MC PERFORMANCE STUDIO
ATHLETIC EMPOWERMENT PHOTOGRAPHY
EXPLORE
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WHAT IS ATHLETIC EMPOWERMENT PHOTOGRAPHY?
Athletic empowerment photography is about showing young athletes the way they deserve to be seen, strong, capable, disciplined and powerful. It goes beyond documenting what an athlete looks like. It captures what they have built.
The strength. The repetition. The confidence. The intensity. The work nobody sees.That distinction becomes especially important in sports like dance, cheer. Although perceptions have changed, for generations, both have been surrounded by words like pretty, graceful, elegant and even girly. In some ways those sterotypes still exist. Those things can absolutely be part of dance and cheer but they are only part of the story. Dancers and cheerleaders are athletes. They train. They sweat. They fail. They get back up. They develop extraordinary strength, flexibility, balance, coordination and body control. Their performances are the result of countless hours spent building skills that are intentionally made to look effortless. Athletic empowerment photography changes the visual language. Instead of asking a dancer to simply look beautiful, I photograph the power required to create that movement. Instead of treating a cheerleader's strength as something happening behind the performance, I put it front and center. And the same philosophy carries across every sport I photograph. For young athletes, these images become more than portraits. They are an opportunity to see themselves differently not simply as a kid who plays a sport, dances or cheers, but as an athlete who has earned the strength, skill and confidence staring back at them. Beauty doesn't disappear. Grace doesn't disappear.
They just stop being the whole story.
This is what strong looks like.
MC Performance Studio accepts a limited number of individual athlete, dancer, team and creative commissions. There are no hourly blocks, no race against a session timer, and no predetermined number of images. You’ll see that repeated throughout this site, and intentionally. Even after hearing it, clients sometimes arrive feeling like they need to rush through a shoot. You don’t. I’m not watching the clock, and I don’t want you watching it either.
I don’t believe in filling a gallery simply to reach a promised number. If an image doesn’t meet my standard, it doesn’t belong in your collection. I start with an idea and work until we have what we came to create. What you receive is a carefully selected collection of the strongest images from our work together—not filler added to satisfy a quota.
Sessions can range from dramatic portraiture and movement studies to promotional campaigns and larger studio collaborations. Every commission begins with a conversation. Tell me who we’re photographing, what you’re envisioning, and what you want the finished work to feel like.
Bring me the idea. We’ll build the rest together.
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COMMISSIONS
BEHIND THE LENS
Marcus Collins is an international award winning sports photographer specializing in elite movement and form.
His work lives somewhere between sports photography and fine-art portraiture. His high contrast style is intentional, and built around the strength, intensity, and athleticism of the people in front of his camera. That approach has increasingly drawn Marcus toward ballet and contemporary dance, where he photographs dancers with the same intensity he brings to traditional athletes. Dance photographers photograph dance. Marcus photographs dancers like athletes.
Marcus lives in Franklin, Massachusetts with his wife and their 11-year-old daughter, and multi-sport athlete who has had a huge influence on the way he sees young athletes and the people behind the performance.
Before photography became the focus, Marcus spent more than a decade coaching competitive club softball. That experience still shapes his work today. He understands the training, pressure, confidence, frustration and grit that exist long before anyone steps in front of his camera.
Behind all of it? His wife. His biggest supporter from the beginning.
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