Last HS G LAX game

Next year we will be off shooting NCAA G LAX. Should be much quicker. This was another rainy Day. But it was above 50Deg.
My keeper rate has been going up to about 75 photos a game.
C&C please

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Nice shots. You did a lot right. Exposure isn't bad. You can see faces. The ball is in the picture. The background is blurred to isolate the players. But if you are after suggestions.....

Great shots tell a story too. Like.....girl with ball cutting hard with a defender in the picture too. Tight crop. Hopefully girl with ball tack sharp and defender slightly less sharp. Need to see the faces too, hopefully with a good expression of determination. Not so simple in reality and I'm no pro; but I'm getting better with practice.

Your first shot is nice but no real action.

I'm not sure what is happening in the second shot.

Neither shot is bad or great; just ok

Some ideas
George

first is a great sportrait shot that parents and athletes would love. I would suggest that you sharpen a tad more and probably selectively. I use a three step process (capture in ACR, then high pass and finally USM in PS). Seems to crisp thing up nicely without oversharpening since you can control it in layers with opacity.

Great shots.
The essence of the sports were captured by your shots.
I love the picture below.

Careful, Paul...once you get to the NCAA level it's Women's Lax I, too shoot at the NCAA (D-III level)...where you heading?

I wish I could come do some shooting with you Paul!

They both look good. #2 is a little too abstract for my tastes but thats what sets us all apart. Only thing Id say is to watch your white balance. #2 is noticeably cooler than #1

George E. wrote in post #5567944
Nice shots. You did a lot right. Exposure isn't bad. You can see faces. The ball is in the picture. The background is blurred to isolate the players. But if you are after suggestions.....

Great shots tell a story too. Like.....girl with ball cutting hard with a defender in the picture too. Tight crop. Hopefully girl with ball tack sharp and defender slightly less sharp. Need to see the faces too, hopefully with a good expression of determination. Not so simple in reality and I'm no pro; but I'm getting better with practice.

Your first shot is nice but no real action.

I'm not sure what is happening in the second shot.

Neither shot is bad or great; just ok

Some ideas
George

George, I am trying to start up another business shooting sports.
I think these shots would sell to the parents. I call these sell able keepers. The type of photo your taking about I full understand but I may only get a few each game with a high intensity game with a little luck.

Thanks Paul

namasste wrote in post #5568363
first is a great sportrait shot that parents and athletes would love. I would suggest that you sharpen a tad more and probably selectively. I use a three step process (capture in ACR, then high pass and finally USM in PS). Seems to crisp thing up nicely without oversharpening since you can control it in layers with opacity.

Scott, Thanks for the tip - I just tried it and that really does the trick. I need to start FTP with the photos. I see they lose so much detail when I reduce the file size to post them thru POTN.

It would be nice to do no PP - I find at the end of the night looking thru hundreds or thousands of photos is a killer.

There must be a way to batch process them all. Need to look into that.

Also I'm finding cropping another issue. I'm using EM and I don't like the idea of have to re crop for all these different sizes.

I will have to say I'm having a blast !!!

BTW Scott, You were right about photo #1 as she is my star.

6 weeks ago she collapsed on the LAX field. She got up on her own and the coach was yelling at her to score again. There happen to be the head ER Doctor from our local Hospital there. They checked her out and her pulse was well over 200 beats per minute. Well to make a long short she was operated on three days later to repair her heart. So She miss a few games but played the last four of the season and she's doing well.

shotpoint wrote in post #5568402
Great shots.
The essence of the sports were captured by your shots.
I love the picture below.

Thank

williec wrote in post #5568591
Careful, Paul...once you get to the NCAA level it's Women's Lax I, too shoot at the NCAA (D-III level)...where you heading?

Correction Noted - Thanks

AdamLewis wrote in post #5570990
I wish I could come do some shooting with you Paul!

They both look good. #2 is a little too abstract for my tastes but thats what sets us all apart. Only thing Id say is to watch your white balance. #2 is noticeably cooler than #1

Adam, Watch what you wish for. If she plays for Uconn we just might meet. Is this your last year? BTW about the WB - a few times I would get lost in all the settings. I'm sure by the start of the fall session I should have it pretty well figured out.

Also photo #1 was within the lens sweet spot. #2 was way at the end of the field. Just starting to understand the lens.

Thanks, Paul

unreal story on that girl Paul. She bada@@!

