How would I take this photo...

[Molly55]

I wish to take photos at the circus. I saw the show last week without the camera, and now want to go back with it; 10D of course.

It is indoors of course, and fairly dark. There are many spotlights, of all different colors, pointing all over the place. This gives a nice bright glow to the subjects (clowns, animals) while still keeping a dark environment. The challenge is to keep the shutter speed fast enough for hand-held shots, and capturing slow moving people and animals, like elephants, while keeping the noise down in the black backgrounds. To do this, I thought I would use 400 ISO, no flash, 1/30 or 1/60, and f2.8. This should give enough light, but I also want a good DOF since I will to capture lots of action occurring at various distances.

What would you guys suggest? Should I buy a speedlight for this?

Thanks.

[Vegas Poboy]

First will the Circus give you permission to have the camera with you? I went to one here late last year & they even took peoples phones with cameras in them.
For that type of setup up I would say a fast lens, ISO @ 800 amybe even 1600 and to stop action most likely speed of 1/250 but I'm only going off of what some friends of mine told me from a sports photography class, the class included doing stage acts of in a couple of casinos.
My class starts next week so I would like to know how things come out for you.

[Mark Kemp]

Mollys answer seems about right to me,

Basically I think you will have to compromise a bit on your requirements.

You want to shoot in low light, hand held, no flash, low grain, wide DOF and a moving subject. :shock:

If you figure out how to do all those things at once, let us know and we will all try it.

Your best bet is to hope it isn't too dark and increase the ISO setting as much as you need to get the picture and accept some noise.

[PacAce]

I wish to take photos at the circus. I saw the show last week without the camera, and now want to go back with it; 10D of course.

It is indoors of course, and fairly dark. There are many spotlights, of all different colors, pointing all over the place. This gives a nice bright glow to the subjects (clowns, animals) while still keeping a dark environment. The challenge is to keep the shutter speed fast enough for hand-held shots, and capturing slow moving people and animals, like elephants, while keeping the noise down in the black backgrounds. To do this, I thought I would use 400 ISO, no flash, 1/30 or 1/60, and f2.8. This should give enough light, but I also want a good DOF since I will to capture lots of action occurring at various distances.

What would you guys suggest? Should I buy a speedlight for this?

Thanks.

Those spotlights can be very deceiving. They don't look very bright in the darkened environment but they really are. So what you may end up doing is stopping down the aperture a bit more just so your subjects don't come out washed out under the spotlight. I think when I was in a similar type lighting I started out with ISO 400, 1/45 and f/4. After taking a couple of test shots I think I finally ended up using f/8. I used the LCD display and the histogram to help me pick the correct settings and, of course, the camera was in "M" mode and no flash.

Good luck.

[PacAce]

Those spotlights can be very deceiving. They don't look very bright in the darkened environment but they really are. So what you may end up doing is stopping down the aperture a bit more just so your subjects don't come out washed out under the spotlight. I think when I was in a similar type lighting I started out with ISO 400, 1/45 and f/4. After taking a couple of test shots I think I finally ended up using f/8. I used the LCD display and the histogram to help me pick the correct settings and, of course, the camera was in "M" mode and no flash.

Good luck.

BTW, here are examples of what I was talking about:

http://tanseikai.com/tanseikai/Lion%20King_1.htm

[Avarond]

Great shots Leo. What lens was that with?

[CyberDyneSystems]

Those spotlights can be very deceiving. They don't look very bright in the darkened environment but they really are.

Tell me about it!

We have a pair of followspots that can ignite paper at about 10 meters!!!

[PacAce]

Great shots Leo. What lens was that with?

Just the standard Canon 28-135 IS.

[Molly55]

First will the Circus give you permission to have the camera with you? I went to one here late last year & they even took peoples phones with cameras in them.
For that type of setup up I would say a fast lens, ISO @ 800 amybe even 1600 and to stop action most likely speed of 1/250 but I'm only going off of what some friends of mine told me from a sports photography class, the class included doing stage acts of in a couple of casinos.
My class starts next week so I would like to know how things come out for you.

Yes, Ringling Bros. Circus allows cameras - its states so on their website.

[Vegas Poboy]

First will the Circus give you permission to have the camera with you? I went to one here late last year & they even took peoples phones with cameras in them.
For that type of setup up I would say a fast lens, ISO @ 800 amybe even 1600 and to stop action most likely speed of 1/250 but I'm only going off of what some friends of mine told me from a sports photography class, the class included doing stage acts of in a couple of casinos.
My class starts next week so I would like to know how things come out for you.

Yes, Ringling Bros. Circus allows cameras - its states so on their website.

Great I hate to let someone else have my toys when I want to play. Good luck with the shoot