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Canon r6, 70mm focal length, cropped from the left. Exposure adjustments made to brighten the image. Shutter priority @ 1/1200, f/4, auto ISO 12,800. Servo autofocus. Lightroom’s noise reduction feature used. Also darkened the background and used the new blur function to throw the spectators and sideline folks OOF. Any and all feedback welcomed including tips on sports photography beyond this image. For example, these sorts of group images vs. trying to get a single player in action?
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- https://instagram.com/lightstalking
- https://www.flickr.com/photos/lightstalking
- Allows Edits: Yes
Allows Edits? YesVery solid if you’re a fan of #31 !!
TBH, I think shooting at 70mm is going to be very tough in most situations in sports. I think you would need to be immediately on the baseline at that focal length to fill the frame (almost dangerously close). I’d be pulling out my longer lenses for this one.
That being said, I think this is a solid effort at 70. I’d possibly burn #23 a little more to really bring the eye to #31.
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Thanks for this feedback. A good part of this outing involved experimenting with my positioning. My wife wants me in the stands with her and that’s where I was most of the time–in the stands, near mid-court and about 10 feet above the floor. I had my 70-200mm lens (and no other). Even so, nearly all my images were shot at 70 or 90 mm, most with only a small amount of cropping. This surprised me. For this and a few other shots, I was on court level where 70mm made for tight framing. I was able to include the ball in most of my pictures from the stands as Lenny and Valery suggested, but not here. From this position, I needed a wide angle lens, a different position or different timing. Portrait orientation might have given me the wider angle to include the ball and narrower framing. Burst mode might have gotten the ball and action along with the players’ focus. I should try that.
This brings me to one of the issues I have: environmental action (groups of players in the action) or portrait of a player or two (#31 is our grandson and the reason for my presence). It may not be and either/or choice; but it seems really hard.
I’ve modified my profile. If either of you can produce a different crop that does what you prefer, I’d like to see it. The original doesn’t include any space at the top.
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Here’s another go at this image, completely eliminating the basket and net since the ball wasn’t in the frame at all–not just cropped out. I’m pretty sure that waiting for the ball to enter the frame would have captured the moment and a wider angle might have added to much, diluting the subject. I also didn’t apply the blurring function, leaving the background more in focus. What do you think?
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Some people behind number 33 and 31 in the first version were not blurred which was a give away. Maybe a blur amount between the two would work but be careful not to leave any telltales.
Interesting PP to work with but a shallower DOF than f/4 might be a better starting point.
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Shutter priority resulted in f/4 but all showed backgrounds in focus. Distance between the lens and focus point seems to have a more direct effect on dof than f stop. I could apply additional blur to those faces in the 1st version—well, Lightroom says you can but I was never good at staying between the lines in my childhood coloring books.
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Granted that distance to subject matters but so does f stop and focal length.
I tend to use manual with auto ISO for control of shutter and aperture.
This may help some who are reading this.
https://www.photopills.com/calculators/dof
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IMHO without the ball the storyline is incomplete; therefore to salvage the image, I tried out the generative fill feature in Photoshop on my iPad and added a Basketball. Blurred out the people in the stands behind the players, darkened #23 in order to bring attention to # 31 and darkened the background to help the “subject’ stand out more. The white line at the top and the guy in yellow lower right side were both eye snags – filled in the white line with black and Desaturated the guy in yellow lower right side.
Again, I just did a quick edit on my iPad and you can do better with original image. Just wanted to give you an idea to see what you think.
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Thanks for all this feedback. Several responses:
DOF: f/4 is the limit of my 2 main lenses. I have a 150-500 that limits f stops even more than that. I am surprised at how much focus occurs at the wide end of a 70-200 lens at 70mm.
Distractions: I do like eliminating that 2nd white line at the top of the frame and dulling the boy in the background.
The ball: I wouldn’t add an element to any of my photos. Why? Well, lack of skill plays into part of it I suppose. I would have preferred the ball in the frame but it just wasn’t there. I had originally set my Canon r6 to high speed burst but turned it off. If I had left it on, I probably would have gotten the ball in the frame but almost certainly have lost the pose of the grouping. I’m not a photojournalist (obviously) but I don’t think news sources allow much change, especially not the addition of objects to a picture. Most of these pros now have a direct FTP feed from shutter click to delivery to the editors and use jpg! One tip I’ve read since starting this: shoot high speed. You can’t anticipate all of the action so you’ll have to throw a lot away but you increase your chances of getting the decisive moment/(in this sport, instant).
Framing/Focal Length: A good part of my initial question had to do with composition. My pictures mostly were from a distance and at 70-90mm. I had a lot of leftover focal length that went unused. This picture was shot from floor level and I had to stand back from the action to get this much into the frame (minimal crop on this one), barely getting the rim in. I need to practice my technique, switching to portrait but also limiting the horizontal space and number of players in the scene. I went to our local newspaper to review photos from its own (contract) photographers of our women’s basketball team. There was hardly an image there that contained more than 3 players, all action shots including a ball, most with only 2, many with the photographer kneeling on the floor shooting up. This likely involves a lot of moving around to get an angle that includes only 2 or 3 players.
Your feedback is helpful, so thanks to all. I have photographed our grandchildren’s sports activities but not basketball in the last 3 years or so since Covid hit. The difference between 10 year olds and 13-15 year olds is huge and makes for very different photography.
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