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CFA Football Game
anonymouscuban
Registered Users, Retired Mod Posts: 4,586 Major grins
I had the opportunity to shoot a CFA (California Football Alliance) league football game.
OK... so first of all, I want to go on record with the fact I have never shot a sports event. Ever. I was kind of out of my comfort zone with this. I shoot other stuff so I know my way around a camera but this was very different than the static stuff I shoot so please keep that in mind when viewing these.
I'm posting these in hopes that you guys that shoot this stuff can help me improve. Overall, I'm pretty happy with what I got but I'd like to improve and there is always room.
Few things about how I approached this from my own intuition, since I have no experience. Maybe you guys can see some mistakes I made in my approach:
BTW, I'm used to thoroughly editing each of my photos in PS. The thought of doing so with this many shots was just ridiculous. I did very minor batch editing on these in LR. WB, slight curve adjust to add contrast and sharpening. I shoot in RAW so I had to do at least that. How do you guys approach editing a large set?
Cut to the chase, here a few random shots. Hopefully not too many:
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OK... so first of all, I want to go on record with the fact I have never shot a sports event. Ever. I was kind of out of my comfort zone with this. I shoot other stuff so I know my way around a camera but this was very different than the static stuff I shoot so please keep that in mind when viewing these.
I'm posting these in hopes that you guys that shoot this stuff can help me improve. Overall, I'm pretty happy with what I got but I'd like to improve and there is always room.
Few things about how I approached this from my own intuition, since I have no experience. Maybe you guys can see some mistakes I made in my approach:
- The game was at high noon and there was absolutely no cloud cover. I knew lighting, especially since the uniforms were white vs. black, was going to be rough. I went with matrix metering since spot or center weighted would have metered mostly for the white uniform. I'm not too disappointed with how they turned out from that respect.
- I shot in Aperture priority thinking that I would maintain a fast shutter due to the bright conditions. I mostly shot at f/5.6 or lower to isolate the action. The more static shots were shot at f/2.8. I was just too afraid to miss focus shooting the action that wide open.
- I got myself on the field. I tried to shoot from various heights. Some were shot standing but a lot were shot crouched down or even laying on the ground. I also tried to move around the field as much a possible. I followed the ball and tried to shoot from from different perspectives to add interest.
- I filled the frame as much as possible. Tried to really get in tight to capture the action. I struggled at times with how far in to zoom where I wasn't losing the action going on around the player with the ball.
- I shot A LOT of pics. WOW. I think I filled a 16g card. I culled some, mostly boring or OOF shots but I still ended up with 500+ shots. I started to get a feel of what to shoot and what not by the 2nd half. I think I will get a bit more discriminate with experience.
BTW, I'm used to thoroughly editing each of my photos in PS. The thought of doing so with this many shots was just ridiculous. I did very minor batch editing on these in LR. WB, slight curve adjust to add contrast and sharpening. I shoot in RAW so I had to do at least that. How do you guys approach editing a large set?
Cut to the chase, here a few random shots. Hopefully not too many:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
"I'm not yelling. I'm Cuban. That's how we talk."
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Comments
For me the only ones in this group i would have kept are 3,5, and 6. Maybe some of the setup shots like the kickoff I would have kept. And you need to crop tighter on those so just the ball carrier and tackler are in focus.
Shooting low to the ground works every time. Most photographers are lazy and shoot while standing.
2.8 is your friend, Don't leave that setting.
Meter off the faces and then get in manual mode. Anything other that will give you wild shutterspeeds as the dark and white jerseys will throw off the camera metering.
When culling photos, try not to do it while shooting. I have had some keepers after looking on a larger screen. Start looking at good sports photography and notice what looks good. Face contact and action in front of the camera is key. Backs turned to camera are not good.
Lightroom is your friend for globally adjusting photos. At the end of exporting the photos you can have Lightroom set up so that the photos are opened in Photoshop for any final tweaks.
Strive to get one or any combination of these three things in the photo. Ball, Faces, Action.
From my perspective the action is either the kicker and ball, ball carrier and tackler or the blocking by various players (usually only two players). I have very little interest in getting shots of players away from those three scenarios during the play of the game. After that I look for portrait style shots.
If the prime subject of the photo is not in focus it is trash.
Use a single point for focusing. Do not let your camera decide what it thinks the proper focus is for the photo. Using single point and f4 or wider you should be able to get the players in focus in the above three scenarios, the depth of field will be sufficient in a majority of the shots unless the players are to close and you should then be trying to get out of the way anyhow. If the player or subjects are not in focus there are at least a couple of reasons for that to happen. The first being poor technique in holding the focus point on the subject. The second would be not understanding the cameras setting and how those settings pertain to your technique or what you want in focus.
Avoid photos where there is an out of focus person in the fore ground.
Know the limitations of your focal length and because of that what type of picture you can get. For action shots shoot tight crop tighter.
As for the following critiques some of them will be subjective based on what I would have tried to do.
1 Out of focus. Delete
2 Near player out of focus, the shot will be a little later with the players in contact on the line. Delete
3 The shot is the ball carrier and tackler, crop out everything else.
4 The south end of a north bound player is not very attractive. Delete
5 Crop down to the ball carrier.
6 Crop down to ball carrier and tackler.
7 Crop out the dead space on the left.
8 Another backside. Delete
9 The shot will be a little later when the defender is in contact.
10 If shot vertically and with proper technique using only the center point for focusing you would have
gotten all of the ball carrier.
