Texas Tech vs. Kansas

Erbeman

Here is a small album of images from my shots at the game.
Enjoy
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16.


17.


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19.


20.

TGphotos

All of them are GREAT! But I really like #3 the most. The smoke adds a really cool effect. Great shots Russ!

johng

Russ,
Some definite improvement. For only your second season shooting football you're definitely getting better.
1, 2, 7, 10 & 19 are all strong non-action shots. Good job capturing some of the atmosphere.

shot 5 - nice action. This is the type of shot that will really improve when you get a longer lens and don't have to crop down this much.

shot 6 - love the concept. Would be stronger if the receiver were in focus instead of the quarterback - faces are more interesting than backs.

shot 8 - perfect example of the problems with landscape oriented shooting. Cut off part of the player, missing the ball in the frame and uninteresting dead space to the left. Just think about it - everything about a pass reception screams vertical. Shoot it that way and you'll improve on all the above issues.

shot 9 - great shot. Nice & tight, good sharpness, good color and good action.

shot 12 - great action and nice and sharp. But image is crooked and you've cut off a foot. I mention the foot because you've got room at the top of the frame - it's a great reason why I use a non center point as my focus point - that way when you're focusing on head or chest you have less chance of cutting off feet.

shot 14 - nice action. Crop moe of 78 out - he's way too distracting. Also something to consider - you're maintaining the highlights in the jerseys in all these shots but at the expense of faces in the helmets. My personal preference is to expose more for the faces even at the expense of blowing highlights. That's tougher with a lot of dark skin tones in bright light but you might want to consider cheating your exposure a bit more to the right.

shot 15 - nice action but again framing is a problem. The story here is the defender - but you've got 1/2 the frame filled with a useless lineman on the left. And again - faces are more interesting than backs. So if you're shooting from behind the quarterback like this - the defender is going to be the better story. Think about this shot without the lineman on the left and with the facial features of the defender visible. Those are things YOU the photographer can control.

shot 16 - no ball and from the back. It's a sharp image but not compelling or interesting in any way except for the fact that it's sharp.

Keep it up - you're getting better every time out!

BCSPhotoguy

From someone who isnt a Football fan - i like these! made me feel like i was there. Something about 7 & 17 I am really diggin... Not sure what it is though!!

Sounds like you got some great advice above - Cant wait to see more !!! Keep it up with the crowd shots!! They make the whole 'story' complete!

Are these done with the 70-200 & 1.7x? Nice n' sharp!!

One thing - whats with the hand gestures? Gotta ask!

David Evertsen

Russ, I really enjoying viewing your shots you have a great eye and they look great!! Congrats on a job well done.

johng wrote:

shot 12 - great action and nice and sharp. But image is crooked and you've cut off a foot. I mention the foot because you've got room at the top of the frame - it's a great reason why I use a non center point as my focus point - that way when you're focusing on head or chest you have less chance of cutting off feet.

John, I have a question for you based on your critique of shot 12. I use the top and bottom focus point sometimes during Dance shots and the bottom every once in a while for Football for kickoffs and such. I can see the reasoning for using non center what points do you use and do you have any examples we could look at??

johng

David Evertsen wrote:

I can see the reasoning for using non center what points do you use and do you have any examples we could look at??

First, my preference is to shoot portrait orientation for about 95% of my action shots in football. But which focus point to use depends entirely on the camera you have and the focus point array. I shoot with a canon 1dmkIII and at least in that camera all 19 points I can select from have the same capability. In Canon that's not true of the cameras below the 1d. Even the new 7d - all 19 selectable points are cross-type but only the center point has the high precision (more accurate with f2.8 lenses). In the Canon 9-point arrays I don't like the positioning of the non-center points in portrait orientation. Russ's cameras have nikon's 51 point array so he can select a non-center point that is in a good position in the frame. I don't know enough about Nikon's focus system to know if there is a difference in quality between non-center and center focus point.

Here are a couple football shots illustrating the portrait framing. Some cropping has been done but you'll notice there's space at the bottom of the frame in each:

johng

by the way - shoot tight portrait style and you can get some great landscape crops:

tjstrider

liked most
I really liked the majority of the shots except the #18. 18 represents over contrast/saturation in my opinion. It looks over processed, and it is a temptation to keep sliding up the contrast and the saturation in post or in camera but it is a slider not a 1,0 input so find a better place that exemplifies the person better.

I think that this could be applied to many of the shots as, too much contrast affects the out of focus quality of many of the pictures.

nipprdog

johng wrote:

First, my preference is to shoot portrait orientation for about 95% of my action shots in football. But which focus point to use depends entirely on the camera you have and the focus point array.

Agreed. Landscape is good for most MX, but...........

I shoot my football with D300, 300 2.8 with 1.4 (no 1.4 on flag football, short field )

I, too, use one of the focus points above center.

