Night HS Football 1DmkIII and ISO 6400

Shot my first HS football game of the season last night. It was 85 degrees at kickoff so just moderately warm. I had NO problems with AI Servo focusing. Any OOF images were my fault for not keeping my focus point on target. And I'll admit I was pretty rusty too.

Here are two 100% crop images... before and after Noise Ninja. I'm quite happy with my results. Other than applying Noise Ninja I did no other post-processing.

I shot all night with my 500 f/4 and 1DmkIII. Once I got my camera set they way I wanted it, and remembering just how far off the line of scrimmage I needed to be..

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That shot cleaned-up nicely. The MKIII is looking better-n-better. Thank you.

i tend to stay away from 6400 just because it really does push the system too far... good to hear that a supertelephoto in no light focuses

nice

basroil wrote in post #3840477
i tend to stay away from 6400 just because it really does push the system too far... good to hear that a supertelephoto in no light focuses

From your Gear List you have an XT which doesn't have iso 6400 unless you under expose iso1600 by 2 stops and push it in RAW. I guarantee you that it would turn out a lot different than the OP's example.

The OP could have used iso6400 or simply not gotten the shot. Iso 6400 it is.

Yes, I shot it with the 1DmkIII and 6400 you gotta test it at some point to find out how it works in the real world.

nice.. picture looks great

I'm sorry, I really don't think that's usable...just MHO.

for a news paper that will work fine

I'm no pro...but it certainly looks usable to me....especially since it's just a crop.

Can you post the whole picture?

I only can get my MK3 to ISO3200, how to do ISO 6400? I like to do some test too?

Thanks.

Galaxy99 wrote in post #3844912
I only can get my MK3 to ISO3200, how to do ISO 6400? I like to do some test too?

Thanks.

I'm not sure about the MK3, but on the 5D for instance, there is an ISO expansion custom function that has to be set in order to get to IS0 50 and ISO 3200.

deeeez wrote in post #3844010
I'm sorry, I really don't think that's usable...just MHO.

With the lighting conditions the OP was in, that's a really usable picture. Keep in mind it's a 100% crop. It'll be good for newspapers and they won't crop that tight.

Hi JBillings,
That impressive at 100 % crop. What shutter speed were you using? Could you post a few more shots? As soon as I am convinced that the AF problems are solved on the MK3, I am going to get one. Hopefully the problems will be worked out by the time Basketball season starts.

deeeez wrote:

I disagree, that is totaly acceptable for for a news paper shot for a high school football game.

JX wrote in post #3845384
Hi JBillings,
That impressive at 100 % crop. What shutter speed were you using? Could you post a few more shots? As soon as I am convinced that the AF problems are solved on the MK3, I am going to get one. Hopefully the problems will be worked out by the time Basketball season starts.

I shot that image at 1/500, f/4.0 in manual mode, the same as I shot these 2 images I'm adding to this post. Yes the 500 focuses fast enough. It's just too darn LONG and requires 30-40 yards of distance to get decent images. I now understand why the photographers from the local papers perfer the 400 f/2.8 and the 300 f/2.8. Will be working with a 300 f/2.8 next week and hope to have better luck.

AI Servo autofocus has been working just fine for me and I've got an early mark III (504xxx).

I've been shooting indoor basketball and I've got 2 galleries up with images shot at ISO 3200

Check out the my site link in my signature for more football images as well as the 2 basketball galleries.

I can't complain about the mark III other than it has LOTS of custom function menus and you have to put a lot of though into how your working to get it configured correctly. Thankfully you can save 3 different setups to allow changing from one style of shooting to another.

As for Deeeez comment about 6400 being unusable, I think the attached images speak for themselves.

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