Swimming outdoors vs Indoors

[Todd08]

My son at a swim meet this past weekend. So many indoor pools with bad lighting it's nice to shoot a meet outside.

[Geoff_UK]

Hi,

Nice shots - I shoot a lot of swimming events, but I've never been able to shoot one outdoors. I always have to contend with horrible light !! :cry:

The only time I get to shoot swimming outdoors is when I'm on holiday and my kids are in the pool !! Believe me, the last thing they want to do is swim when they're on holiday as they are never away from the pool when they're at home.

I usually find I can achieve 1/400 sec at f4 or f5 at either 400 or 800 iso. Some PS work on levels to brighten things up, some work to remove colour casts then followed by noise ninja, produces some pretty good images

The exif data show that you shot these at f32 and f29 - is that correct??

I was always under the impression that f stops as high as that would actually degrade image quality??

I'd be interested in peoples views on this??

[Todd08]

Thanks, Club swimmers do spend a lot of time at the pool, My son does practice twice a day 5 days a week for summer. Only get to shoot a couple outdoor meets a year, and the only way to get good pics indoors is if you can get on deck. As for the f-stop I didn't shoot in manual this time I took those in TV mode, set shutter speed at 1/320 and 800 iso. thats were the f-stops came out to be. No time to do any PS work on them yet.

Todd

[superdiver]

Another swim club dad here. All the meets I have been to in the last 7 years have been indoors. So I feel your pain....

As far as high f-stops, I have heard the same thing and now see it on my pictures. I really try and shoot most my landscape at f-16-22 at the most.

For swimming I almost always shoot at 2.8 or 1.8 or even 1.4....again, this if at indoor meets. I would LOVE to get pictures like the first ones at f32.....now thats what I call lighting!

[INF SQD LDR]

I'd shoot wide open at 100 ISO on AV outdoors. The wide aperature will give you a more a fast enough shutter to freeze the action and throw the background out of focus.

I made some Levels and Curves adjustments, cropped slightly, and blured the background a bit. My two cents for what it's worth. :)

[jediforce4ever]

Hi todd.Great shots.
However then seem a little soft on my screen.
Try shooting at ISO 200 in daylight.I personally feel that ISO200 gives more dynamic range than 100.
I would try stopping down a little to achieve a little sharpness, maybe around f7.1-8.
Shutter speed might be around 1/1000-1/4000 at that kind of light.

;)

from my experience, indoor meets suck for shooting:lol:

[Binning]

inf sqd ldr,

Great postprocessing work! I have about 2000 swimming shots I'd like to send you!

Your work made it a story about the lead swimmer instead of a picture of a swim meet. It was a nice shot to begin with, but the post editing made it a chapter in a story. And I want to read on...

[Todd08]

I too like the postprocessing on the photo. I just looked in PS and have 14 swim meets from short course to finish all indoors shots. Only been working on what parents ask for and did a year end photo montage for the banquet.

[10Dennis]

I would also like to share a series of shots I did for a local newspaper article about tri-athlete practice particulary on swimming. Please CC. Thanks! :)

JDennis

http://www.nayonphotographers.org/images/_Y5B1459.jpg

http://www.nayonphotographers.org/images/_Y5B1471.jpg

http://www.nayonphotographers.org/images/_Y5B1478.jpg

[superdiver]

Nice shots!