How to improve indoor fast action in poor lighting

[ScottW]

I am very new to the world of digital photography. I've started taking pictures of our dogs in dock diving competitions. I have numerous problems with the indoor venues. Sometimes the pictures are overly red, the dogs (and people) look like they have flashlights for eyes, or I don't get the dog in focus. This shot was taken with the Tv setting on my Rebel and ISO at 1600with the telephoto lens. I try to focus lock to a point where I want to take the shot. There wasn't enough light at the site and the built in flash wasn't strong enough to reach the subject. Bright spots and dark spots all over the dock and water due to the overhead lights. Any suggestions on improving would be appreciated.

[sdjl]

Have you maybe tried without the flash and going into Aperture priority mode (Av)?
If you can get a large aperture (lower i.e. f/2.8 - f/5.6) you'll increase the light coming into the camera and won't have to rely on the flash.
Give it a whirl!

David

[AZ4Runner]

Originally Posted by sdjl

Have you maybe tried without the flash and going into Aperture priority mode (Av)?
If you can get a large aperture (lower i.e. f/2.8 - f/5.6) you'll increase the light coming into the camera and won't have to rely on the flash.

While a larger aperture will allow more light into the camera, you're going to have to have a shutter speed of 1/250s or better to stop the action. If your experience has been like mine, a large aperture plus a high shutter speed won't always get what you need. My guess is that you're not going to get the "freeze" action shots you're looking for without using a flash or a faster lens.

I know Canon makes a speedlight that would probably be more of service to you than the built-in flash that comes on yoru camera.

[ScottW]

Thanks so much for the advice. My initial thought was that I should get a speedlight but didn't want to spend money without making sure it would improve my chances of getting the shot I see in my mind. The Canon 430EX Speedlight is what I was looking at. This seems to be reasonably priced for an introductory flash.
I tried taking some shots with the Sports setting but all the shots were blurry due to the camera trying to allow more light in at the expense of the shutter speed, at least this is what I assumed was going on.
Would the speedlight also reduce the white eyes that I was experiencing?

[smc1377]

A speedlight will reduce the whiteness bounced back to an extent, but I don't think it'll be all that noticeable on a dog. When taking pictures of humans, the light source being further from your lens will reduce redeyes for sure, but with dogs, I'm sure their eyes/pupils are so wide open that it'll still bounce about the same amount of light back at your camera.

[ScottW]

Ordered the flash since it was something I wanted to do anyway. Should have it in time for this weekends dog jumping down in Virginia at a pet expo. Thanks again for comments. So much to learn.

[hpebley3]

You might want to head over to www.strobist.com. Pretty much all that's talked about there is lighting, particularly flash. If you look on the right side of the page, there's "Lighting 101" and "On Assignment". Several articles in there talk about situations like this.

Hope this helps.
Harley Pebley

[ScottW]

Originally Posted by smc1377

A speedlight will reduce the whiteness bounced back to an extent, but I don't think it'll be all that noticeable on a dog. When taking pictures of humans, the light source being further from your lens will reduce redeyes for sure, but with dogs, I'm sure their eyes/pupils are so wide open that it'll still bounce about the same amount of light back at your camera.

Yes, the lighting is just low enough in the indoor events that the pupils are enormous. I stopped shooting head on to avoid the white lazer beams of light that were bouncing back at me. It doesn't help that the event management always puts the docks in the back corner of the site since they don't want water all over the place.

Hopefully I can improve some this weekend with the addition of a flash.

[AZ4Runner]

I've seen a few photoshop plug-ins that address "pet eye." Pet eye is the animal version of red eye. You may want to search around and see if you can find one that works for you.