A lot of factors come into play with a great sports photo, but there’s one thing in particular that Blair Peters, owner of North Vancouver’s Vintage Sports Images, is looking for when he wants to find the best of the best.
“It’s all about the eyes,” Peters says from his new gallery and sales space on Marine Drive. “The eyes have to be focused on what’s happening in the picture. I’ve got a great one of Tony Esposito and you can tell that his eyes are just lasered in on the puck as he does his old poke check.”
North Shore sports fans can now see for themselves all of the vintage photos that Peters has turned into a burgeoning business based on eclectic images from the sports fields of days gone by.
The collection started with Peters’ friend Eric Olsen, who carved out a niche buying and selling photo negatives on eBay after his wife politely asked him to get rid of his sports memorabilia to make room in their house for their three children. Olsen slowly built the business to the point where he was invited onto CBC’s Dragons’ Den to pitch his idea. The Dragons were wowed by the images Olsen had collected and got into a bidding war, although the agreed upon deal ultimately fell through after the cameras were turned off. That’s when Peters came into the picture, joining his buddy Olsen – their daughters both played fastpitch for the North Shore Stars – and eventually buying the company outright, with Olsen still onboard now in semi-retirement.
The Dragons didn’t cough up any cash, but one of them did spit out an idea that hit home with Peters. When he went on the show Olsen was pitching the idea of enlarging the business he had going, buying and selling more negatives. One of the Dragons had a different plan.
“Kevin O’Leary, who is not my favourite person, he had some great advice,” says Peters with a laugh. O’Leary figured that they should get into the business of using their negatives to make prints, blowing up the shots and selling them to sports fans. Peters got to test out the idea when he ordered a few large prints that were to be used for a charity auction.
“When my printer came to the house and delivered the 12 that we were putting up for auction, I was just blown away by these stunning images on canvas,” he says. “I was just like, wow. Wow.”
From there the idea was born to take the Internet-based business and give it a brick-and-mortar home.
“I always follow my gut in business, and my gut was saying we’ve got to get this stuff up on walls,” says Peters. “We had a real vision of creating a space where people could come in, walk around, poke around.”
That’s how Peters ended up opening his doors last month on a gallery/sales space in a bustling neighbourhood on Marine Drive in North Vancouver. The busy streetscape, near Capilano Mall, Indigo and Boston Pizza, was what attracted him to the neighbourhood.
“I was just getting a good vibe from the area,” says Peters. “I really liked what was happening here along this strip. It’s a really vibrant area here along Marine Drive.”
With the gallery now open, sports fans can come in and buy something right off the wall, or browse through the company’s online database and order anything they like.
Getting the eyes just right may be the key to a great photo, but there are other factors at play as well, says Peters, who worked as an animator before getting into the sports photo game. Some folks might be grabbed by a shot that captures an incredibly athletic play at the perfect time.
“Being a former artist, composition is really important to me,” says Peters. “Sometimes it’s just the beauty of the shot, the action, the moment. There’s just something esoteric or cool about some of the shots.”
Other times, people want a shot of their hero. The gallery currently features a photo of the great Bobby Orr.
“It’s called Orr Contemplates His Next Move, and you can just see that he’s looking up ice trying to figure out his path to the goal,” says Peters.
With more than 50,000 images to choose from, Peters can find something to accommodate most requests. He’s thrilled when he sees families browsing the gallery together and reanimating the past through the images.
“It’s where art and sports collide,” he says. “Some kids don’t know who Hank Aaron is, and I love the fact that kids can come in and dad will be there and say, ‘Hank Aaron, he broke Babe Ruth’s record.’ There are a lot of stories with these pictures.”
