The rodeo
PHOTOMAYBE
Registered Users Posts: 60 Big grins
Well instead of Dressage it was more like barrel racing and such,but a good time was had by myself.The camera and lens felt proper to me and I set it at at ISO and shutter speed .Isaw as the light diminished ,just as ziggy said the auto focus had difficulties locking in to it's proper focal length.I have to download all the discs into my computer tomorrow and will then post shots.
I have so much to learn,but I will.....
I have so much to learn,but I will.....
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There is another event next week so I will be there to shoot.
The camera did it's job that is for sure,not a glitch.I was the glitch.
First, daytime is best unless it is a serious pro arena (in which case they probably won't let you shoot anyway), as lighting tends to be terrible. Not only is it too dim, they often use mercury vapor lights (which are cheap) which flicker, so you can shoot two consecutive shots at the same spot and one will be orange and one green, or they will differ by a stop or more.
Secondly, if shooting under lights, unless they are way up high, shoot with a lens hood and try to get some elevation. When shooting in really poor light, you will not notice it in the view finder, but lights just out of the frame give you very bad glow/flare in the top/corners of your image.
Shoot raw. Always.
Faces always sell, but for riders they like the horse also. Good tight crops on the whole horse (and rider) as they are performing - jumps, turns around barrels (get the dirt flying), gallop, etc. This is where a fast burst rate helps, as if I get 10 shots of a running horse maybe 2 of them have a good leg position combined with a complementary rider position, eyes open, etc.
You've got to keep the shutter speed up UNLESS you are trying for a blurred motion shot on purpose (example below). I must throw away 20 of those, or more, for everyone I keep. You have to pan with the horse, but get lucky to get the rider when they aren't moving up/down so their face is sharp. That was 1/60th at F2.8, ISO 1000. It's not great, but she mostly has a face that is recognizable; if you want the horse's face also recognizable then shoot a LOT more).
I recommend you shoot in manual mode and let auto-ISO do its thing. Pick a shutter speed (depending on event and lens experiment but start about 1/320th as a bare minimum and as fast as you can get light for), most wide open f-stop (both for light and to blur the background), and let the camera set the ISO. Watch how it sets it, compromise a bit on shutter if you have to (or set a negative exposure compensation and under-expose a bit and fix in post). The second image below was under lights only, no sun, and was down to 1/320th of a second. That's too slow actually, for motion left to right, but by shooting just as she rounds the barrel, the horse is actually moving slower and it works out. Even then, this shot is pretty soft from general motion blur and really needs about twice the shutter speed. But I find that (unintentionally) blurred images look worse than ones with high noise from too high ISO. Plus post processing can help noise, it's pretty hopeless for motion blur.
Final suggestion - get there early and pick the spot. A lot of events tend to be evenings, with setting sun. Get the sun behind you, but also look to see what your background is - try to keep it plain and far enough away you can blur it. Having a lot of close people or horses in focus in the background is bad also. Then look at the course and ask if in doubt which way the horse will be turning - shorts of horses buts are not that interesting. Find one or more compromise spots, and do some test shots so you know how they will frame up in whichever lens(s) you are using and check depth of field and the backgrounds.
I find a 70-200 is a good bet most places where you can be up at the ring, rarely is action too close for 70 (on full frame, but probably DX also). But that varies by arena -- I went to one Saturday for bull riding, expecting to be at a distance needing about 400mm, and was almost on top of them. Leaving yourself some time to get the feel for the place will make you more comfortable to think about the shots rather than the position, swapping lenses, etc.
In this shot she's not just touching the barrel, the horse upset it and she grabbed it and is standing it back up, to keep from disqualifying. She did it without even slowing down.