Matthew Stockman/Getty Images

As Will Smith said, “Welcome to Miami.”

It’s day nine here at the Sony Ericsson Open in Miami, Florida but just day two without rain. Rain has made for some tough times here on the island of Key Biscayne but hasn’t prevented the team of four photographers from making some nice images.

The first week’s roster of Getty Images photographers nearly contained a Grand Slam with experience and location. With Clive Brunskill (from the home of Wimbledon), Chris McGrath (from the home of the Aussie Open) and Matthew Stockman (from the home of the U.S. Open) the staff had plenty of tennis knowledge to maneuver the 12 different courts here at Camden Park. The first couple days of a tennis tournament are always hard because with a draw containing both 96 men and women plus 64 doubles teams there is just a lot of cover.

Chris McGrath/Getty Images

The first couple days our crew typically had to cover up to 25 matches in one day meaning timing and speed is everything. So when the rain came – typically around noon everyday – the delays would throw off the entire schedule preventing our photographers from being able to hop around to the matches they were assigned to making it even more difficult.

Unlike other sports such as baseball, cricket and golf, where you also can’t play in the rain, the difference with tennis is that once it rains you need to wait until the courts are dry because the court can become very slick. Each rain delay would cost us nearly an hour and just about when the court would dry the rain would come lashing down again.

The other problem with rain is clouds. A cloudy day in tennis is nearly as bad as rain due to the lack of the natural light from the sun.

Chris McGrath/Getty Images

However, some good tennis is still being played and now that we are on to the later rounds some of the match-ups are becoming exciting. Today alone we had Maria Sharapova take on Serena Williams along with Andy Roddick, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Justine Henin also play in Stadium Court.

Let’s hope that tomorrow brings more good matches and sun.