Indoor Youth Soccer help requested

I am new to whole DSLR game but learning fast. I was wondering if anyone would be able to offer some pointers for me. The light is very tough at most of these indoor events but I did the best I could. I have attached one RAW file and one that I have worked a little with Lightroom 5.

If anyone had a minute, and also had Lightroom 5, could you let me know what you would do differently to the RAW image, i.e. how would the professionals edit this? So far my editing consists of Auto Tone and Cropping. What would be my next steps

Equipment/setup:
T2i
70-200 2.8
1/800
70mm
ISO 6400
Spot Metering
AI Servo

Thanks,

Eric

http://i771.photobucke​t.com …/_MG_4258_zps01​f31d71.jpg

http://i771.photobucke​t.com …er1/Emma3_zpsc0​a0b772.jpg

The first shot is I underexposed. One thing you should do is try shooting in manual mode. The lighting in those indoor arenas is Pretty even across the arena so once you establish an accurate exposure you can stick with it, The problem with using av or TV mode is that the presence of An extra White or black jersey in the frame can fool the meter and alter your exposure even though the light hasn't changed.

You could try the following:

1. slow your shutter down so that you can reduce the ISO a level or two.
2. get yourself a noise reduction program like Noise Ninja.

The indoor environment especially when taking sports pictures makes it difficult to get clean images. Good luck and keep practicing.

Before getting noise ninja you should try the built in LR 5 noise reduction, I think it works really well.

Agree with shooting manual as light will normally be quite constant, you can drop the shutter speed slightly for youth football as they are not quite as fast which will allow you to lower the ISO and help a bit further.

You don't actually have a link to a RAW image here. They are both jpg's. If you have a RAW file and provide a link and turn on image editing, I would take a shot at it and see what could be done.

1. Drop that shutter speed. High ISO + underexposing = bad results. You don't really have an option to increase ISO (6400 on the T2i is already pushing it) but you can probably get away with 1/400 or 1/500 of a second shutter for youth sports.

2. Shoot much, much tigher. High ISO + cropping = bad results. The best way to deal with tough lighting conditions is to shoot much, much tighter than usual. Getting good results at high isos is all about signal to noise. A tight shot at ISO 6400 with almost always look better than a heavy crop at even ISO 800. You mentioned you were at 70mm for this shot, when you probably should have zoomed out closer to 150-200mm

3. Get lower to the ground. It makes sports photos of kids about 100x more interesting when you can get below their eye level.

1. Yeah tough to get real good results with T2i. As everyone suggested lower your shutter speed a touch. Should get away with 500. You have the right glass, just make sure you are shooting f/2.8.

2. Another thing you can do a custom white balance prior to shooting anything indoors.

3. Totally agree with getting lower. You may get more interesting background than just the field. And they look bigger.

4. I always shoot raw, so if I need to adjust the exposure or tweet white balance it's a lot easier to correct in raw.

Thanks all for the replies.

I was shooting in manual mode at f/2.8 as that is what the lens would afford me. I will try slowing the shutter speed a bit and dropping the ISO but I guess that is always the compromise of stopping the action without blur vs getting noise free, brighter shots.

I thought I linked the RAW file, humm. How does one link a RAW file, I think both Flickr and Photobucket converted them.

Agreed, Strouty, I should try to zoom in a bit more. It is tough being a parent and wanting to watch the action vs just taking pictures. I am trying to balance both. I will just have to pick my moments a bit better. Still tough as I don't want to miss any action myself.

Thanks for all the tips. I will keep shooting and post more after the next event.

brownel02 wrote in post #16697644
I thought I linked the RAW file, humm. How does one link a RAW file, I think both Flickr and Photobucket converted them.

I believe that all the photo sharing sites convert to JPG. Setup a free account on http://box.com and you can create public folders to share your raw files. Also, go in to your profile here and enable "Image Editing OK" so others can show you their efforts to help your images.

brownel02 wrote in post #16697644
I was shooting in manual mode at f/2.8 as that is what the lens would afford me. I will try slowing the shutter speed a bit and dropping the ISO but I guess that is always the compromise of stopping the action without blur vs getting noise free, brighter shots.

ISO 6400 is very noisy to start with, and your images have the added disadvantage of being about 1-stop underexposed and in need of some significant cropping, which will make the situation much, much worse. At the end of the day you have to shoot whatever settings are needed to capture a properly-exposed image. In this case, it looks like ISO 6400, 1/400th at f/2.8 would have given you the best files to start with. You can minimize movement blur by shooting when the subjects are moving directly towards (or away from) the camera, or pan as you capture the shot to try and keep the head and body of the subjects sharp while allowing the background, arms and legs to blur. A monopod will help reduce camera shake.

The next thing is getting closer to the action to reduce the amount of cropping in post. Unfortunately, this will be limited by your equipment and school policies. Get there early enough to guarantee yourself a front row seat. Talk to your daughter's coach and see if you can shoot from the sidelines and next to the goal. Then use all of your zoom and wait for the action to come to you.