My first football of the season

I shot some youth league football last Sunday and had no time to do anything with them before I had to fly to Dallas for my day job, no PP done to these, i am checking these on my crappy work laptop so let me know what you think.
Thanks
Frank

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I think you need to get closer and isolate the players from the bg.

The EXIF data shows these were taken with the 300mm at f/2.8 with a fast SS. The action captured was good but it seems like you should get a sharper image with your camera/lens combo. How far from the sideline were you?

Try cropping these images tighter and re-post the images larger with larger file sizes. A 91kb file is pretty small.

Pic 1 I was pretty far off and almost didnt shoot it, I will have to crop them when I get home on the 3rd, I am working in Dallas then Pittsburgh for the day job. I agree about the sharpness I have been getting what I would call blah pics and cant put my finger on why. Thanks for the input, when I get home I will do some work on them.

If these are full frame, then you were too far down field, in my opinion. Shooting football means lots of walking. I find it rather hard to shoot little dudes with a big lens. I shoot their games with a 70-200. Remember, a 300 or 400 is going to compress your image - flatten it. If you want to get distance between your subject and background, you have to mix up the ratios. The farther you are away from the subject, the flatter the image gets with telephoto lenses. The closer you get, the more depth you get. Example. If you are shooting 15 yards down field, the sidelines will be 15 to 30 yards away depending on the angle. Move 40 yards down field, to get the same seperation between subject and background/sidelines - it would have to be 40 to 60 yards behind. Then add to that the factor of a 300 versus a 200, and it makes the distance need to be even further.

This isn't a big deal with NCAA or Pro sized players because they fill the frame more and it changes up the ratios. But cropping little guys, it is better to get closer and shoot tighter to get greater depth into the shot.

Hope this makes sense. Love the 300, use it, but just fill the frame. Ups the challenge of shooting... but that is the fun of it.

I uploaded two images to show you how shooting at 200 can really punch the backgrounds out - not that they were perfect pictures in of themselves. Cheers!

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I am confused as to what Mark is trying to say above particularly with respect to using 200mm.

Thanks Mark I will keep that in mind, I have a 70-200 2:8 and another body and my next thing to do is start using both on the sideline.

I don't see the connection between the name and the game.

Cheers.

I love shooting football w/ my MkIIn and the 70-200 2.8 IS. It gives great DOF and I can relatively close to the action. Last weekend there was a guy shooting w/ a 400 2.8 and he was half way down the field. I viewed his gallery and it wasn't all that impressive. He had great shots of other things w/ the 400 (HS FB), but not pee wee. To the OP, try the 70-200 next game and I'm sure you'll be happy with the results.

I am going to put the 70-200 to use on the next game. My next chance will be in Rock Island on the 4th of Sept, at my sons game there I am working in Pittsburgh until then on my day job. My wife and I will be making the 3 hour drive for the game.

bobbyz wrote in post #8526375
I am confused as to what Mark is trying to say above particularly with respect to using 200mm.

Have you ever seen the effect done in movies or on TV where the person seems to stay the same size, but the background either zooms in closer or pushes further back. Really long lenses will make the background look a lot closer to the subject than a shorter lens. So by actually getting closer to the subject with a shorter lens, you push the background further back.

If you have a clean background, long lenses are great. Or if the background is far away, link shooting down field at action. But shooting cross field with a long lens creates issues becuase it pulls the background closer to the subject.

Let try this another way. A lot of action in football happens between the 30 yard markers. Unfortunately in college and pro, you can't shoot there. You have two choices. If you set up camp on the 30 at action happening on the 50, the oposite sidelins will be an equal distance between you and the subject, and itself and the subject. Shooting tight with a 300 or 400 in these conidtions is going to pull that sideline mess up tighter to the subject than a shorter lens would. Much like the poster's first shot. Now if you are stuck shooting long glass, then approach would then be to take a sharper angle to the action, move furhter down field. This would rotate the sideline further away from the subject.

Or you could try to shoot with a shorter lens which would not comprese the image as much. The problem is that it is totally a crap shoot. You got a 50/50 chance the ball is coming your direction. If you know your teams well, you can improve your odds. Or you can do what a lot of pros do and sit in the end with a 400, pop on or off a TC as needed, and have another body with a 70-200 at your side incase the play comes into the endzone. With these little guys, cruising the sidelines is much more effective, in my experience. Wearing knee pads and getting low, and moving up and down the field with them is the best way to have happy results.

At least it has worked for me.

OK, I get what you saying about the tele compression but won't longer glass offer more blurring of the back ground? Shoot closer with 200mm f2.8 or farther with 400mm f2.8, I would think 400mm f2.8 would be better choice to avoid ugly back grounds. Maybe I should try my 70-200mm and compare it to 50m f4.

Since I can't move fast, for me the better option is sit low in the end zone with something like 500mm f4 and shoot as action comes towards you. I do miss shots if action is on the far end. With something like 300mm f2.8 I am more mobile and will shoot from sidelines.

Hey, everyone has to work with what they have.

As to blurring (commonly known as Bokeh), there are a lot of factors that drive it. Number of blades in the aperture, type of glass, DOF, etc. But one thing the Canon 300 and 400 have is beautiful "blur"

So here is another fun factor for you. Even with the big daddy lenses being shot at f2.8, the further the subject, the bigger the area that will be in focus will be. So by shooting really long shots, you have a fatter in focus area. Anytime you can shorten up the range you are shooting, and having the background be further from the subject, the better the blur will be. On fields surrounded by chain link and ugly parking lots, the only way to get rid of them is to shoot short range getting them as far back as possible. You can even get then to completely go away if you are lucky. Get youself a short little squatty camp stool, or better yet put a bleachers seat pad thing on the ground, and they will fade downward in your shots. The lower you get, the better you are off.

I am in my late 40's, have been doing this since college, and played lots of dumb sports, so my knees really complain about it. But it is the best way to get the shot.

Cheers.

Croasdail wrote in post #8533581
Hey, everyone has to work with what they have.

As to blurring (commonly known as Bokeh), there are a lot of factors that drive it. Number of blades in the aperture, type of glass, DOF, etc. But one thing the Canon 300 and 400 have is beautiful "blur"

So here is another fun factor for you. Even with the big daddy lenses being shot at f2.8, the further the subject, the bigger the area that will be in focus will be. So by shooting really long shots, you have a fatter in focus area. Anytime you can shorten up the range you are shooting, and having the background be further from the subject, the better the blur will be. On fields surrounded by chain link and ugly parking lots, the only way to get rid of them is to shoot short range getting them as far back as possible. You can even get then to completely go away if you are lucky. Get youself a short little squatty camp stool, or better yet put a bleachers seat pad thing on the ground, and they will fade downward in your shots. The lower you get, the better you are off.

I am in my late 40's, have been doing this since college, and played lots of dumb sports, so my knees really complain about it. But it is the best way to get the shot.

Cheers.

Agree.

Sometimes small change in your shooting position or angle can make a big difference in those ugly back grounds.