How many shots do you take?

H

Harmless`

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208
Name
Chris
Edit My Images
Yes
I've just covered a swimming meet for my wife's swimming club. I never done any type of sports photography, so I shot it with a spray and pray mentality and felt bloody silly, but I missed every single frame attempt as I know nothing about the timing of swimming. In the end I wound up with nearly 700 shots of water splashes, peoples backs and folks in superman dive poses, with the odd occasionally identifiable swimmer.

Must say that I find the rapid shutter clicks a bit embarrassing.

Is this a sign of a rank amateur,or what your average swim photographer does?
 
Harmless` said:
I've just covered a swimming meet for my wife's swimming club. I never done any type of sports photography, so I shot it with a spray and pray mentality and felt bloody silly, but I missed every single frame attempt as I know nothing about the timing of swimming. In the end I wound up with nearly 700 shots of water splashes, peoples backs and folks in superman dive poses, with the odd occasionally identifiable swimmer.

Must say that I find the rapid shutter clicks a bit embarrassing.

Is this a sign of a rank amateur,or what your average swim photographer does?
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think you answered your own question there (y)

You gave it a go, it turned out :shrug: who knows, without pics no-one can comment. If it was a day out and you enjoyed it then it's good, if it's put you off shooting again it's bad.

Phil.
 
The two biggest tips I can ever give any potential sports photographer is to learn when to press the shutter! This should be a split second before the peak of the action.

The other tip is RESEARCH! Know the sport your covering. You simply cannot just turn up and point and shoot :nono:
 
I wouldn't worry about it. Having shot portraits for 18 months in a business sense, I tried my hand at a couple of sports events last year and ditched it even quicker than I'd agreed to do it.
 
awp said:
erm . . . yes! :)
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Damn!:nuts: I was hoping that I didn't look as foolish as I felt. I did enjoy myself, but was acutely aware of the clattering rate of the shutter.

The trouble is that all the swimmers have different breathing patterns (left or right or right and left with different frequncies)and trying to get a single shot as the water sloshes about is damn difficult.

The plus side is as my wife's relay team broke a British record, I might a photo published in a local paper, Whoot!

I did learn a lot about not standing next to the pool side when someone with a huge belly does a diving start though. Next time a bit further from the pool side and I'll try and anticipate better.

Here are some of my efforts. Please crit or I'll never learn.

img2.jpg



IMG_20431.jpg


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IMG_22791.jpg
 
Not as bad as I thought they would be tbh, goes to show that you should give it a go even if your not that confident, good efforts, just needs a little polish, that will come with practise.
Have a look round for some others shots and see how you can improve, Kipax has some on his site that are worth looking at for good pointers
Phil.
 
If I'd never done them before, I'd be pleased with those.
 
Why didn't you use flash in these?
 
I think they ar egood. I would crop the silver handrail out of the last shot though.
 
awp said:
Why didn't you use flash in these?
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Because he's new to this type of photography and maybe though flash would be frowned upon?

Do you EVER have anything positive to say about anything?
 
I didn't use flash as the competion organiser said it might distract the competitors especially at the start. These guys get disqualified if they false start!

I'm happy with some of the images I took, but rather than skillful planning, it feels like a numbers game by taking a huge number of pics, but as I have no experience, is this the norm?

I was shooting at 1/650th throughout, but this meant to ISO wobbled between 2500-3200. Should I shoot a little shower next time to try to reduce noise in the full sized imag?
 
Dman said:
Because he's new to this type of photography and maybe though flash would be frowned upon?

Do you EVER have anything positive to say about anything?
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yes - often.

You are now on my growing ignore list! :)
 
awp said:
yes - often.

You are now on my growing ignore list! :)
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Maybe if you weren't so negative in everything you post, Mr Meldrew, you wouldn't have an ignore list?
 
Harmless` said:
I didn't use flash as the competion organiser said it might distract the competitors especially at the start.
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Common sense, really. Some people will do anything to moan about 'amateurs' having a go though.

Like I said, you got some good shots (y)
 
Thanks.
It was fun and I'd do it again, but being in a new enviroment can really throw you out. I got asked to take a group shot of a team that had just broken a European record and I missed their feet, forgot to take it off hi speed continuous and blazed away at a static group!
 
The horizon on No1 is off by about 2°, which you can straighten without losing too much, and if you went for a closer crop on No4 you'd lose the rail and close in on the action a bit more, but considering the pessimism in your first post those are not bad shots at all.
 
