My first go at MMA.

[20DNewbie]

*Background, this is for part of a project I'm working on so it isn't terribly important as I can use material I've shot prior to this semester.

I realize the usual is shooting through the cage, but what scant room there was to be had was taken by those who were supposed to be there and not someone looking to fulfill part of an assignment. So I figured I'd go high to the balcony and get over the cage best I could instead. Hindsight being 20/20, I should have used the 300 more than I did.

Body 1D, glass 70-200 2.8L and 300 2.8L IS.
1.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3042/2978546778_e4a3788494_o.jpg
2.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3014/2977689945_02a5e70cfe_o.jpg
3.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3137/2977689885_441fcbc7cb_o.jpg
4.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3058/2977689839_13336a2a44_o.jpg
5.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3195/2978546866_fc77c31bd7_o.jpg
6.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3159/2977689619_bf76296413_o.jpg

So aside from cropping to get in tighter on some(remember, ol' school 1D, lol) and my vantage point, what else would you suggest?

Thanks.

[ironbelle]

Christian, you already know that a tighter crop would improve these images. I would have used a higher shutter speed. I notice on some images you used a 1/80 for your shutter speed. 1/500 is good enough to stop the action. Your 1000 ISO is fine and I use that constantly. Remember, if you see TV cameras, your can USUALLY count on good light. I say USUALLY because I've shot a difficult venue where it was televised, but still had to shoot at a 3200 ISO just to get good images that I still wasn't happy with. Yeah, the 300 would have brought you in tighter to the action and that's what you want when you have busy backgrounds. You got some good grabs, now you know not to be afraid to tighten up the shot the next time you tackle MMA.

[20DNewbie]

Thanks for the response, I was just a bit leery of pushing the 1D past 1000. With some of the shots of the fighters pressed against the cage the BG was getting just a bit noisy for my liking. Granted LR2 seems to be handling it pretty well for now. We'll see after the next one.

[SnapLocally.com]

Maybe you should use the 40D instead.