U13 Soccer

silvio000

Last weekend i had another chance of shooting another youth soccer game.

This was just for fun and to learn some more about sports shooting. I followed some tips from you guys, and i am pretty pleased with the results.

What i found harder was to beeing able to focus correctly and to frame the ball, faces and action.
I tried to get at least 2 of those conditions in the frame and focused but it was harder than i expected.

I was shooting in continuous mode with 51 points and manual for adjustments (since i use the backbutton focus). What setting do you think is easier? 3d tracking? i tried 3d tracking for a couple of minutes but i was missing even more shots.

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Tell me what can i do to improve.

regards,

Sílvio Oliveira

johng

Silvio,
Here is some feedback since you asked for it. First of all, your exposures are good and sharpness is good. Now is where things start to get a bit more difficult.
Shot 1: doesn't work - no ball. there is nothing compelling enough about the faces to make this shot work without it being full body and showing the ball.
shot 2: too much dead space at the top of the frame with the ball too far away.
shot 3: same as shot 2. There's not any compelling action in the shot here and the ball is too far away to be of much interest. Whether or not a shot with the ball away works well depends on the rest of the image - facial expressions, body positions etc.
shot 4: no ball. This is a potentially great shot but you need the ball to make it work.
shot 5: doesn't work. Too far after the action.
shot 6: way too much dead space. The story is the scrum of players in front of the net before the shot. All that dead space to the left and top of the frame detracts. You need the final shot framed tighter so you can see expressions better. The striker and 'scrum' should fill a much larger portion of the frame. If there is enough detail left after the crop, that would be a great shot.
shot 7: too much dead space and shot is at a very awkward body position. You want a shot that either has great action or if it's a standard isolation shot - shows the athlete in a good position. This is a bad body position so the shot doesn't work well.
shot 8: nothing interesting here
shot 9: Better than #7 - framing is tighter and body position is a bit better. It still tends to look better with leg extended rather than drawn back - usually just at or after contact.
shot 10: wrong angle. Faces are important - not backs. This is a great angle to focus on the striker with the goal tender out of focus. But if you want the focus to be on the goal tender it works better from the front side so you can see the face with the OOF striker in the foreground. Having both players in the frame is great context but a face tells a better story than the back of a head.

The above sounds harsh, but you're an adult so you don't need to be hand held. For only shooting a couple times, you're doing very well. You're keeping exposures well controlled and sticking with focused shots. That's good. Now you have to get past the initial excitement of every in-focus shot being a keeper. With each time out, you'll get better at timing the shots closer to the action occurring. When shooting common action / isolation, pay more attention to body position when culling your shots afterward. That's why burst rate is so important in sports. Not so you can take 10 shots in sequence but so you can take 3 or so and select the one with the best expressions/body positions. While you can anticipate peek action to some extent it is still good to have 3 well timed shots to select from. Keep at it. You'll get better each time out.

silvio000

Many thanks John, this is why i keep coming to dgrin. This kind of critique is exactly what i need to improve.
Many many thanks for taking the time. I will make adjustments to the ones i have and will remember your words next time. Man, can't wayt for the next time now. :-)

Cheers, Sílvio

Mitchell

John gave you some great advice.

I shoot a lot of youth soccer. Typically I shoot in continuous focus mode with a single point that I place onto my target's chest. I use the AF-On button (Nikon) which I hold down to track the focus and then use the shutter release only for taking the photo.

Many of these need to be closer and cropped tighter. Facial expressions will always make these sport photos more engaging.

Watch your backgrounds. Lots of clutter in these which is distracting but may be unavoidable. I tend to shoot wide open to try and get as much background separation as possible.

I like your angle on these. I try to shoot from low down (kneeling) looking a bit up at these young players. They look larger and more dramatic.

silvio000

Thanks Mitch, glad to know we are using the same tricks, as to focusing and kneeling, altough with very different results ;-) but i'll get there ...

As to cropping i will see what i can do with the shots i have. I was also shooting wide open, but the lens is a f 3.5 Sigma 180mm that gave me around f5 at this distance. Not the best lens for sports shooting, but it's what i've got for now.
I was also shooting behind the fence and with my 3 year old daughter grabbing my leg, so i missed some shots because of that, but that's no excuse. At least it was only a light rain ;-)

Cheers,
Sílvio

Mitchell

I love shooting soccer in the rain!!

silvio000

So, i tried some croping and some detail is lost but i believe they are better than my first edit.

What do you say?

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Cheers,

Sílvio Oliveira

jhefti

Definitely a huge improvement with the closer crops; much nicer!

You've got some great advice above. I'll just emphasize one point and add another:

1. Not every in-focus nicely exposed shot is a keeper: I know that when I started shooting sports I was thrilled when a shot was correctly exposed and in focus. I tended to keep them all. Over time though, I got better at discarding shots and making the set of photos tell a story without being boring or redundant. It takes practice; and even after shooting professional sports for a number of years, I still have to remind myself that it's ok to delete a good photo.

2. AF choices: I've never had good luck with anything other than using a single AF point in servo mode. Never. Even AF expansion mode doesn't work as well for me. In the latter, I get fewer totally OOF shots, but way too many soft shots. I try to keep the AF point on the face--especially when shooting at f/2.8 with the subject nearly filling the frame. The jersey is the next best target, and should work fairly well at f/3.5.

I know that using a single AF point in a fast game takes practice. What I did to hone my skills is shoot birds in flight using a single AF point; the more erratic the flight, the better. After many hours of doing this, even professional soccer players were fairly easy to track.

Keep on shooting!