need help with exposure

[emtp563]

I have an EOS 350D and use a Tamron 18-200 f/3.5-6.3. Last Thursday I was at a bicycling event during the late afternoon on a sunny day. The sun was bright. Most of my photos came out overexposed and blurry. I was shooting in Av mode with the aperture set to f/8 most of the time. ISO was set to 100. I attached an example of one of my not so good pics.

Now that I think of it, I should have set the ISO higher to get a faster shutter speed. Should I consider shooting this event in the future in Tv mode instead? I really would like to be able to control DoF though.

What about light metering? Should I use the camera's Evaluative metering or partial metering? OR, should I meter from some of the sun lit grass on the ground and lock exposure? FYI, I had the sun to my back.

If I stick to Evaluative, should I increase Exposure Compensation? I'll have another shot this Thursday. This event is held every week.

http://www.oc-athlonxp.com/web_images/race.jpg

[Longwatcher]

From the looks of the shot I would try f5.6 for aperture myself (but then I tend towards shallow DoF, which would allow you to up the shutter a stop. I would leave in Av mode since depth of Field is what you are primarily after. If that is still having problems then maybe shoot in manual mode and adjust the settigns as needed. If you still can't get an exposure you like then I recommend a 2 or 3 stop Nuetral Densisty filter if over exposing.

Also did you shoot in raw, at least a stop of exposure can easily be recovered if you shot in raw? Otherwise it looks pretty close to good for starting from if raw.

Just my experience and opinion.

[emtp563]

I love RAW and usually shoot in RAW, but for the bicycling events I shoot in jpeg just because I use AI Servo and take lots of continuos shots. The CF card fills up pretty quick in RAW and not to mention the buffer. I'm not exactly using the best of lenses (Tamron 18-200). Sharpness is definitely lacking. I'm getting the Canon 70-200L IS 2.8 this Summer and a 30D towards the Fall. I should have better results with that lense at least. I think my results are poor mainly because the lense is slow in focusing. It can't seem to keep up with the action.

[Longwatcher]

I can't help you with the slow focusing lens, and it sounds like you already have decided on best way to fix that.