Youth Wrestling

[ARKreations]

Here's one of my favorite shots from a youth wrestling tournament I shot for a local club last weekend. I'm shooting another meet for them this weekend and would like to know if there is anything I can do to improve on my setup and approach. I'm primarily interested in feedback on exposure and lighting. This shot is almost SooC except for some minor cropping (top & right), increasing the exposure by 1/3 stop and processing with Noise Ninja.

EXIF:
Camera: Nikon D80
Lens: 24-70 f/2.8
Shutter: 1/350
Aperture: 2.8
ISO: 1000
Focal Length: 62mm
Flash: SB-800 Manual @ 1/4 power, 45 deg. bounce w/ diffusion cap

[Jim Bryant]

You're getting there Much better this time around than that of your first attempt. It's hard shooting little guys at that skill level. They don't have too much wrestling skills and it's really hard to capture peak action when there isn't. They are basically dancing bears until one makes a stupid mistake.

[oldwolf]

I think it's a good shot for the lighting you had to work with. I think your white balance is a bit off though.

Also have to second what Jim said. LOL at the dancing bears comment.

[ARKreations]

LOL - now they're gonna wonder why I'm chuckling to myself when I'm shooting!

Actually, this guy (I think he's 11-12) won his class and had the pin 1 min into the second round.

Thanks for the feedback guys, it really does help.

oldwolf, would you mind commenting in a little more detail on the white balance? I've tried Auto with miserable results. Shooting a white card still seemed to come out pretty cold. This time, I tried to simulate an expo-disk by covering the lens with a white tissue and thought I was getting pretty close. (At least that seemed to look the best to me.) Any and all suggestions greatly appreciated.

As far as peak action goes, I was able to get a few like this, but obviously I need to work on the framing and orientation a bit.

[oldwolf]

Shooting the white card will work if the white card is where your subject will be.

Not sure what program you use to process your pictures but sometimes there's a little slider bar that you can use to adjust the color temperature. The picture looks a bit blue to me for some reason.

Not sure what program comes with Nikon stuff. I use what came with my Canon which is Digital Photo Professional to process my RAW files and adjust white balance in there. I set my WB to Auto 90% of the time I'm shooting unless I remember to change it.

[ARKreations]

Maybe that's my problem. I'm all over the gym and with different mats and light levels, it really isn't constant enough to get consistent white card shots.

I'm using LR2 for post processing and definitely have temp controlls available. I did, in fact try to adjust to see if I was close, but any warmer started to look too red on my monitor. (Color calibration keeps moving closer to the top of my hardware acquisition list...) I might have to give auto one more try. Thanks much!

[oldwolf]

Originally Posted by krossk

I'm using LR2 for post processing and definitely have temp controlls available. I did, in fact try to adjust to see if I was close, but any warmer started to look too red on my monitor.

No worries.

If the gym has mixed lighting then that might throw you off too. Some times they'll mix fluorescent light with tungsten so that kinda messes you up a bit when trying to figure out what WB to use.

[ARKreations]

I don't think it was a much mixed as it was different orientations. It was obviously a divided gym that was opened up for the meet. Some sections had large white reflective panels between the lights, while others were open with a white ceiling. Most certainly different light levels from mat to mat. And to top it off, mats were either red or blue, which will definitely induce color cast as well.

This is all definitely stuff I had not considered and will make a point of being aware of this weekend. This meet is the important one that they are really looking for.

Thanks.

[Jim Bryant]

I found that the pixs that sell the most are ones where there's peak action and getting pinned shots. Also watch for reaction from wrestlers if it's a close match and one comes from behind to win. Those are great selling shots