Typical Hand-Held Low Light Yields

I was wondering what sort of yields you get from shooting (without flash) hand-held in low light such as for a wedding or indoor sports event. I'm a neophyte and I'm lucky if I get 1:25, but then I have no clue what I'm doing with high ISO yet. It's so much more difficult shooting hand-held without IS than I could have imagined, but I'm getting better and the results are showing it.

I've took some keepers with a 50mm (FF equivalent 88mm) @ 1/20. It really depends on the day for me

I know if you have a large aperture lens the yield rate goes up

Oops, now that I see watt100's post, I hadn't quite understood your question. In your gear list I see you have quite a bit of fast lenses, I'm surprised your keeper rate is so low.

Assuming your issue is motion blur, wedding is very different than indoor sport.

Wedding usually has slow moving subject, mottion blur usually is from camera shake. If this is the case, IS should improve handheld ability dramatically. Large aperture lens help onnly if you don't need large DOF. But when light is low enough, IS+high ISO should generate more keeper than large aperture.

For indoor sport, the issue is usually a fast moving subject. You will need highest possbile shutter speed. IS does little for you here. You need large aperture lenses.

I do not see any "fast" lenses in the Ops list, not that they would guarantee good results anyways. Indoors, and sports in general are indeed hard. Pratice, pratice, pratice. If you see your keeper rate improving each time you shoot you are doing well.

I agree with eelnoraa. I have more keepers (less blurry) shots with my 18-55 IS kit than my Sigma 30 1.4. I have to keep my Sigma at 1/50 shutter speed to stabilize the lens.

I shoot as low as 1/5-1/10 sometimes with my 24-105 F4L IS just because i need least 6.3-8F. i get a good keeper rate, then again my subjects know i'm taking photos and don't jump around I usually do 4-6 burst. Also i use flash for fill on subjects. Low exposure is just for the background.

You shouldn't have to be shooting at 1/20 second with a 5DII and a f2.8 lens unless you at shooting at a low ISO. Bump the ISO up to 1600 or 3200 and see the results bring.

The old rule-of-thumb from film days was that you should be able to hand-hold at a shutter speed at or above 1/focal length. For example, with a 100mm lens, you should be able to hand-hold at anything over 1/100 second.

I was mostly using my 24L-II. That's not fast?

gasrocks wrote in post #9152223
I do not see any "fast" lenses in the Ops list, not that they would guarantee good results anyways. Indoors, and sports in general are indeed hard. Pratice, pratice, pratice. If you see your keeper rate improving each time you shoot you are doing well.

I'm shooting at f/1.4 using my 24L-II. It was very dark where I was shooting. I couldn't even read my dial or controls. I had to use a small penlight to make adjustments.

fitzhughsmith wrote in post #9153222
You shouldn't have to be shooting at 1/20 second with a 5DII and a f2.8 lens unless you at shooting at a low ISO. Bump the ISO up to 1600 or 3200 and see the results bring.

Route246 wrote in post #9153360
I'm shooting at f/1.4 using my 24L-II. It was very dark where I was shooting. I couldn't even read my dial or controls. I had to use a small penlight to make adjustments.

For better results, set your eyes to ISO 3200 or higher. noob.
(kidding!!)

that does sound awfully dark. At least you got some keepers...