Glow riders: a low-light surf shoot with the Canon EOS-1D X Mark III

Speeding along the crest of a wave, bathed in an otherworldly red glow, a surfer is caught frozen in motion. But he's not on the ocean – he's behind a boat on a lake. Capturing the moment was extreme sports photographer and Canon Ambassador Richard Walch, crouched in the boat in front of the surfer, almost touching the water himself.

"Wakesurfers need a rope to start with but after a couple of seconds they can let it go," he says, comparing the niche sport to wakeboarding, which requires a rope throughout. "Surfers love it because they can ride a constant rolling wave."

Playing with fire

Richard wanted to demonstrate the speeds at which the surfers travel, so he asked them to light rescue flares while riding the waves. "The concept was to bring fire into the game," he says. "I like playing with fire."

A number of elements needed to come together for the perfect shot – wave, action and light – complicated further by Richard travelling in a fast-moving boat close to the water. "The rider had to surf and light the flare, leaving about 45 seconds for the trick," says Richard. What's more, with a limited supply of flares, each with up to a minute's burn time, he had just five minutes to capture his vision. "That puts a bit of pressure on," he laughs. "Luckily the Canon EOS-1D X Mark III shoots at 20fps."

At 16fps with the optical viewfinder and 20fps in Live View mode, the frame-rates on the Canon EOS-1D X Mark III are faster than its predecessor's. "The moment when the board, surfer and flare are in the perfect position is very short – a split second," says Richard. "But if you can shoot at 20fps, boom – you have the shot. When the light of the flare was behind the surfer's body and he was silhouetted against the background glow, it was magical."

The toughest body around

As well as shooting in burst mode from the boat – about three metres in front of his subject – Richard also took single shots from a second boat, about 10-15 metres from the action. To shoot from a range of distances, he relied on the "classic trio" of zoom lenses: a Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8L III USM, a Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM and a Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS III USM.

At times, Richard was incredibly close to the water. "I was very low in the boat so I could get a really low angle and make the waves look even bigger," he says. "The camera was around 20cm away from the water, and once in a while you get a splash.

"The camera doesn't like it, but because of the way the body is made and sealed, it can handle it. It's the toughest body there is. It's reassuring to know I can just focus on pushing the envelope with my photography."

Enhanced AF tracking

With only seconds to get each action shot pin-sharp, Richard found the camera's new high-resolution AF sensor – with about 28x the resolution of its predecessor – to be a significant boost. With enhanced focus tracking and the new AF point smart controller built into the AF-ON buttons, he was able to change the focus point while tracking at speeds faster than he'd ever experienced, he says.

"Previously, setting the AF point would lock the framing, so I couldn't change the AF point during the action – I'd catch the athlete and follow him. Now, I can change the AF point so rapidly that framing and adjusting the AF points are two separate things. I'm confident you can change the AF point while the action is taking place, because it's so quick."

Richard also noticed a marked improvement in processing speeds when writing data to the camera's two CFexpress cards, compared with its predecessor. "I could fire constantly for as long as the flare was burning and pick out the best shot. The advances in this camera mean you can capture images you could not have taken before."