Paris Heineken Cup Launch

In September, I had the chance to photograph the Heineken Cup Launch in Paris for Getty Images and the ERC (European Rugby Cup). The mission was to make some portraits of the athletes and their coach in the France Television photo studio, to shoot some cool outside group pictures and to take some photos during the press conference. All was really fast, and it was not easy as I had to run everywhere, but it was a great job and opportunity to meet these great champions.

Here is a bunch of what I've shot. You can see all my work for Getty Images whenever you want on their website typing "Richard Bord" in the search area ;-)

Thanks for visiting. Cheers!

Captain Aurélien Rougerie of ASM Clermont Auvergne

Captain Sébastien Tillous Bordes & coach Bernard Laporte of RC Toulon

Captain Jacques Cronje & coach Gonzalo Quesada of Racing Metro 92

Captain Imanol Harinordoquy of Biarritz Olympique PB

Coach Guy Noves of Stade Toulousain & Coach Laurent Rodriguez of Biarritz Olympique PB

Captain Thierry Dusautoir of Stade Toulousain

All the images are © Richard Bord / Getty Images

Photo value on Internet : worst than ever?

This month, I received one of my worst Sales and Royalty Statement since I work for a photo agency. Don't think it's necessary to give you the name, I guess every agencies are affected by... I have sold dozen and dozen of photographs for an Internet time limited access use for only 0,31$. Yes, you read well : 0,31$!! And of course, you have to subtract the photo agency rate, and then to convert American Dollars to Euros. Enough said, I think you can easily imagine that a photo on Internet has NO VALUE in 2010. Well, it's not always true, sometimes you can sold a photo for 50$ if it's big enough and if it's for a big and well known website...

What if photo value would depend of the number of views on a page? What if you removed all the photos and pictures on a daily news website, on every websites? Yes, it could be very poor, uninteresting, boring. I think everybody needs photographs to illustrate a website. So, why images don't have their right value, depending on their size and on the number of views? Don't you think photo value should be more important on Internet when you have thousands and millions of views and clicks than on a paper magazine?

Well, I hope and I wish 2011 will be a better year for all the professional photographers who are in the streets and everywhere to shoot what's happened in this world, a World who doesn't turn really round...

Eclectic week

Last week, I covered several events in Paris. And, as often, I run to an event from another one, so that I feel like a chameleon who can change his color when he goes to a different place and meet different people. Diversity is exactly what I like when you are a photographer. You learn new things each time you shoot a new subject. I could talk about that during hours and hours. It's a big part of motivation for me and I think I could resume it with one word : curiousity.