Terrible night of football - until the last 4 minutes

johng

Wow - nothing was going right for me. I always seemed out of position - nothing interesting all night - and then the last 4 minutes. Here are 6 shots - the first 2 from the first 44 minutes of the game the last 4 from the last 4 minutes. Glad I didn't leave. Shot 5 should have been the winning touchdown with 1:30 left - accept the other team marched down and scored with a second left. As always, C&C welcome:
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sun8550

night pictures are awesome
I have to shoot the last football game of the season it will be dark and wondering what settings, you used what camera setup.

I have canon EOS30D with 28 by 135 lense and 70 by 200 lense.

any help would be greatly appreciated.
thanks
Dawn

johng

sun8550 wrote:

I have to shoot the last football game of the season it will be dark and wondering what settings, you used what camera setup.

I have canon EOS30D with 28 by 135 lense and 70 by 200 lense.

any help would be greatly appreciated.
thanks
Dawn

The 28-135 will be useless for any action. Which 70-200 lens do you have?

mercphoto

sun8550 wrote:

I have to shoot the last football game of the season it will be dark and wondering what settings, you used what camera setup.

I have canon EOS30D with 28 by 135 lense and 70 by 200 lense.

The 28-135 is too short and too slow. The 70-200 will work if its a 2.8 lens, and you'll be at 200mm nearly all the time, often wishing for more. 300/2.8's and 400/2.8's are king of field sports, and 2.8 is a must at night. Consider renting a lens.

sun8550

lens setup
ok I use this so little i didn't even know what i had, it's a Canon EF 70 by 300mm 1:4-5.6 IS

so i will be using this i'm sure.

johng

sun8550 wrote:

ok I use this so little i didn't even know what i had, it's a Canon EF 70 by 300mm 1:4-5.6 IS

so i will be using this i'm sure.

Not for night football under the lights. Common exposure setting for night football in decent lighting is ISO 3200 f2.8 1/500. With a 5.6 aperture lens you'd have shutter speeds of 1/125. And that lens will hunt in the low light.

Let me ask - you say you "have to shoot the last game of the season". Why do you "have to"? What is the purpose of the shoot? Yearbook? School paper? Print sales? You're going to need to get a hold of some different equipment if you "have to" shoot the game.

sun8550

thanks
Thanks for all your help, the only thing i have to do is get a good shot of the senior with their parents before the game they do an introduction of the seniors on the team, and that should be ok, i can be as close as i need to be for that and it will probably be dusk so i will have some light left outside. Basically i'm taking the pictures for them to use in yearbook, scrapbook.... and they are putting out 100 of my flyers in their program.

my compromise might be to get to a daytime game/practice to see what i can get with the lense i do have.

thanks so much
Dawn

johng wrote:

Not for night football under the lights. Common exposure setting for night football in decent lighting is ISO 3200 f2.8 1/500. With a 5.6 aperture lens you'd have shutter speeds of 1/125. And that lens will hunt in the low light.

Let me ask - you say you "have to shoot the last game of the season". Why do you "have to"? What is the purpose of the shoot? Yearbook? School paper? Print sales? You're going to need to get a hold of some different equipment if you "have to" shoot the game.

johng

sun8550 wrote:

Thanks for all your help, the only thing i have to do is get a good shot of the senior with their parents before the game Dawn

OK - this is a completely different thing. Set camera in manual exposure - ISO 800, f8 1/100 with flash enabled. Take a couple test shots while everyone is getting set up - if lighting is really good this might overexpose a bit - if so, drop ISO to 400 if that happens. If you're comfortable using RAW then do so - you'll be able to fix white balance and adjust exposure.

When the player/parents stop at their spot (i.e. not while they're walking) get their attention - make sure they're looking at YOU not at other family members or other photographers. Snap 2 shots then move to the next.


Repeat.

It would be better if you had an external flash but even with the internal one you're better than no flash at all. You might have to correct some red-eye.