New Camera / Graduation Photos

Hi all,
I am a NON professional, just an average joe here, looking to upgrade my Kodak EasyShare digital camera to the Canon PowerShot SX20-IS.
My daughter is getting ready to graduate High school, and in addition to that she has a senior award she is being presented.
These are two major events and I want to make sure I capture them appropriately
The awards ceremony will be held inside in an auditorium, not sure of the distance I will be shooting, but in the past, no matter how far or close I am, these auditoriums always have terrible lighting and my photos are always blurred or dark :/
For the Graduation, it will be held at her high school on the football field, with seating being on the bleechers.
My questions are, what can I do, to make sure I am able to get decent shots, at both events? Lighting and distance wise ?
Please remember I am not a professional, but I am eager to learn and appreciate any and all help
Thank you so much
Kristy

Kristy,

I'm not a professional either (nor do I have experience with the Powershot), but I think a couple suggestions for you would to be to make sure you bump your ISO up to get a decent shutter speed and use a tripod if you can to avoid handshake. The downside is a possibility of some graininess in the picture due to the higher ISO, but at least they won't be blurry. You might see if you can recreate the lighting scenario to test it out before hand. I'm sure somebody with some experience with this camera might be able to give you some more suggestions than I can.

Kristy-

First of all, these are some tough questions, and I think you're taking the right approach. First of all, let's dispense with the impossible/improbable.​..the response of "Get a 5D Mark II and a 70-200 2.8 IS Mark II" is not a reasonable solution for you.

So let's talk about the SX20is, assuming you're going to get one, and your particular shooting scenarios:

Let's talk about the graduation outside, because it's easier. The SX20is will allow you to shoot from the bleachers with its "20x optical zoom." I implore you to keep the "4x digital zoom" turned off. It may give you the supposed advantage of more reach, but the picture quality will leave you very upset. With being outdoors, you'll have the advantage of having enough light, and you should be able to generate some nice clean images.

The shooting in the auditorium is a different story. You've said that in the past, your images have either been too dark, or too blurry. These, of course, are elements related to exposure and available light. Since I don't know how much you understand exposure, and I don't want to talk down to you, I won't make any assumptions. So the only advice that I have is to try and set your camera to as high an ISO as you can get away with. Though that camera has ISO ratings of 80-1600, I wouldn't expect it to be noise-free past ISO 200, and I would imagine 400 to be "usable" but noisy. Once you hit 800, forget about it (IMHO.)

When you get your SX20is, I would perform the following experiment: shoot some shots around your house in "P" mode or in green box mode at ISO 200, 400, and 800. See if you can deal with the graininess of the pictures. That what you'll know the top end of the ISO that you're willing to deal with.

If any of this is confusing, I'd be happy to answer more questions for you. I'm an amateur myself, who is still learning to take better pictures. Shoot me a private message with a little bit more about how much experience and technical savvy you have, and we'll talk

Good luck!