Taekwondo was cool but the Grande Palais was cooler!

Just like the beach volleyball venue here in Paris, the Grande Palais (which was home to fencing and now taekwondo) is so beautiful that I was more interested in capturing the venue than the sport. No offense to those of you who know and love taekwondo, but I just love the architecture in this building.

I was in the Grande Palais about two weeks ago and shot images of the fencing, but the widest lens I had with me was the Canon RF 24-70mm. I really wanted to go back and get some wider shots to show thi amazing place.

Since Canon has the CPS booth in the Main Press Center and we can borrow all kinds of goodies, I went over there and borrowed the new RF 10-20mm lens. This lens is amazing, because it is super wide and with very little distortion.  I started shooting (using the Canon R5 MKII) from a high position, but it showed too much of the press tribune area.

I then walked a little lower and took some photos from about 20 rows up, in the public area. It was a cool shot of the building, but I needed a little more of the taekwondo to make this relevant. 

I had to wait for the next match to start before I could get down in the field of play area. I decided to switch lenses to the RF 70-200mm lens to get in closer to the action. 

I waited for some high action and bursted out images. I really don't know the sport well, so I looked for moments that were interesting photographically.

I tried doing some multi-exposure photos to see if they would work with this sport, but didn't feel like it was working out. And trust me, I take many photos here are the Olympics that are not keepers. I just usually don't share those with you. This is the rare exception. :)

I even tried a super side shot with multi-exposure and it was OK, but nothing great.

This is the shot I was looking for, with some high action at the bottom of the frame, but surrounded by the amazing architecture of the Grande Palais. This image really shows off the abilities of the new RF 10-20mm lens. The close-up images (shown previously) were taken from the same spot as this photo. What a difference a lens choice can make!

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* Thank you to Canon, Apple, ProGrade Digital, Crucial, Tiffen, DataColor, ThinkTank, Adobe, and CameraBits  for providing loaner product to me for the Olympic Games!

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