1st time attempting soccer

[khaz]

I was shooting our school soccer team yesterday, and was having a hard time getting the sharp images I have seen on here. I am not sure if it is the settings I have on the camera, or the lens that I should start with first. I know most of the problem is me, but I thought the settings on the camera were good by watching the light meter.

I was shooting with the 70-200 f4 IS,
ISO 160
SS 1600
F 4

Should have the IS on when shooting at this shutter speed? If so, when shooting a soccer game that I am panning trying to follow the ball, should I use the mode 1 or 2? Some of the pictures appear to be ok, until I look at them at 100% in DPP, then they look blurred.

How would I save an image at 100% in DPP to show what I am talking about?

[HighPixel]

Can you post an example?
HP

[khaz]

Here is one that looked ok, until I saw it at 100%. The writing on the jersey is blurred when I look at it at a higher percentage.

[khaz]

Here is one more that looks ok, until I zoom in.

[Mark1]

They look fine.

How big do you need them to be? If they will never be seen at 100% why are you so worried about them at 100%? And if they will be in the school paper or yearbook they will get murdered in the halftoneing any way.

[khaz]

Ok, thank you. I was thinkng I was missing something on the focus. Most of the images are going to be put on our sport websites, although some of the coaches may want to blow them up for pictures in the office. Mostly 8x10 photos I would assume.

As you said, I was probably just getting too picky!

[HighPixel]

Those will be fine...Overall IQ looks very acceptable. Try not to pixel-peep your images as you will always find something bad about them.;);)
HP

[wayovrpar]

I agree with the statements above. These look very good. Don't get so hung up on the pixel peeping. Focus on action, faces, and the ball. Keep shooting!!

[Magic 24]

I started shooting at a low ISO (160 -200) range thinking I need to to keep great colors and things of that nature. I found though that the pics were slightly soft and not as sharp as I wanted. Bump it (ISO) to 320 maybe 640 and see if you like it.

The SS will be higher of course but may/should stop the slight fuzzies.

[cpu2k]

You also have to remember that the sensors also use an anti-aliasing filter... so when you do pixel peep, it won't come out tack sharp...

If you want to bring the sharpness back, give it a little unsharp mask in Photoshop...

[Stacas]

I started shooting at a low ISO (160 -200) range thinking I need to to keep great colors and things of that nature. I found though that the pics were slightly soft and not as sharp as I wanted. Bump it (ISO) to 320 maybe 640 and see if you like it.

The SS will be higher of course but may/should stop the slight fuzzies.

Shooting at anything higher than ISO 200 in that sunlight would seem ridiculous...as long as you can keep your shutter speed up at 1/640th sec. or above then you should keep the ISO as low as possible to minimise grain. In that sort of sun, 1/1000th should easily be obtainable at ISO 200. You don't need anything faster...upping to 640 ISO would max. out your shutter speed (perhaps 1/8000th sec.) which is completely unnecessary.

Maybe a note...watch your backgrounds...floodlights appearing out of players' heads don't make the prettiest pics!