Stupid gym lights?

JohnBiggsJohnBiggs Registered Users Posts: 841 Major grins
edited May 18, 2010 in Technique
I don't shoot many sports and definitely not much indoors. So while shooting a jump rope demonstration I had my shutter speed as high as I could get it (500-1000). However when I got home I noticed several pictures had a color shift right through them. Almost looked like my shutter was going bad.

Is there a in camera solution to this? I assume it's a high frequency colorshift in the gym lights that the fast shutter is capturing. I guess I can try to PP it out, but that's more work than I care to do for these types of photos.
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Comments

  • pathfinderpathfinder Super Moderators Posts: 14,708 moderator
    edited May 12, 2010
    John, I rarely shoot sports also, but I experienced this shooting the gym portions of the Special Olympics on the Indiana State University campus.

    The flourescent lights color temp fluctuates as they cycle through a full sequence. To get a full, consistent color spectrum from them, requires using a shutter speed slow enough to capture a whole sequence - less than 1/125 or so if memory serves. Maybe 1/160th. But no faster than that.

    1/60th is even better. Even then, you may have some difficulty with flourescent light color balance. Somewhere here on dgrin is a better, more scientific answer than the one I have given here, but it says about the same thing I think.

    I'm with Joe McNally about fluorescent lights - the best filter is the electrical switch on the wall. And they are everywhere - tungsten lights are being replaced by fluorescent lights everywhere, even including your own home.
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  • JohnBiggsJohnBiggs Registered Users Posts: 841 Major grins
    edited May 13, 2010
    pathfinder wrote: »
    John, I rarely shoot sports also, but I experienced this shooting the gym portions of the Special Olympics on the Indiana State University campus.

    The flourescent lights color temp fluctuates as they cycle through a full sequence. To get a full, consistent color spectrum from them, requires using a shutter speed slow enough to capture a whole sequence - less than 1/125 or so if memory serves. Maybe 1/160th. But no faster than that.

    1/60th is even better. Even then, you may have some difficulty with flourescent light color balance. Somewhere here on dgrin is a better, more scientific answer than the one I have given here, but it says about the same thing I think.

    I'm with Joe McNally about fluorescent lights - the best filter is the electrical switch on the wall. And they are everywhere - tungsten lights are being replaced by fluorescent lights everywhere, even including your own home.

    Ohh the dilemmas. Shoot at 1/125 for jumprope just sounds like lots of blur.

    With the color shift I have quite a few images that caught the light in a good spot in the cycle and are acceptable. There is probably no real solution.... Other than shoot black and white.
    Canon Gear: 5D MkII, 30D, 85 1.2 L, 70-200 2.8 IS L, 17-40mm f4 L, 50 1.4, 580EX, 2x 580EXII, Canon 1.4x TC, 300 f4 IS L, 100mm 2.8 Macro, 100-400 IS L
    Other Gear: Olympus E-PL1, Pan 20 1.7, Fuji 3D Camera, Lensbaby 2.0, Tamron 28-75 2.8, Alien Bees lighting, CyberSyncs, Domke, HONL, FlipIt.
    ~ Gear Pictures
  • GadgetRickGadgetRick Registered Users Posts: 787 Major grins
    edited May 13, 2010
    JohnBiggs wrote: »
    Ohh the dilemmas. Shoot at 1/125 for jumprope just sounds like lots of blur.

    With the color shift I have quite a few images that caught the light in a good spot in the cycle and are acceptable. There is probably no real solution.... Other than shoot black and white.

    Shoot with flash...
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  • SnowgirlSnowgirl Registered Users Posts: 2,155 Major grins
    edited May 18, 2010
    GadgetRick wrote: »
    Shoot with flash...

    Depends on the sport. Many don't allow flash.
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  • GadgetRickGadgetRick Registered Users Posts: 787 Major grins
    edited May 18, 2010
    Snowgirl wrote: »
    Depends on the sport. Many don't allow flash.

    Honestly, I've not run into a sport which doesn't allow it. Although I've not shot tennis or anything like that but just about anything inside will allow it.
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