CS2 and 3 can batch stuff but I agree that it's a pain to go through thousands of shots. For me, I just am too anal retentive not to. Sharpening wise, I use the details tab in ACR at about 40/.7/25ish/75ish then open the RAW in PSE6 after adjusting any exposures. In PSE6, I dup the layer, then blend as soft light, go to filters, high pass and set to around 5 then adjust layer opacity accordingly. Finally, run USM around 120/.3/3-10 depending. Hope this makes sense. May seem like a lot but it's less than a minutes work/image.

Cropping is another story but since I have starting shooting for Maxpreps, I just use their sharpening action which I brought into PSE6. Basically crop everything to 2166x1600. The action also sets a saftey zone and as long as my crop fits into the zone, I can print 4x6 up to 16x20 with no issues whatsoever in terms of cutting off arms, legs, etc.

I can share more of my process if anyone is actually interested but for me the key is to spend 1 min or less per image to adjust color, exposure, sharpness, straighten, and crop. I know there are better ways such as using the Image Processor in CS2 but for us lowly PSE users, I do what I can.

Good luck on the biz and let me know if there is anything I can do to help.

Paul S wrote in post #5571544
Scott, Thanks for the tip - I just tried it and that really does the trick. I need to start FTP with the photos. I see they lose so much detail when I reduce the file size to post them thru POTN.

It would be nice to do no PP - I find at the end of the night looking thru hundreds or thousands of photos is a killer.

There must be a way to batch process them all. Need to look into that.

Also I'm finding cropping another issue. I'm using EM and I don't like the idea of have to re crop for all these different sizes.

I will have to say I'm having a blast !!!

BTW Scott, You were right about photo #1 as she is my star.

6 weeks ago she collapsed on the LAX field. She got up on her own and the coach was yelling at her to score again. There happen to be the head ER Doctor from our local Hospital there. They checked her out and her pulse was well over 200 beats per minute. Well to make a long short she was operated on three days later to repair her heart. So She miss a few games but played the last four of the season and she's doing well.

namasste wrote in post #5571797
unreal story on that girl Paul. She bada@@!

CS2 and 3 can batch stuff but I agree that it's a pain to go through thousands of shots. For me, I just am too anal retentive not to. Sharpening wise, I use the details tab in ACR at about 40/.7/25ish/75ish then open the RAW in PSE6 after adjusting any exposures. In PSE6, I dup the layer, then blend as soft light, go to filters, high pass and set to around 5 then adjust layer opacity accordingly. Finally, run USM around 120/.3/3-10 depending. Hope this makes sense. May seem like a lot but it's less than a minutes work/image.

Cropping is another story but since I have starting shooting for Maxpreps, I just use their sharpening action which I brought into PSE6. Basically crop everything to 2166x1600. The action also sets a saftey zone and as long as my crop fits into the zone, I can print 4x6 up to 16x20 with no issues whatsoever in terms of cutting off arms, legs, etc.

I can share more of my process if anyone is actually interested but for me the key is to spend 1 min or less per image to adjust color, exposure, sharpness, straighten, and crop. I know there are better ways such as using the Image Processor in CS2 but for us lowly PSE users, I do what I can.

Good luck on the biz and let me know if there is anything I can do to help.

Scott any thing to share would be greatfull - I need to stream line this part of it.

Oh BTW she is my daughter and I believe in angles !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Paul S wrote in post #5571613
Adam, Watch what you wish for. If she plays for Uconn we just might meet. Is this your last year? BTW about the WB - a few times I would get lost in all the settings. I'm sure by the start of the fall session I should have it pretty well figured out.

Also photo #1 was within the lens sweet spot. #2 was way at the end of the field. Just starting to understand the lens.

Thanks, Paul

haha well UConn is in the BigEast but Id probably only see you if you came here. I dont have the seniority to travel yet

Paul S wrote in post #5571856
Scott any thing to share would be greatfull - I need to stream line this part of it.

Oh BTW she is my daughter and I believe in angles !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Awesome Paul, obviously you're proud of her and it sounds like you have every reason to be. Glad to hear everything turned out well for you guys, sounds like someone () was watching over her.

Workflow is a tough one but I'll dig up a link Dennis sent to me about Image Processor in PS, it'll make you give serious thought to how you handle workflow.

Other than the sharpening techniques I do, the only other tweaks are to maybe add a soft light layer at really low opacity to give colors some punch and if it's a sport with helmets/hats, I may select the shadowed face areas and lighten shadows a touch (don't overdo that however as you get some funky results for sure).

That's about it for crop, sharpen, edit in my workflow. Sometimes I will also do some noise reduction although that is always done in batch via Noise Ninja.