What’s Your Preference?

WVCoalMiner · #1 (**permalink**) 09-12-2009, 05:10 PM

OK so my daughter (17 next month) wants me to take her an hour away to see her new boyfriend who plays high school football play at Fayetteville, WV (Home of the New River Gorge Bridge by the way) So I said ya know what OK sure I'll take my camera along and practice my sports shooting (This was my very first time shooting sports LOL).
Right away I knew it was going to be a challenge. Both of these schools are Single A class which is the smallest sports class in the state so they are small school with small budgets. The first thing I notice was the lighting, only 4 banks of lights for the whole stadium (compared to 6 or 8 banks at most AA and AAA schools) and then the temperature dropped and the fog rolled in between the mountains.
The first half hour or so I fought with settings and terrible motion blur due to slow shutter speeds. Finally I broke down and just admitted I was going to have to shoot in ISO 1600 to get a fast shutter speed to get any usable shots.
BTW I was using my new Canon 75-300 f4-5.6.
When shooting night sports in bad light you definitely need a fast lens!!!!!!
Well after almost 300 shots here are 4 I thought to be the better of the bunch.
Now I know these are not as good as Jim Bryant's sports shot but maybe I'll get to his level one day!!!!

Camera: Canon EOS Digital Rebel XSi
Exposure: 0.02 sec (1/50)
Aperture: f/5.6
Focal Length: 300 mm
ISO Speed: 1600 <------WOW
Exposure Bias: 0 EV
Flash: Off, Did not fire

gunners67 · #2 (**permalink**) 09-12-2009, 05:13 PM

well wvcoalminer if this is your first effort at sports photography i can`t wait to see more the first and fourth are supurb!!!!!!!!!!

WVCoalMiner · #3 (**permalink**) 09-12-2009, 05:19 PM

Thanks Gunner I REALLY appreciate that!!!!!
Like I said I think I need a faster lens for High School football games LOL not enough light to freeze the motion.
I'll post some more once I get another comment LOL

jakethepig · #4 (**permalink**) 09-12-2009, 05:40 PM

Great action shots WV especially under difficult conditions. Well done mate you did a good job.

Dave.

MSidPhoto · #5 (**permalink**) 09-12-2009, 05:48 PM

Three words dude:

Great Sports Shooting !!!!

Well done, you did a great job at this.

cathyg62 · #6 (**permalink**) 09-12-2009, 06:23 PM

I think they are great !! I've yet to venture into sports shooting... hopefully when I do, my efforts will be half as good as yours. Great job !!

Darren Mathews · #7 (**permalink**) 09-12-2009, 06:59 PM

You could also add 2 stops of EV and increase your shutter speed just a bit; that would keep your exposure about the same yet reduce some of the blur.

WVCoalMiner · #8 (**permalink**) 09-12-2009, 07:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sanddlife

You could also add 2 stops of EV and increase your shutter speed just a bit; that would keep your exposure about the same yet reduce some of the blur.

At 300mm the lowest fstop I had was 5.6