No Pressure: 90 Seconds to Photograph Basketball Great John Stockton

University photographers often end up rubbing shoulders with some pretty famous alumni, and that privileged position sometimes offers the chance to shoot some compelling portraits of said celebrities. Unfortunately, that doesn’t always mean you’ll have a lot of time to bust out the strobes in the studio. Sometimes, all you have is 90 seconds, a speedlight, and a hallway.

Or at least that’s what Gonzaga University photographer Zack Berlat had to shoot one of the school’s alumni that you may have heard of – basketball legend John Stockton, who was a point guard for the Utah Jazz from 1984-2003 and was one of the best in the game.

Stockton was inducted into the West Coast Conference Hall of Honor on March 4th in Las Vegas, and in addition to shooting photos of the event for the University, Berlat wanted to get a portrait of Stockton.

He set up his umbrella, light stand, Nikon SB-700 Speedlight and Pocket Wizards in the hallway outside the event and dialed in his settings. In a quiet moment, snaked Stockton away from the crowd and took him to his pre-arranged setup. Since the settings were already dialed in, all he had to do was fire away.

“That really just freed me up to focus on me and him and our interactions together, making sure that I got him somewhat comfortable,” Berlat says in the video.

In the end, he got 10 frames of Stockton before his time was up. You can check out the results in the video from Berlat above.

[via YouTube]