses the shutter. The camera starts shooting and also saves the images in the buffer at that point, ensuring it captures all of the action. With the recent firmware update, the number of shots taken using pre-capture can be selected in the camera’s menu from 1 to 20 (on EOS R1) or 1 to 15 (on EOS R5 Mark II).

"It's witchcraft," Richard laughs, "but those extra frames are incredibly useful. It's the tech helping you do the job – and it's seamless:" the feature works whether you're shooting JPEG, HEIF or RAW, and the extra frames are saved in the same file format.

In the field, Richard observes, "file size is important because we're always transmitting pictures but not always on a high-quality network." For him, the 24MP EOS R1 delivers an ideal balance of image quality, file size, and high-ISO quality.

Sometimes, however, you do need more detail – you might have captured a unique shot of the team manager on the sidelines or a goal at the wrong end of the field, for example, and have to crop hard to achieve the desired framing. For such cases, in-camera AI Upscaling can generate an image with up to 4x the resolution, and Richard says "the image quality is fantastic." Unlike most software upscaling, it understands your lens and camera settings, so that it preserves background bokeh and depth of field. "In an industry based on time, to have that baked into the camera is fantastic."

Sports and action photography can be very high-pressure, and Richard emphasises the importance of ergonomics and ease of use. The EOS R1, he says, has all the buttons and controls in the right place, so that everything is intuitive and comfortable to operate. The weight and balance are right even when you have to hold a telephoto lens for some time. "When shooting winter sports," he adds, "we're inevitably wearing gloves, but you can feel the press of a button through the glove as well."

Both cameras have dust- and water-resistant construction but, as the flagship pro camera, the EOS R1 has a more rugged case and can operate in more extreme conditions. It delivers longer battery life and offers more shooting flexibility thanks to its vertical grip, which is an optional accessory on the EOS R5 Mark II. The EOS R1 viewfinder even features an anti-fog system to ensure usability in the cold.

In fact, Richard points out, the EVF is one of the most important parts of the camera, the interaction point. He praises the brightness, high refresh rate and large physical size of the EVF in the EOS R1 – "it's three times bigger than some competitors," he notes, "with the highest magnification of any EOS camera ever. No other EVF compares to it." A 2025 firmware update even eliminates EVF turning-on lag when the camera is raised to the eye.

"I leave it in exposure simulation almost all the time, and now can use depth of field preview and flash simulation as well." When he wants an unfiltered view, Richard simply selects optical viewfinder simulation, again demonstrating the system's comprehensive configurability.

The agency uses what Richard describes as a "tag and send" workflow, in which all the events it covers are live-edited by the editing team. "At a football match, I might shoot around 1,000 pictures," he explains. "I might upload around 150 to our editors for them to decide which ones they want to use, keep or discard. From that 150, maybe 75 get to the site or are published.

"When I'm shooting pictures, I'll voice-caption them, tag, and send them. I use the camera's Voice Memo feature to record all the salient caption information to the file, and then the File Lock function to 'mark' that file. In the image transfer options I select 'Locked files not transmitted' and then upload them to my chosen FTP destination using the camera's secure file transfer capability. This saves time, as I don't have to scroll through the images on the LCD screen frame by frame and send them individually.

"So many online feeds are replacing traditional outlets such as newspapers, it's vitally important not only to deliver great imagery to clients, but to be able to deliver it as fast as possible."

Canon's EOS R System cameras are designed to make image sharing as simple and as rapid as it can be. "The EOS R1 and EOS R5 Mark II support 6GHz Wi-Fi, where available, as well as 2.4GHz/5GHz – a vast, less-congested bandwidth that only these cameras can use – and have more antennas for a more reliable signal. They can use dual-thread FTP if network bandwidth permits. You can store networks and settings on card or in-camera, and switch quickly when you need to, for example when you move from the tunnel back to a wired LAN connection on the sidelines of professional grounds. And when you can connect using the latter, both cameras can transfer data at 2.5Gbits per second – twice the speed of previous cameras."

"I'd definitely say the Canon EOS R System has diversified my output," Richard concludes. "The continuous shooting speeds – up to 30fps on EOS R5 Mark II and 40fps on EOS R1 – "allow you to do things you couldn't do before. If I'm shooting a swing sequence in golf or tennis, for example, I've simply got more frames to choose from. And with the advanced AF, all of them are perfectly focused."

Using the silent electronic shutter at a golf tournament, "I could shoot whenever I wanted, without fear of putting the players off, and I could let the AF do its thing and keep track of faces/eyes, which allowed me to concentrate on where the subject was in the frame and if they made any sudden movements. I could also make sure the exposure was perfect, especially with silhouettes, and being able to move up to extremely fast shutter speeds" – up to 1/64,000 sec – "meant I could keep a shallower depth of field to make the subject pop.

"The latest Canon cameras are fantastic, and the jumps in AF, image quality and lens quality are amazing. Also, as well as getting the best images, it's critical in this market to get them out fastest, and the enhanced connectivity and file transfer features are unmatched." In this competitive world, with the best kit for sports and action photography, Richard knows his Canon cameras and lenses keep him ahead of the game. "You have to trust your equipment implicitly, and the only way you do that is by using it and realising how it can help you create things quicker, easier and better."