Triathalon of sports(pt.3 volleyball)

[creechjs]

I definitely clocked in my share yesterday, shooting 3 sports from 1 to 9:30 followed by 5 hours of editing. The margaritas and hot dogs were the only things that kept me going. haha

I love this picture.
1.
http://i10.tinypic.com/5xpy3rl.jpg

2.


3.


4.
http://i3.tinypic.com/52m12x2.jpg

5.
http://i4.tinypic.com/4uon48n.jpg

6.


7.


8

[Dan-o]

Very good Jeff. All three posts.

[XTi Guy]

Jeff,
Very nice shots indeed.I`m still trying to figure out this volleyball lighting deal.(tears out hair)!I`m still learning the whole PP thing and am curious how much PP you all do to your images.Meaning how bad can an image be and still be made to look good?Anyway to convince you to post the original?I think I may be giving up to soon on some of my images (gotta learn the patience thing).Any help would be greatly appriceated.

[creechjs]

Thanks Dan-o.

Xti Guy, my editing to most of my sports stuff is very minimal. Its really dependent on the situation and sports. When I'm shooting fieldhockey at 12 or something the lighting can be a bit harsh. I'll usually meter off the whites (making sure they arent blown out) and then relying on shadow/highlight and levels adjustments to correct for the shadows. With volleyball and basketball, however, I am very confident with my settings. My particular gym seems to perform best at ISO 1600, f/2.8 at 1/500. With these settings very minimal editing is needed or even possible with the amount of noise evident in the pictures. At the very most, I correct the white balance using curves eye droppers, slight contrast adjustment map, crop tight, sharpen, resize, sharpen again, apply watermark, and thne save. Usually takes me around 5 minutes a picture because my computer is a lil pokey.
Here's an original straight out of the camera.

[XTi Guy]

creechjs,
Thanks for posting the picture for me.Exposure is sure a funny thing.Are you shooting RAW or jpeg?and which do you prefer? thanks again.

[creechjs]

Originally Posted by XTi Guy

creechjs,
Thanks for posting the picture for me.Exposure is sure a funny thing.Are you shooting RAW or jpeg?and which do you prefer? thanks again.

I prefer jpeg because I dont have much more room on my computer and my workflow is faster with jpeg, but I would definitely recommend shooting RAW. It's something I should get in the habit of doing.

[corosario]

Nice pictures, exposure looks great!

[david888lee]

wow your shots are absolutely stunning. great job. now if only i could shoot like that.

[disneydork06]

nice shots! no fair on the gym lighting though. my doesn't have as direct lighting so I don't get the darkness in my bg. oh and yay margaritas, but I'm a little wary about the hotdogs...

[AnzioBake]

Number one is a goody. You may want to edit out the little pink thing sticking out of her head though.
The following is my opinion based on my preference:
I think your timing is a little off. In all the shots except no.7 (and maybe 3) you are either a little early or a little late i.e. The attackers arm is either completely "cocked" or has completed there arm action. For a closer to contact shot you need to trigger a moment after the arm is released from the cocked position / before the actually contact. You should never see the actually contact,else you are triggering too late.

[creechjs]

Yeah, I realize my timing is off, but you have to realize how great their arm speed is when they spike the ball. Its a bit like bat on ball in baseball or club on ball in golf. While probably not as hard, these shots are a dime a dozen and people are usually happy with one or two in a outing. It would be very hard to so consistent with your timing, that you get ball on hand every time. Obviously that's what I'm attempting to do every time I press the shutter, but it's obviously a little harder than it may seem.

[Volleyball Mike]

Jeff,
Nice captures and I love your ability to see the non-action side of the game. Pic #1. Love it as well. Please keep sharing.

[sonnyc]

Nice pics. I like #4, no ball but I like the expression on the faces. And a very clean nice black background.

[williambeeler]

Great job. It's nice to know I'm not the only one that rarely gets hand on ball, let alone hand on compressed ball. ;^)