Best lens for poorly lit dance competition

Will be shooting my first dance competition for my wife's dance studio. It will be a big, poorly lit theater with me sitting in the back. I have 7 solos to shoot, shes not bringing her large groups to this comp.
Question is...I will be renting a lens and I always assumed I would get the 70-200 f/2.8 but I saw that lensrentals has the 200mm f/2.0. Now the price is alot more for the f/2.0 but these dance moms are kinda nuts, so I'm willing to spend more to appease them if it will make a difference in the shots.

But will it make a difference for a novice like myself?

Any way you can preview the theater to get a feel for what focal length works best? You're gaining an extra stop of light with the prime at the expense of the convenience of the zoom. You're going to basically be using the same shutter speeds with both, so the 1 stop difference is going to come at the expense of iso. You will realistically want to be using a monopod also.

No, unfortunately. Its not an overly big theater, average size, but they never have good lighting and I'm sure I will have to sit in the back in the dark. My first thought was get the f/2.8L IS II and in addition to the actual dancing shots, also do some shots of them rehearsing, get some candids, and maybe some of the mothers too. Kinda capture the whole experience for them. But then I saw that 200mm and I thought maybe that would work better with the extra stop.

Well if you renting 200mm f2 IS might as well rent 1dsmk3 to go with it.

do you get a dedicated seating area??? Not really easy to rent a lens if you dont know the distance.

That 200 f2 on a 1DMKIV body is a great low light combination.

Rick: If I show up with that combo, I might be mistaken for a professional.
Alan: I wont know where they will put us until that day but at competitions in the past, it has been in the very back of the auditorium from what I remember.

I think I'm going to get the 70-200 and maybe get it for a week and go to some baseball/softball games. I'm sure the 200 is amazing but I think I'll get more use out of the 70-200 and plus it will give me a chance to try it out as thats the lens I'm thinking of upgrading to from my 70-300 IS. And if for some reason its not the back of the theater, I have more flexibility with the focal length. I'm hoping if I crank up the ISO, at f/2.8 I will be able to capture some of the dancer "poses".

I have done quite a few dance competitions. A lens with F/2.8 or better is recommend. Manual settings is the only way to get consistent exposures. Also a shutter speed of 1/500sec is a must to freeze the action.

- thumbled from my iPad

Make sure you shoot in TV mode, that way you can mess with the shutter speed while shooting and let the camera handle the aperture push the ISO, my motto is never fear the noise ;0)

curlydog: very nice. Where are you taking those from?

Thanks everyone for the advice too. Very helpful.

You could get F2 with the 135 F2 and save a lot over the 200 F2. Also instead of the 200, and for half the price, you could rent the 70-200 and the 85 1.8 to give yourself some options. On a crop camera in a smaller theater the 85 can often be a great focal length.

I agree with the above poster, that make sure you get good shutter speed and don't be afraid of some noise. Parents would much rather have a little noise in the photo than a blurry shot of the big moment.

Good luck and have fun!

Thanks

About 15 rows out from stage dead center, shoot around judges heads

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EF 85mm f/1.8 or 135l,, or both.

irishtn wrote in post #14119813
...It will be a big, poorly lit theater with me sitting in the back...

Why sitting in the back?

As you are the official photographer, you should stay close to the front, and move as needed to different place to get the best shoot.

You'll miss many shoot at the back.