OT: Show off your sports photography...

[CampWest]

For me, its just a personal preference... I almost always shoot in aperture priority whether doing portrait, sport, or landscape.

In portraits, I want to control the depth of field to isolate the subject from the background. For landscape I want to ensure I have enough depth of field to have enough of my subject in focus. For action/sports, like in portraits I want the subject isolated by a large aperture limiting depth of field but also I want the fastest shutter speed available, which will always be at the largest aperture setting for your lens. Larger the aperture = the faster the shutter speed.

I'm more comfortable isolating my desired aperture and letting the shutter speed float. If there isn't enough light to get a fast enough shutter speed to stop the action, say 1/250th or faster, then I leave aperture alone and crank up the ISO until I'm shooting at a fast enough shutter speed to freeze the action.

Also, some lenses have lower image quality at the largest and smallest apertures. At small apertures you get chromatic abberations, at larger apertures you may have less resolution. The sweet spot of nearly every lens is in the f5.6-f8 range. Depending on how good the lens is, the differences in image quality at different apertures may be more or less of an issue - a pro quality lens performs well at all apertures where an entry level lens performs less consistently across the aperture range.

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I've found that using shutter priority mode, can cause big swings in aperture, which for my preference is a bad thing...

As an example picture a day where the sun is moving in and out behind clouds, or even better part of the field is in bright sun and part is in a shadow (I'v taken pictures where everything beyond the mound is sun, but the batters box/home plate is in full shade. If I lock a 1/500th shutter speed I may get an aperture of f13 on a player in the sun which for me is an undesirable aperture... Then I track over to a player in the shade, but I may not have a big enough aperture at that shutter speed resulting in a picture thats underexposed at f4.

If I lock in a f4.5 aperture, I might get a 1/2000th second on the player in the sun and a 1/250th on a player in the shade. Both photos are acceptable, where as in shutter mode neither was acceptable.

Obviously, if lighting is consistent like in a basketball court, its not as big of an issue and shutter speed priority may not create many severe aperture fluctuations... but for me, i'm mostly outdoors and there is not consistent lighting very often. Aperture just works better for my style. If shutter works better for your settings and style, then stick with it.

Why do you recommend aperture priority mode over shutter priority mode? I usually use shutter priority on 1/250 with my ISO at 1600 for court-side photography. I understand your point about the flash, but my lens simply doesn't let in enough light to do non-flash pictures.

Perhaps I should buy another lens, but I do not have enough money to afford that kind of upgrade. Especially when I'm buying a new nature photography lens, which is my true passion. So - I am trying to make due with what I have, my Nikkor 18-105 mm lens.

Please explain how you work aperture priority mode and what are the advantages over shutter priority mode?

-Frik

[jobathenut]

Campwest-I just like taking pictures at sporting events.My camera expertise is this.I turn the camera on and hit the button.You might as well be speaking a foriegn language to me as i did understand what you are talking about.As far as shutter speed and all of that.I have no knowledge when it comes to that kind of thing.Is the shutter speed something i control.I will be honest i am completely stubid when it comes to this technical aspects of the photo hobby.But you have to admit i might take pictures like the great one kyle,but for someone who knows nothing about what they are doing i take alright pictures.As far as the hockey pictures go.I NEVER use the flash on my camera at games.I assummed that the professional photographer at the game triggered the light the same time i took a picture.As the one was so much brighter than the other picture.Thanks for all the information now if i was just smart enough to know what it ment.

Its really not obvious at all. Exposure has several factors, brightness of the subject, aperture (amount of light passing through lens), shutter speed (amount of time light is exposing the film/sensor), ISO (the film/sensor's sensitivity to light). So too many unknowns to state for certain which picture had the flash.

Anyhow, I personally think the second/darker image has the better exposure. The lighter image is overexposed, there is a loss of detail in the painted lines in the ice and the player's jersey shows less detail.

I pulled down your two photos... The brighter image has a 1/40th second exposure at f3.5 and the darker has a faster 1/60th second exposure at the same f3.5 (aka aperture). So that tells me the first/over-exposed image has too slow of a shutter speed - too much light hitting the sensor. The second image was close to properly exposed. My software, interestingly is telling me that the flash was turned off in both images. Which makes sense since the differences can easily be attributed to the difference in the amount of time the shutter was open. I think the difference you are seeing is not attributable to the flash and merely to differences in shutter speed.

Anyhow, my reasoning for not using a flash was and is, that all but the best professional-caliber flashes are ineffective at spectator distances, causing the camera to incorrectly expose an image in a lot of cases. And generally flash photography is prohibited.

[HawaiiSportsNut]

Great photography guys. Those of you who live where there are professional sports are so lucky. I don't have any pro sport team where I live in Hawaii so all of my sports photography is of local college teams & high school teams.

[CampWest]

Great photography guys. Those of you who live where there are professional sports are so lucky. I don't have any pro sport team where I live in Hawaii so all of my sports photography is of local college teams & high school teams.

On the flip side, I live in Kansas... Just took a trip to Kaua'i in September, and you definitely outscore us on the possibilities for landscape photography, and also water sports like surfing.

So I don't feel too bad for you living in Hawai'i... And of course there is this pesky issue of winters in the midwest...

[CampWest]

Yeah HSN... its tough for me to feel bad for ya. Tell ya what, anytime you wanna visit KC, I'll hook you up and you can hook me up with a free place to stay in Hawaii. What island do you live on?

On the flip side, I live in Kansas... Just took a trip to Kaua'i in September, and you definitely outscore us on the possibilities for landscape photography, and also water sports like surfing.

So I don't feel too bad for you living in Hawai'i... And of course there is this pesky issue of winters in the midwest...

I don't have any pro sport team where I live in Hawaii so all of my sports photography is of local college teams & high school teams.

[DenkerCollector]

From the Aflac Game Practices this year. I was able to score a media credential and shot on the field.

All eyes on Harper

[ironmanfan]

A shot I took of Cal Jr. taking BP @ Memorial Stadium in April of 1986

[HawaiiSportsNut]

CampWest... Unfortunately my landscape photography is dreadful as hell. I live on the island of Hawaii, and I have never gone to photograph the volcano. Sports photography is my passion even if I am just mediocre at it.

I guess we just gotta make the best out of what we got.

On the flip side, I live in Kansas... Just took a trip to Kaua'i in September, and you definitely outscore us on the possibilities for landscape photography, and also water sports like surfing.

So I don't feel too bad for you living in Hawai'i... And of course there is this pesky issue of winters in the midwest...

[Manram]

These are some really cool photos

[woody1351]

here are a few of my favs.