A litte Junior College B-ball

Steve Cavigliano · January 6, 2005

A few from Wednesday night. I went and watched my son's team play. I finally figured out how to set a Custom WB so I didn't have to process RAW's this time around :lol I'm so proud....lol Had something pretty amazing happen too. I saw an old friend I had worked with for about 10 years, outside the game. I hadn't seen him in about 6 years. Come to find out, he's the father of my son's coach :doh

ISO1600 using the 85mm F1.8

Steve

Andy · January 6, 2005

sweet indoor action!

see you next week. looks like i can get up to the city on thursday, meet 2:30pm at alternate spot, north of our usual. call me early next week ok?

wxwax · January 6, 2005

Nice action in the second and third shots. And a very nice job with the white balance, congratulations. What did you use for the WB, a gray card?

Ann McRae · January 6, 2005

Hey Steve - great color - I learned that having the right white balance sure helps with the color rendition of the shot.

Great job. Keep it up, and keep us up to date.

ann

Steve Cavigliano · January 6, 2005

andy wrote:

sweet indoor action!

see you next week. looks like i can get up to the city on thursday, meet 2:30pm at alternate spot, north of our usual. call me early next week ok?

Andy,
Thanks

Will do. Got you in my calander for a Tuesday afternoon call. A 2:30 liftoff would be great, some light and some night shots of the City

Hopefully, the weather will cooperate.

Steve Cavigliano · January 6, 2005

wxwax wrote:

Nice action in the second and third shots. And a very nice job with the white balance, congratulations. What did you use for the WB, a gray card?

Thanks Sid

Yeah, the 3rd time is a charm. This gym has sodium vapor lighting and the first game I just used RAW and didn't even try to get close temp-wise with the jpgs. The next game I used the K (set your own temp) wb, set to it's minimum 2500K. That helped the jpgs a bit, but the images were still pretty yellow. Last night (the 3rd game I've been to) I brought the old gray card and used Custom wb. It got me really close (2050K, -2 tint). So I was finally able to just use the jpgs, taken using Parameter 1, with minor tweaking. I used to have to use that gray card all the time with my older Sony's. Haven't used it in awhile, but it worked very well

Plus, now I know how to use almost all of the 20D's wb settings

Thanks for looking,
Steve

Steve Cavigliano · January 6, 2005

Ann McRae wrote:

Hey Steve - great color - I learned that having the right white balance sure helps with the color rendition of the shot.

Great job. Keep it up, and keep us up to date.

ann

Thanks Ann

You are so right about the correct wb being important on these type shots. I knew wb was important from my Sony indoor sports experience, but as you'll see in my response to Sid, I took a little journey to get there....lol Good thing that I was finally successful. I sure was getting tired of converting RAWs. My workflow was taking 3 times longer, per pic, than it should. With 40-60 keepers per shoot, that was really eating into my time.

If you ever find that F2 zoom, let me know....lol When the subject is in the near side of the court, I have to go to the top of the bleachers to get him all in the frame. When the subject is in the farside, I have to go down to courtside, to make him/them larger. Shooting at the other end of the court from where I am sitting, is easier. In that case they're all small...lol A 50-125mm F2 would be worth at least $1000 to me. I'm not holding my breath waiting for Canon to announce one....lol

Thanks for looking,
Steve

mercphoto · January 6, 2005

Cool!

Steve Cavigliano wrote:

ISO1600 using the 85mm F1.8

I want one of these lenses now.

Were you shooting wide-open? Would a 50 prime have been any better? (you mentioned how often you had to climb the bleachers to get everyone in-frame).

Steve Cavigliano · January 6, 2005

mercphoto wrote:

I want one of these lenses now. Were you shooting wide-open? Would a 50 prime have been any better? (you mentioned how often you had to climb the bleachers to get everyone in-frame).

Thanks Bill

I was between F2 and F2.5. Mostly at F2.2. Which is pretty wide open. As far as the 50mm being better, if the players are close to you, yes it would be, but if they are across the court (not at the other end, just across from where you are sitting) it wouldn't be as good as the 85mm. I'm not so sure the 50mm focuses any faster than this sweet lens. I may grouse about having to zoom with my feet, but this lens is awesome for low light action (not to mention how sweet it is for portraits). All in all, it's probably the best indoor basketball, soccer, hockey and volleyball lens available for Canon cameras.

Thanks for looking,
Steve

Mongrel · January 7, 2005

Just wanted to say...
those are some really well done BB shots. I've tried it a few times but was too lazy to work out the WB. As your shots prove, WB is essential in getting a decent shot from the typical middle or high school gym. Not to mention all the other good qualities of the shots

You have given me the inspiration to sort out the 20D's WB for sure. I've shot only one game this season with that same setup (20D and 85 f/1.8), so I know there is hope-lol.

Thanks for sharing these.

Tony

Steve Cavigliano · January 7, 2005

Mongrel wrote:

those are some really well done BB shots. I've tried it a few times but was too lazy to work out the WB. As your shots prove, WB is essential in getting a decent shot from the typical middle or high school gym. Not to mention all the other good qualities of the shots

You have given me the inspiration to sort out the 20D's WB for sure. I've shot only one game this season with that same setup (20D and 85 f/1.8), so I know there is hope-lol.

Thanks for sharing these.

Tony

Thanks Tony

I hope you get results you're happy with and I hope you enjoy shooting low light action as much as I am. You've sure got the right camera and lens combo for it

This Junior College gym, isn't lit all that well, but compared to the high school and middle school gyms I used to shoot my 717 in, it's a stop or so better. If you can't get the exact wb, you can always shoot in RAW and adjust the wb during conversion. RAW also helps if you need to under expose to get fast speeds. But as I mentioned in an earlier post, this sure adds time to post processing.

Good luck and thanks for looking,
Steve

A litte Junior College B-ball

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