11 Should have been at 200mm and vertical with center point focus on ball carrier.
12 Focal length limited.
13 Focal Length limited.
Some of the shots you guys don't like, I do. I guess they may not appeal based strictly as sports shots. I guess I'm used to shooting more creatively. I guess I have to leave my creative hat at home when shooting sports.
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Do you have a site where I can check out some of your work? I searched for threads with some of your pics but I don't seem to find any.
I'm a visual kind of learner so seeing some shots with good technique would be very helpful. The ones posted by John are awesome and very helpful.
Thanks,
- Alex
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John68 nailed it in his critique and pipster provided good feedback. there are two mantras in sports:
1) shoot tight, crop tighter
2) face, ball (puck), action, emotion
There is nothing wrong about being creative, but who's is the photo for? Pro sports shooter aim either for a cover or a double trunk or parents with deep pockets since you have to capture something that the parents can not.
You don't always have to shoot by the rules, but the images must stand by themselves.
1) This is a wide shot, has no puck in the frame and isn't of any action, but it tells a story; it's the juxtaposition of the the joy of winning and the pain of losing.
2) Wide shot; super wide! (fishy). The frames has no players on the ice, no pucks, and the game didnt' even start yet, but people find it interesting because it's a different perspective than usual
3) I went super close. This worked for some and didn't work for many others. This photo was significant for certain hockey fans since it was the first day dany heatley was in a Shark's jersey; the very first day that he wore the Shark's Teal.
This is a great blog post from Donald Miralle about his iron man frame.
Sports photos doesn't have to be cookie cutter images, but they must have some express something about point in time and hold the viewer's attention. A good sports image is more than just a pretty image or something in focus. It's about editing to show a a moment in time.
Like I said, this was my first time and I may end up shooting more of these games so all the information provided so far from you guys will certain help improve my shots.
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1. Shooting JPEG: I know that many people swear by this for sports shooting, but I don't get it. I shoot pro sports all the time--submitting live and on deadline--and I always shoot RAW. Recently I have been using a dual formula with RAW going to one card and JPG to another (and then wirelessly to my laptop), but mostly I end up using the RAW shots. Memory is cheap, editing is easy, and it's just a few minutes of time to convert to JPEG (assuming one only converts the keepers). Of course, if you are printing and selling on site, I can see why JPEG is the way to go.
2. Shooting for the parents and media: There is a certain style and formula that sells; and if this is your goal, fine. Still, even on assignment I play around with new angles and ideas, while making sure I get the required set to submit to my media outlets. Rules and guidelines are great, but don't be too bound by them.
+1
The RAW vs JPEG always gets people going. I almost never shoot JPEG. Yes the files are bigger and take some tweaking but they allow you more flexibility especially in tough lighting conditions. The rest of the advice above is like a masters class, flow it carefully. I would emphasize 1) shoot manual, meter for the faces. Slightly blown out uniforms are not that big a deal. 2) One i just recently started is shooting low on cloudy days( where the sky is ugly) shooting ultra low in mid day sun. sometimes getting some great blue in the background. The best piece of advice i ever got about sports shooting was " get it right in the camera, dont depend on PP for help". I know this not always ideal but it forces you to improve your on field technique.
I went to your site, love your stills!
If you're shooting in great light and your exposure is spot on, there is no benefit. If your highlights are slightly blown--e.g. with white uniforms--I find it easier to recover them with RAW files. A more common issue is WB under stadium lights. And in my experience, the WB is a function of position on the field as well. For example, at AT&T Park, where I shoot the Giants, the WB at home plate is actually a good bit different than the pitcher's mound; and yet still different from the outfield. Part of this has to do with reflected light off the ground, which at the plate orange shifts the colors. Since I shoot night games at ISO 2000 or higher--depending on what I am trying to capture--I am finding that the jpeg shots do not look as good as th RAW files when color corrected. Of course, maybe I am not so skilled with shooting jpegs since I am new to it.
The only added part in my workflow is the conversion of my take before submission; a few minute procedure done right before FTPing them off. For me anyway, this is a small price to pay for the added flexibility in editing.
Sometimes I take pictures for friends, and they don't really care if the pictures are from the back, especially if they are tackling someone and just want it on facebook. I took one picture of a guy from the back and his face is just in profile, and it's his facebook profile picture. I almost threw it away.
Or if I'm shooting for a magazine, then it's all paired action or shooting or scoring and closer is better as long as all the action is in the frame and in focus.
But I shoot jpeg and process everything in photoshop in batches of 120 pictures at a time (about my attention span). Sports Illustrated only takes jpgs. But ad people prefer RAW so, depends on who wants your pictures.
It works best if you get the settings right in the camera and don't have to fix a bunch of stuff (often unavoidable). In harsh light with white and black jerseys, pretty much it works best to go full manual and meter for faces.
I know you take awesome pictures of people standing still (I suck at those, wish I was better). I think everything just takes practice.
Go take more pictures!
:-)
Anna
Land sports: http://scippix.smugmug.com/
Try to get all four in a photo, not easy to do, but when you do you will likely have a winner.
Face and action are obvious.
Contact could be players colliding with each other, or a bat contacting a ball, etc.
Toy - ball, bat, stick, puck, etc.
Phil
"You don't take a photograph, you make it." ~Ansel Adams
Phil
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