Boys Basketball in Dark Gym - 1D Mark III

I have been fiddling around with the Mark III for a week now and haven't actually gotten to do anything that I really bought it for. Tonight I dropped in on a boys varsity basketball practice session in a gym that I've shot in at least a hundred times over the years. I can basically go into this gym and I know what manual settings to use, and feel very comfortable. To cut to the chase, I shot about 450 images with only about 5% out of focus or very soft. The rest I'd consider sellable. This, along with the increased high ISO and speed led me to easily feel like the Mark III blew the IIN out of the water for this shooting. Keep in mind I was also constantly changing the AI-Servo settings and experimenting, so that would account for at least half the bad shots. Here are a few samples.... not very exciting, but should demonstrate some of the capabilities.

First off, this is using the 70-200 f/2.8 IS... a lens I'd never use here without strobes on any other camera. This is ISO6400, 1/400s, f/2.8 - no noise reduction... only a levels adjustment, crop, and sharpen.

Great stuff man!
In my other life, (I play a theatre techy in real ife, I'm only a photographer on TV), so I can't wait to see this beast in action in low light!

CyberDyneSystems wrote in post #3606058
Great stuff man!
In my other life, (I play a theatre techy in real ife, I'm only a photographer on TV), so I can't wait to see this beast in action in low light!

I was expecting the first reply to be the usual... "they look soft to me"... so thanks for sparing me from that one!

I've shot basketball in this gym a many times with various Nikon and Canon bodies. The Mark III, most recently compared with the IINs that I still have, is a major step forward.... in low noise high ISO, in color, in autofocus, and in other areas as well.

I fiddled with the autofocus settings quite a bit. What I found was the things that really seemed to mess it up were going to auto point selection OR point expansion. Staying away from both of them seemed to yield the best results. Also, I end up on Fast for the "give up" setting. This is the same setting that yields the best results on the IIN ironically. With the IIN, I have never been able to consistently get a burst of a run to the basket without it losing several images to OOF. Had a few lost with the Mark III... which is a lot better. Another thing the Mark III seemed to handle better was just throwing it up to grab a shot quickly... when you notice someone making a run at the basket while you are chimping away. I would almost never get a good shot doing that with the IIN, and I tried it twice tonight and both were keepers.

fantastic stuff for a low light gym! Thanks for sharing

Amazingly low Noise at ISO 6400!!!!

Overkill wrote in post #3606510
Amazingly low Noise at ISO 6400!!!!

Yep... I can count on 1 hand the number times in the past I've shot important things at anything greater than ISO1600... and all of these are above that... 2000, 2500, 3200... and 6400. I don't think I'd go 6400 in most cases, but it clearly is usable.

Very nice. ISO 6400 sure opens up a lot of possibilities. It's like a whole new world. Right now I can only dream (lottery is my only hope) and continue to battle those lousy gyms that we all dread. Thanks for sharing.

Wow, the ISO performance is outstanding

calicokat wrote in post #3607540
Wow, the ISO performance is outstanding

Yep, I was just reading in a Nikon forum yesterday speculation that their D2H replacement would have better high ISO performance than the Mark III... I had to chuckle. They have yet to come anywhere near the 20D even, and this thing really takes it to a new level. I hope the guy is right, because competition is a great thing... and the D2H autofocus engine is much better than anything Canon has (in my opinion), but to think they are suddenly going to solve the high ISO situation and better the Mark III is one that I can't even imagine.

Great shots, but I'm confused by some of the shots saying f2.0 and f1.8, didn't you say this was with the 70-200 f2.8?

Oh, wait, I see you say 85 1.8 further down.
KAC

Yep, the ISO6400 was with the 70-200... everything else was 85mm. I will go back next week at the same practice session and use my dynamic duo... 85 1.8 and 200 1.8 which I usually shoot on two bodies. Since I only have one MIII at this point, I'll just swap it back and forth.

convergent wrote in post #3606133
I was expecting the first reply to be the usual... "they look soft to me"... so thanks for sparing me from that one!

They look soft to me......

ISO 6400 is something to see......looks like ISO 3200 is pretty sweet....

Thanks for complicating things for me

GBRandy wrote in post #3613876
Thanks for complicating things for me

You didn't think I was going to make it easy for you to return the Mark III did you?

oh, thanks for giving me faith in my new $4500+ toy. Can't wait to read the manual and start to play around with it. High iso action shot is exactly why I bought mk 3 for! Good stuff!