Russ, if this is the only football you plan to shoot, don't try to convince your wife you need to spend $2500-5000 for a used/new 300 2.8. Look for a used 300F4. Either AF, or AFS. Three years ago, I bought a used AF model for $500. It served me well for a year on my D200. I didn't use it much after buying my 300 2.8(used). But, when the 300 2.8 was being serviced for a couple weeks, that 300F4 AF worked very well on my D300, during the softball tourneys;



It will give just a little more reach than the 70-200, 1.7 combo, but, it will give you much better IQ.

Erbeman

johng wrote:

Russ,
Some definite improvement. For only your second season shooting football you're definitely getting better.
1, 2, 7, 10 & 19 are all strong non-action shots. Good job capturing some of the atmosphere.

shot 5 - nice action. This is the type of shot that will really improve when you get a longer lens and don't have to crop down this much.

shot 6 - love the concept. Would be stronger if the receiver were in focus instead of the quarterback - faces are more interesting than backs.

shot 8 - perfect example of the problems with landscape oriented shooting. Cut off part of the player, missing the ball in the frame and uninteresting dead space to the left. Just think about it - everything about a pass reception screams vertical. Shoot it that way and you'll improve on all the above issues.

shot 9 - great shot. Nice & tight, good sharpness, good color and good action.

shot 12 - great action and nice and sharp. But image is crooked and you've cut off a foot. I mention the foot because you've got room at the top of the frame - it's a great reason why I use a non center point as my focus point - that way when you're focusing on head or chest you have less chance of cutting off feet.

shot 14 - nice action. Crop moe of 78 out - he's way too distracting. Also something to consider - you're maintaining the highlights in the jerseys in all these shots but at the expense of faces in the helmets. My personal preference is to expose more for the faces even at the expense of blowing highlights. That's tougher with a lot of dark skin tones in bright light but you might want to consider cheating your exposure a bit more to the right.

shot 15 - nice action but again framing is a problem. The story here is the defender - but you've got 1/2 the frame filled with a useless lineman on the left. And again - faces are more interesting than backs. So if you're shooting from behind the quarterback like this - the defender is going to be the better story. Think about this shot without the lineman on the left and with the facial features of the defender visible. Those are things YOU the photographer can control.

shot 16 - no ball and from the back. It's a sharp image but not compelling or interesting in any way except for the fact that it's sharp.

Keep it up - you're getting better every time out!

Wow, another great critique! I'll keep it up if you'll keep it up. Haha, thanks for all of your help brother. I'm continually learning how to shoot this game and you've been a big part of that.

Erbeman

BCSPhotoguy wrote:

From someone who isnt a Football fan - i like these! made me feel like i was there. Something about 7 & 17 I am really diggin... Not sure what it is though!!

Sounds like you got some great advice above - Cant wait to see more !!! Keep it up with the crowd shots!! They make the whole 'story' complete!

Are these done with the 70-200 & 1.7x? Nice n' sharp!!

One thing - whats with the hand gestures? Gotta ask!

Thanks Brennan. Yes, I used my D300 which has a crop sensot with my 1.7x and 70-200. It gets me in there nicely but it is a bit slow to focus and not as sharp as without the 1.7x, but still fairly good. I also carry my D700 with a 35-70 lens for my up-close non-action shots.

The hands gestures, they are putting their "guns up." We are the Red Raiders, so we have pistols. So, we throw them like gang signs!! Haha

David Evertsen

John,

Thanks again for the lesson, On my 50D they focus points top and bottom center are too low/high for portrait on some shots but I can definitely see the reason using them on others. I would really like them to be midway between my and edges center. Looking forward to trying them out on some soccer this week..

Erbeman

tjstrider wrote:

I really liked the majority of the shots except the #18. 18 represents over contrast/saturation in my opinion. It looks over processed, and it is a temptation to keep sliding up the contrast and the saturation in post or in camera but it is a slider not a 1,0 input so find a better place that exemplifies the person better.

I think that this could be applied to many of the shots as, too much contrast affects the out of focus quality of many of the pictures.

Thanks for your input brother. However, your eyes are playing tricks on you because I don't touch the contrast slider in post-ever. I batch all of my shots with Auto contrast. I then open each pic up , crop if needed, unsharp mask, and depending on if it needs it or not, I give it a hint of shadows adjustment to expose the faces a bit more and that it. I don't over post. I don't like seeing other photogs do it either, when a photo looks fake, I loose interest. The shot you are refering to is simply warm. It's warm because the sun was going down. It was getting darker and the sun's light wasn't as harsh any more.

I have my camera set up to shoot in Vivid, which bumps the saturation a bit, but I generally don't add anything to that.

Here is the pic taken straight from the card with no PP followed by the pic that I posted after PP. There is hardly any difference at all.

Erbeman

nipprdog wrote:

Agreed. Landscape is good for most MX, but...........

I shoot my football with D300, 300 2.8 with 1.4 (no 1.4 on flag football, short field )

I, too, use one of the focus points above center.

