How to Photograph Football--14 Tips for Friday HS Football

[JohnR84740]

I have several brands of rain gear, and you know what I use most of the time? A plastic grocery bag. It is easy to put on and maneuver with, and works in light to moderate rain. If it is heavy, I go with my Aquatech, but that is not very usable with zoom lenses.

For the flash, I wrap it in a ziplock sandwich bag, and tape it closed. I am wrapped in an oversized gore-tex rain suit. Oversized so that I can protect the gear if it gets really bad!

+50 to the hand warmers!

[pantherphotos]

+ 1 to the plastic grocery bag. Of course, I now have the 1D2 and 70-200 f/2.8L IS, so I'm pretty good to go! But plastic bags and ziplock bags work great, are cheap, and easy to use!

[~Devils~]

New photographer here, I'ved used some of the tips in this post to shoot Australian rugby league football. I spend $300 for a 10D & lens on ebay so I wasnt expecting much.
How can I get a consistent bokeh effect, my image quality seems all over the place. I'm shooting in 'sports mode' because Av mode doesnt seem to get focus lock.



10D, EF 75-300mm II f/4-5:6 (I now learn this is a crap lens), F5.7, 1/1500 sec.
Late afternoon in the Australian winter so I've tried some post processing.


10D, EF 75-300mm II f/4-5:6 (I now learn this is a crap lens), F8, 1/1500 sec.
Morning light, good bokeh.

[Bronko52]

Originally Posted by asysin2leads

Think Tank makes nice wet weather gear, too, but are a little pricey. If you ever find yourself in SW Ohio, give me a shout.

Thanks brother! And SW Ohio maybe just maybe come playoff time otherwise I'm here in NE Ohio!

[bentlax33]

Does anyone still use a 20d for night football or is the high ISO too noisy?

[MizzouMan_2000]

Two things are going to affect your bokeh (actually 3, but 2 of them work together)
1. Aperature - Keep your aperature wide open.
2 & 3. Distance to subject and focal length - The bokeh at 5.6 is going to look better at 300mm than it is at 75 mm assuming the distance to the subject is the same in at both focal lengths. In your first shot, the lens was at 75mm and f8 aperature - that's going to give you a sizeable depth of field. I don't know the exact parameters of this shot, but let's say you were 30 feet from the players. Then at 30 ft, 75mm and f/8 with a 10D you would have 15.6 ft for your depth of field - 5.9 ft in front of the player is in focus and 9.7 ft behind (this is from the DOF calculator at http://www.dofmaster.com/dofjs.html). Your second shot was at 300mm and f/5.6 - so you had two things working in your favor - the long focal length and the and using the wide-open aperature of the lens at 300mm. Let's say you were 30ft from these guys again. Using the settings of your camera in the second shot, you would only have 0.63ft depth of field. Much narrower thus better bokeh.

Originally Posted by ~Devils~

New photographer here, I'ved used some of the tips in this post to shoot Australian rugby league football. I spend $300 for a 10D & lens on ebay so I wasnt expecting much.
How can I get a consistent bokeh effect, my image quality seems all over the place. I'm shooting in 'sports mode' because Av mode doesnt seem to get focus lock.



10D, EF 75-300mm II f/4-5:6 (I now learn this is a crap lens), F5.7, 1/1500 sec.
Late afternoon in the Australian winter so I've tried some post processing.


10D, EF 75-300mm II f/4-5:6 (I now learn this is a crap lens), F8, 1/1500 sec.
Morning light, good bokeh.

[Methodical]

I played with the 500 at one LL game from behind the punter in the endzone. This was one of 2 teams that actually punted the ball, so I said to myself that I would focus on it and I got this photo. I will definitely focus more on it this year if the young'ns punt more.

[dirtylens]

Thanks Phil! Cant wait to use all this on the field!

[Zivnuska]

Originally Posted by dirtylens

Thanks Phil! Cant wait to use all this on the field!

I'm jealous of those of you who will start this weekend. We're losing about 2 minutes of light per day this time of year and I won't have any games till September 2. Shoot those early games and enjoy the daylight while you can.



This:
.


Changes to this:



and becomes this:


all too soon!


I can't wait to get started.

Phil

[Strnge]

Thanks for posting!

[USMCWayne]

We just moved to Texas a month ago, and I finally got to experience first-hand the spectacle (in a very, very good way) that is Texas High School football. Weatherford is a 5A school in a "notably difficult district with five tough Arlington schools and perennial NFL-quality players".

I covered my first game this past Friday night, and was very happy with the overall results. I'm still shooting with my old reliable f4 70-200 but the big difference was I was able to shoot the entire game with that lens, instead of swapping out to a smaller faster lens as the light faded. The stadium lights were exceptional.

As far as more tips, I'm still a big proponent of a good monopod and keeping your eye in the viewfinder and your finger on the shutter release.

After touchdowns, I always take a shot of the scoreboard, for cutline purposes.

I'm always wandering the home sidelines, but I usually shoot offense about ten yards down from the line of scrimmage, as it allows me to get players faces instead of the backs of their heads (something I see way too often in publication). Same for defense, about ten yards behind the line of scrimmage, so as to get some defenders faces.

When "my" defense or offense is close to the end zone, that's where I'm usually positioning myself. No messy backgrounds and, again, players coming towards the lens.

The Weatherford Roos (Kangaroos) face off at home this coming Friday with the two-time defending 4A state champions Aledo Bearcats. Aledo features Jonathan Gray, the top-ranked high school running back in the United States and a signee with the University of Texas. Gray scored eight TD's in last season's state championship game, so I expect plenty of offense.

[bobbyz]

I have been shooting mostly portraits this yr so with football starting soon I thought I will ask a question. I always used "Focus Priority" on my 1dmk2 which drops the fps (not that I shoot 8fps all the time). But then I heard I should be using "Drive Priority" as I am in AI servo mode. I tried that one dance competition and my keeper rate was quite low. So I am back to focus priority mode but just a question what do most folks use?

Thanks in advance.

[Methodical]

I used focus priority mostly in the past and read some sports photographer's page on drive priority, so I have been experimenting with drive priority with non-sports related shots, but will get a chance to test it this season.

I like to know what the sports photographers use, too.

[dwarrenr]

I only use focus priority. It has not seemed to slow down my fps when set at 10fps, but for the most part I don't use 10fps. I'm more concern about getting tack sharp images then 10fps, and more then three frames of one action sequence is more then I want to look at any way. Thus I'm either shoot at 3fps or single shot for 90% of my sports.

[bobbyz]

That is what I thought. I also shoot burst of 3-4 frames max.

BTW - Frame rate will drop with focus priority as each frame camera has to make sure focus is achieved. FPS is only guranteed with drive priority. Check it out with some player coming at you. You won't get 10fps.