Matt Brown recently spent time with Angels starting pitcher CJ Wilson who is passionate about photography.

Photo by CJ Wilson

Photo by CJ Wilson

Photo by CJ Wilson

Photo by CJ Wilson

MB:     What got you started in photography?

CJ:    Both my parents were really into photography, my mom actually worked at a camera store, that’s where my parents met back in the day, so it’s something that’s always been around the house and there’s always photo books laying around and stuff like that, so it’s been something that I’ve always respected as an art form.

MB:     Does your dad shoot as well?

CJ:       Yeah, both my parents shot for a long time, and then as real life creeps in and you get a little bit older the having kids and all that stuff slows it down a little bit but hopefully I won’t have to work so much when I have kids as they did so I’ll be able to photograph for my whole life.

MB:     What do you enjoy shooting?

CJ:       You know I’ve kind of been all over shooting everything, more than anything I enjoy shooting animals, like safari related stuff. I’ve been over to Africa and I’ve gone to a bunch of different zoos and stuff like that and I really enjoy trying to personalize the animals, like almost treat them like a model, or a subject in that sense, just like a person.

MB:     What’s your favorite animal then?

CJ:       The giraffe is actually the easiest animal to photograph because it’s got a ton of personality. I know that sounds kind of funny, but they have weird proportions and they seem like they’re always far away because they’re so tall and stuff like that but they’re actually very approachable and they’re very friendly. And I feel like they have a unique look because of the coloring and the spots and stuff that the contrast shows up really well on paper and on the screen when you shoot.

MB:     So what’s you favorite piece of equipment?

CJ:       I’ve used a bunch of different cameras, some of them I own and some of them I didn’t, I shot with a Leica medium format camera that was amazing but out of all the stuff I own my Canon 1DX and the new 24-70mm lens that came out that Canon makes for it, the L series lens, is amazing. And having the 24-70mm it’s kind of cheating because you’re allowed to do stuff with it you couldn’t do with a fixed lens, although prime lenses are the best. It’s really hard because you have more than lens to get all the different styles of shots that you want to get.

MB:     So that’s your go-to, that’s the one in the bag? The 24-70?

CJ:       Yeah, I’d say that’s probably the most user friendly, most repeatable, easiest in multiple light conditions, and it’s wide enough that I can do landscape stuff which I like to do as well.

MB:     So if you had your chance to shoot any one player in the history of baseball, who would it be?

CJ:       I don’t know, I feel like there’s very few iconic photographs of baseball players in general in relation to some of the other single athlete sports like boxing, everybody’s seen those Muhammed Ali photos and stuff which are so amazing from some of those guys in the past and some of the basketball shots are amazing as well, some basketball players, some race car drivers. I don’t know I’m a huge fan of some of the guys from the 50’s and 60’s, you know I would of loved  to have shot Ted Williams or Bob Gibson or Sandy Kofax, like a guy that had sort of a style to his game but also had, kind of a inner thing, because it would have been interesting to try to draw that out. I feel like Sandy Kofax was so reserved that if you could get him, get a cool shot of him it would be something that nobody else ever got.

MB:     Is that a lefty-lefty thing too?

CJ:       I mean, he’s just one of the best pitchers of all time. Bob Gibson’s the same way, he’s super intense, I’m huge fan of his.  I think Pedro Martinez would be the easiest guy to photograph because he seems like he’s just always funny and stuff like that. Buy Ted Williams had a reputation for being a little bit reticent, and so did those other two guys and so I think that would be more of a challenge which would therefore produce a better result.

MB:     So are we talking about a portrait or action photo?

CJ:       Portrait, I think action photos are more depersonalized. If you have an action photo of a guy, unless you’re super close somehow and it’s a staged action photo, you’re shooting the same thing that everyone else is shooting. So there’s some great photos of Sandy Kofax with that big delivery or Bob Gibson big that big arm swing. Ted Williams crouched over, but the really cool shots are when you have the kind of players together like at the All Star Game where you get two guys on different teams who don’t normally interact. I got a cool photo of Prince Fielder and Robinson Cano sitting together at last year’s All Star Game and it was a really, really cool photo of just the two of them focused but a little bit glassed out to me being there because I was just another guy…

MB:     Another guy with a camera?

CJ:       No, no, I was another guy on the team because they didn’t have photographers that close, I was closer than all the other photographers so I got special shots with a wide angle lens that guys were shooting with a 400mm lens from way beyond first base.  So I like that stuff, I like the in between moments. I got a shot of Cano where he’s got his eyes closed and he’s like visualizing where he wants to hit the ball, and that kind of stuff for me is just really cool because you’re drawn into that process a little bit more than if it’s just an action shot from 200 feet away of him smashing a ball. We’ve all seen that. But how many people see him with his eye closed on purpose taking a slow motion swing?

MB:     CJ, thanks for helping out on the blog!