Russ, if this is the only football you plan to shoot, don't try to convince your wife you need to spend $2500-5000 for a used/new 300 2.8. Look for a used 300F4. Either AF, or AFS. Three years ago, I bought a used AF model for $500. It served me well for a year on my D200. I didn't use it much after buying my 300 2.8(used). But, when the 300 2.8 was being serviced for a couple weeks, that 300F4 AF worked very well on my D300, during the softball tourneys;



It will give just a little more reach than the 70-200, 1.7 combo, but, it will give you much better IQ.

I want to keep climbing the ladder of sports photgraphy, so a 300 2.8 is pretty much a must. I've already convinced her anyway. It's going to be an early birthday present. I appreciate the advise for sure though. Thanks

SoonerShawn

Very nice work! I struggle alot with getting my shots a little tilted from time to time also, like was mentioned in shot 12. Especially when shooting football for some reason. Anyway, loved the pics. Look forward to seeing some from when your Raiders play my poor Sooners.

Erbeman

SoonerShawn wrote:

Very nice work! I struggle alot with getting my shots a little tilted from time to time also, like was mentioned in shot 12. Especially when shooting football for some reason. Anyway, loved the pics. Look forward to seeing some from when your Raiders play my poor Sooners.

Thx, I saw OU suffered a terrible loss on Saturday. Very surprising. My wife and I just laughed. I grew up in Tulsa, OK and was the biggest OU an until recently. My wife has a PhD in Physical Therapy and OU only offers a Masters Degree in PT. Well, a few years ago David Boren contacts my wife and starts wooing her to come to work for OU to start up a PhD program. She went and met with him, Bob Stoops, and several others and showed her stuff. They offered her a sweet deal, big money, car, house, free education for myself and our 3 kids, etc.. The only stipulation was that we had to wait a year to get funding. So, we waited and waited. The year came and went without a peep from OU. My wife finally called David Boren and he said that the Board had put a freeze on all new hires because of some funding issues. So, nobody could be hired and they sure couldn't afford to give her all they promised. David asked us to just wait it out. A few weeks later I read an article on ESPN talking about OU approving big time raises for all of their coaches. The raises added together just for the initial year were for a million dollars!!! My wife called David and was like WTH!!!!!! He had no good excuse as to why they could afford to give a million in raises but couldn't afford to hire more professors. So, my wife told them to go to hell because she didn't want anything to do with a college that would put sports ahead of education and she sure didn't want our kids going there. It was a terrible blow to my wife and to me becuase of how much I had loved OU. I turned against them that day. Took all the OU stuff off of my car, took down all of my OU memorabilia, and just tried to forget all about OU.

Since then my wife has been offered her dream job working for St.Judes hospital. We are still having to wait for the economy to turn around so they can afford to start what she will be running, but they gave us a contract with a hire date and if she isn't employed by then by St.Judes, they pay her a large sum of money and sign another contract with another date. So, things have worked out great for us and karma has come back to bite OU where the sun don't shine, so to speak. So, we are really looking forward to OU coming to Tech this year and hopefully we'll put it on them like they did us last year at their house.

tjstrider

that's fine
Then I will amend my comment... get that girl out of the tanning booth. There is far too much skin cancer in the world today to do that...

Erbeman wrote:

Thanks for your input brother. However, your eyes are playing tricks on you because I don't touch the contrast slider in post-ever. I batch all of my shots with Auto contrast. I then open each pic up , crop if needed, unsharp mask, and depending on if it needs it or not, I give it a hint of shadows adjustment to expose the faces a bit more and that it. I don't over post. I don't like seeing other photogs do it either, when a photo looks fake, I loose interest. The shot you are refering to is simply warm. It's warm because the sun was going down. It was getting darker and the sun's light wasn't as harsh any more.

I have my camera set up to shoot in Vivid, which bumps the saturation a bit, but I generally don't add anything to that.

Here is the pic taken straight from the card with no PP followed by the pic that I posted after PP. There is hardly any difference at all.

nipprdog

Erbeman wrote:

I have my camera set up to shoot in Vivid,

Russ, Vivid is fine for colorful motocross bikes, but when spooting sports with skin, and faces, it should not be used. Vivid doesn't do well with skin tones, in most shots. If you want a little more saturation, you should try turning the Vivid off, and then a +1 on the in camera saturation setting.

Erbeman

nipprdog wrote:

Russ, Vivid is fine for colorful motocross bikes, but when spooting sports with skin, and faces, it should not be used. Vivid doesn't do well with skin tones, in most shots. If you want a little more saturation, you should try turning the Vivid off, and then a +1 on the in camera saturation setting.

Thx for the advise brother.

Onrey

Russ, some good shots! Keep at it, lovin those Cheerleader shots
Get me some good OU shots ya hear!

Erbeman

Onrey wrote:

Russ, some good shots! Keep at it, lovin those Cheerleader shots
Get me some good OU shots ya hear!

Will do brother. I got word last night that the OU game will be a day game so, that will be good.