Good and Bad Sports Photography

As many of my peers know, I photograph sports for my school yearbook. At games, there are usually 2-4 serious photographers (I’ll define that as anyone with a DSLR and lens of 100mm +.

Here is an example of the WRONG way to take sports photos. 

I have seen here at a few sporting events now. She uses what I is either a Canon Rebel XS or XSi. The max ISO on it is 1600. The lens is a 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6. This is a very slow lens. Overall, this is terrible for shooting sports in low light. I was shooting at f/2.8 at 3200-6400 ISO later in the night. That shot of this photographer is even shot at 5000 ISO. Here is what is wrong – slow camera, slow lens, but most of all…. Flash! With a full size football field, there is no way an on camera flash will reach players 25 yards away let along across the field. In addition to that, the Rebel cameras only have a flash sync of 1/200th or 1/250th, thus making impossible to get sharp action shots.

Here is an example to the RIGHT way to take sports photos.

I don’t know her name, but I had a few words with her. She takes photos for the Citizen Times, a local newspaper of Asheville. I did not see exactly what camera it was but I think it’s a Nikon D700, D300 or D300s. She told me the lens is a 300mm f/2.8 (just over $5500 new). Of course, only those on a professional budget can get that kind of lens. The monopod is a good choice, and even a must with larger lenses like that one.

Here is one photo I took with my 70-200mm. 

Info: 6400, ISO f/4, 1/750th

Shooting From the Field

It started with a friend asking me to shoot his varsity football game and ended in a new discovery – sports photography. I have focused far too much on portraits, mostly because I did not have a good lens to shoot sports. But now I have the perfect lens – the Canon 70-200mm. For those that don’t know, this is one of those long white lenses that you’ll see professional photographers use on the sidelines of games. In fact, for football, it’s the perfect sidelines lens.

When I arrived at the game, I was surprised at the number of people for a game in the summer at 10AM. I noticed two professional sports photographers on the other side of the field. I started taking some shots from the seats, then I walked down to the sidelines, about 3 feet from the bench where the football players sat who were not playing. Then I eventually took some shots from the field. Generally you’ll know which way the ball is going and can even be in the middle of the field where reffs go. This, however can be very dangerous. Two times the ball was turned around and I was almost tackled by football players. One of the times I had to make a very quick dash with my camera. That would be awful to disrupt the game and damage my gear at the same time – especially if you knew what I paid for my lens and camera.

After about 30 minutes, I found my self being where the other photographers were. One used a Nikon mount with a massive lens and the other used a Canon D30 and 70-200mm, same lens as me. We talked a little on the sidelines and sometimes would show each other our good photos. We talked about technical things like what sports at best for AI Servio and what modes to shoot in. He told me he shot for a newspaper in Brevard and I gave him my card, then I went back to shooting. Here are a few shots I got. Both were taken at f/4 at 1/1500th of a second.

More photos from the game HERE http://www.facebook.com/pages/Oliver-Sholder-Photography/106283589406299?ref=ts#!/album.php?aid=20137&id=106283589406299&ref=mf