2,946 photos.
Between home games and creative content for the Vegas Golden Knights and Henderson Silver Knights, that's the average photographer's week. Zak Krill. Krill serves as the main – and often sole – photographer for all HSK home games, as well as part of the VGK team of photographers at The Fortress.
So, how do you fit the game of hockey into these pictures?
“One of the mottos I always lived by was that of a coach when I was in college,” said Krill. “He told me: 'You have to know the players better than the players.' You have to be able to anticipate and learn that this guy gets a position over here, or that [the opposing] the goalkeeper is really bad on the left side, so we will be shooting a lot on that. This is our top guy with a good shot – when he gets into the zone, he wants to be in front of the puck so he's ready to go. You always have to be ahead of the game.”
In keeping with that philosophy, Krill captured historic images of both the Golden Knights and Silver Knights franchises during his years with the organization: Jake Leschyshyn celebrates the first goal in HSK history; the strobe-light of Paul Cotter scoring the first goal at The Stronghold; A great photo of Mark Stone hoisting the Stanley Cup over his head after the Golden Knights' victory on June 13, 2023.
But Krill's favorites in his Knights portfolio extend beyond those that fall into the team's time category.
“Some of my favorite moments are not the big ones that everyone expects,” she said. “Most of them are young old teammates who are playing alone for the first time. Or seeing boys who grew up together, like him Alaska Men: [Isaiah] Saville, [Pheonix] Copley, too [Jeremy] Swayman. Whether it's in the AHL or the NHL, I always try to catch pictures of them together. Even though they are on different teams, their faces light up when they see each other during the warm-up. Little things that capture the camaraderie that comes with hockey. I'm always looking for video and photos of milestones, like the first goal or the final win. But I hear players talking about all these great little moments, too. That kind of image is special to me.”
Game footage and other on-ice content make up the bulk of the nearly 3,000 photos Krill takes per week. But creating graphic content for two professional hockey teams also includes public events, the introduction of actors and fans, as well as special local shots or Theme Knight jerseys.
Those kinds of shots present a completely different creative challenge compared to game action – one that Krill enjoys.
“I like to be quick on my feet and adapt to these settings,” he added. “I've had to photograph people riding horses in the middle of the desert, or standing in a gold mine, or in a space-themed Illuminarium where everything is made of light panels. With every shoot, there's this challenge of 'okay, how can I make this work? How can I make it beautiful?' For example, in my Nevada Day graphic, I worked with precise lighting and subtle detail shots. We had soft light from the lantern, which created these really interesting pictures. ”
“And we always get great news from these videos, because they're part of what our brand is known for. In the mine, we ended up with six or seven other people on the first trip. One of the couples on the trip was from California, and she was immediately interested in seeing the process. For him, it was the coolest day ever. He couldn't wait to see [the jersey]he ended up following us [on social] just to see the finished pictures and video. With the game, you have thousands of other people watching at the same time, which is amazing. But there's also a lot to celebrate in private moments like these shoots. Like, when we made the Reverse Retro jersey for VGK, there were only about ten of us that knew about it. So being a part of creating and revealing that story was amazing, and seeing the reaction from the fans was even better.”
The process from shutter to social is not instantaneous. After each capture, Krill removes any uncut shots. He then carefully edits the rest of the images by cropping, aligning, and balancing the color of each image.
Some of these photos will be posted directly to the group's social media channels. But others will continue to be part of the Knights' marketing in other ways. Many team graphics and posters have been created from Krill's photos, from special poses taken at media day to action shots from throughout the season.
“It ends up being cool to see what happens [graphic designer] Austin [Zima] he knows how to do with pictures, the way he does posters, victory paintings, goal paintings, etc.,” said Krill. “I like to tell a story a lot. I want to try to shoot in a way where it fits both as the main image, and as a complement to it. It gives me a good challenge to try and expand what I can do and see the picture in a new way. And there are days when I have a certain player that I'm following, or a special jersey, something like that, when I'm trying to talk more about a one-time story.
– but they will be used beyond that specific game. I want to count that.”
Officially, of course, the photographer has no favorites. But are there any Knights who are most excited to be able to capture on camera?
“I like to say clearly that there is someone who likes to play this game, so I like to take their pictures [Mason] Geertsen again [Mason] Morelli. And with Geertsen, there is one boy who have known each other for years and years, so every time they are on the ice they are chirping. That made for some great photos. Brendan [Brisson] he has great festivals, too. Whether it's in front of an NHL crowd or an AHL crowd, he's always absolutely crazy. When you have that much passion for the game, it makes everyone's job really easy. I'm not trying to shoot that one frame where he looks really happy, I've got a series of 30 or 40 shots where Brendan looks like he's the happiest person alive.”
“I've gotten some comments on the photos making fun of the 'accident revival,' which is a nice compliment. Much of the Renaissance was done with paintings that were made because they were the most important parts of the good times. So in a hundredth of a second, you can do what artists take weeks or months to do. That's part of what makes being a photographer so great. I do this because I enjoy it, and I want to be here every day. But I also do it because I like to capture it from our players, coaches, team history, family, fans. No matter how bad the shoot feels, when people talk about an amazing photo the day always feels like it was worth it.”
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