First time High school Lacrosse

These were taken at my brothers high school lacrosse game. These photos, in particular, were taken with a 70-200mm f/4 is lens and a Canon 7D.

The second photo you just barely missed, with the player in white in focus.. and #3 (your brother I assume) just barely off. The last one is probably a good one for family etc, but it seems with so much extra space on the left and the goalkeeper out of focus it would be better with a different angle to eliminate so much of that space? On the ones that you can without losing too much, be sure to straighten the horizon.

I've never seen a lacrosse match since it's not a high school sport up here, but the pictures are far better than my first D-SLR shots were. Like the first one best, and better than the third one which seems to be the next sequence of shots because the goalkeeper's big back end is the center of the shot.

Not bad for just getting into it!

For sports, I always shoot center point focus, which sometimes helps, and sometimes makes me miss a shot or two. Whatev.

As far as composition, photographers will steal each other's compostions like crazy. Look around for good ideas on this forum and flickr, make a mental note of what you like, then go out and shoot it!

If your anything like i was when i first picked up a DSLR, it's frustrating as hell. But keep with it, and don't stop shooting! Everything else will come eventually. I highly recommend using Adobe Lightroom for your workflow (you'll fall in love with the "punch" preset) with Jeffrey's Lightroom Exporter for getting them on flickr easily.

-Adam

DHMN wrote in post #10105238
The second photo you just barely missed, with the player in white in focus.. and #3 (your brother I assume) just barely off. The last one is probably a good one for family etc, but it seems with so much extra space on the left and the goalkeeper out of focus it would be better with a different angle to eliminate so much of that space? On the ones that you can without losing too much, be sure to straighten the horizon.

I've never seen a lacrosse match since it's not a high school sport up here, but the pictures are far better than my first D-SLR shots were. Like the first one best, and better than the third one which seems to be the next sequence of shots because the goalkeeper's big back end is the center of the shot.

Thanks for the input, ill be sure to get a different angle so i can also get the goalie close in the frame. I was using my 7D's 19 point AI servo where the focusing points jump around which might explain why some of the shots are just a little bit out of focus. I will try using the expanded middle focus point and see how things go.

nickanzo wrote in post #10107289
Thanks for the input, ill be sure to get a different angle so i can also get the goalie close in the frame. I was using my 7D's 19 point AI servo where the focusing points jump around which might explain why some of the shots are just a little bit out of focus. I will try using the expanded middle focus point and see how things go.

Another thing you could do is make the aperture smaller so more is in focus. What was your shutter speed?

CJM Photography wrote in post #10107342
Another thing you could do is make the aperture smaller so more is in focus. What was your shutter speed?

Anywhere from 1/600 to 1/1250. I usually try to keep it above 1/800 otherwise the nets on the lacrosse stick tend to blur.

Also, the size of the aperture when i took these photos was f/4.

nickanzo wrote in post #10107372
Anywhere from 1/600 to 1/1250. I usually try to keep it above 1/800 otherwise the nets on the lacrosse stick tend to blur.

Also, the size of the aperture when i took these photos was f/4.

I guessed is was F4, try shooting at F8, more will be in focus. also what was your ISO? and what body are you using?

CJM Photography wrote in post #10107399
I guessed is was F4, try shooting at F8, more will be in focus. also what was your ISO? and what body are you using?

I was shooting at iso 100, I guess I can bump that up to get to f8. I am using a canon 7d, so noise should be minimal at higher isos.

nickanzo wrote in post #10107537
I was shooting at iso 100, I guess I can bump that up to get to f8. I am using a canon 7d, so noise should be minimal at higher isos.

I would totally crank up the ISO, the 7D is really good with higher ISO's and then you can use a smaller aperture AND a high shutter speed, just dont over do it.

CJM Photography wrote in post #10107556
I would totally crank up the ISO, the 7D is really good with higher ISO's and then you can use a smaller aperture AND a high shutter speed, just dont over do it.

Thanks for the advice, I will post more photos after their next game to see the improvement.

On a side note, i was looking at your flickr and you have the same computer case and keyboard i had with my old computer, i recently built a new one.

nickanzo wrote in post #10107649
Thanks for the advice, I will post more photos after their next game to see the improvement.

On a side note, i was looking at your flickr and you have the same computer case and keyboard i had with my old computer, i recently built a new one.

Sweet
I love the case, a tad bit small, but in my next build I am planning on the corsair 800d (it will most likely be a 1000D then) and I want the logitech g19 keyboard but it is a little much for a keyboard and most of my money goes into photography stuff...

Don't get me wrong, I love these pictures but if the other players were in focus as well it would make for more interesting shots.

CJM Photography wrote in post #10107664
Sweet
I love the case, a tad bit small, but in my next build I am planning on the corsair 800d (it will most likely be a 1000D then) and I want the logitech g19 keyboard but it is a little much for a keyboard and most of my money goes into photography stuff...

Don't get me wrong, I love these pictures but if the other players were in focus as well it would make for more interesting shots.

When i was building my new computer i was looking at the 800d (mainly for the amazing cable management system), i was going to so a water-cooling system in that case, but my budget didn't allow for it.
I am using a g19 right now and it is a really nice keyboard, i use this program called everest which allows me to create an application that goes on the LCD screen on the keyboard. It reports the temperature of all my cores and GPU, in addition to cpu, gpu and memory usage.

Straighten your horizons when you crop.

2nd to last shot is a very good capture.

Enjoy!

What I've found to work best for me is choosing point with expansion just above the center. You can also set it so that if you go portrait it will change to a high center spot just by turning the camera...and then back when you change to landscape. With the 7D I also shoot full RAW so I can crop, recompose and straighten horizons til the cows come home and not worry about image quality for prints. I'm usually at f2.8-f4 and high speed (1/1600) and like to keep it there to make the players stand out a bit. ISO wherever it needs to be.

Enjoy!