I think you were being a little harsh on yourself, for a first time these are good

1) i would either try and shoot from above or get down lower

2) crop it to get rid of the lane markers

3) would be good straightened and cropped so that the Omega logo runs across the top of the frame

4) Good framing, shows you were thinking about the right sort of shots

5) Get rid of the hand rail for the ladder, distracting

Ignore people like AWP they are living in the past, and spend so much time criticising others for wanting to do something that they waste the years of experience and knowledge they could share being negative and bitter.

AWP If you don't have anything constructive to share maybe you should stop posting, your the worst kind of keyboard warrior around, you constantly take swipes at people knocking them down when you could, if you weren't so negative all the time, help people massively. Its clear you have plenty of experience so why don't you share it?

There are plenty covering sports on here who will be happy to try and help you improve. Snappz and Kipax are good for advice purely for the wide range of sports they cover :)
 
Andrew asked the OP why he didn`t use flash, the OP has answered. How is that negative?

To the OP, I do very little sport, so can`t add much to what has been said.Keep an eye on composition when taking or cropping the photographs. #1 is very cluttered and #3 would look a lot better without the feet and lower legs of the officials showing for example.
 
I don't think you've done too bad for your first time imo.
 
Ade, i was referring to the rank amateur comment, just fed up of people posting in threads and offering nothing positive constructive or helpful
 
snapzz said:
The two biggest tips I can ever give any potential sports photographer is to learn when to press the shutter! This should be a split second before the peak of the action.

The other tip is RESEARCH! Know the sport your covering. You simply cannot just turn up and point and shoot :nono:
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Is that ever the holy grail!
 
For a first go at this I think you've done better than you're aware. The thing that's letting these shots down is lack of editing - it's an essential part of producing good quality images.

Here's a couple just sharpened, colour corrected and levels adjusted....

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5410351942_fcb3580c5c_o.jpg


Is this 2nd one full frame ? If so there's alot of potential there if you can crop tighter and get the detail on that face - the frozen water running off his face, the eye contact, his expression - it's all there - give it a go.
 
Well I've rotated and cropped a bit more, though I can't seem to do much for 4 as it seems to tight to rotate and crop.

img2-2.jpg


IMG_20432-2.jpg


IMG_21772-2.jpg


IMG_22793-2.jpg
 
Can you post a link to the original full sized version of this?


5410351942_fcb3580c5c_o.jpg
 
Much better, take heed of what CT says. Personally , I would bin number 1, too messy, concentrate on the others.
 
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I think number 4 is much better, but the quality of number 2 has been lost (do you shoot JPEG or RAW?) and I think the image had more impact when you could see the lane markers personally, but maybe thats just me...
 
Its a bit unfortunate that that shot was a mistake as when I moved position to the end of the lane, I went to the wrong lane, so I missed the swimmer I was meant to be taking!
But I'll send you the file.
 
Harmless` said:
Its a bit unfortunate that that shot was a mistake as when I moved position to the end of the lane, I went to the wrong lane, so I missed the swimmer I was meant to be taking!
But I'll send you the file.
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LOL OK. It's worth a look at anyway - with 7D images I'd be surprised if you can't get something out of that one if it's reasonably sharp.
 
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Well it was a jpeg you sent me but I don't think the raw file would have added much. It's not as sharp as I'd hoped unfortunately...

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Still - it's not too bad in all honesty. It seems you used 3200 ISO, shutter speed was 1/640th and aperture was f/6.5, so apart from not using flash (assuming it would be allowed anyway) you've pretty much made the right choices there. The only thing is I think I'd have been inclined to shoot wide open which would have given you a much faster shutter speed and a better chance of freezing the action. Not that I know too much about swimming, I could drown in the bath.:D

For a first go I don't think you should be despondent and for a specialised subject like this half the battle is knowing the game before you start - you'll be a wiser rabbit next time. ;)
 
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Harmless` said:
I was shooting at 1/650th throughout, but this meant to ISO wobbled between 2500-3200. Should I shoot a little shower next time to try to reduce noise in the full sized imag?
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Sorry Chris, I've only just picked up on this post of yours from earlier. This sounds like where you went wrong with this. The fact that you set auto ISO and a shutter speed of 1/650th was manitained throghout indicates you used TV mode. Selecting a speed of 1/640th has prevented you from getting a much faster shutter speed.

I'd shoot this in AV mode and I'd set a high ISO but forget the auto ISO. If you shoot in AV starting wide open and keep an eye on the shutter speed in your viewfinder you always have the choice of stopping down a little as your shutter speed changes slightly, but the main thing is you'll always be getting the fastest shutter speed which that aperture allows in the prevailing light.
 
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Why not use auto iso Cedric? If the camera can cope with high iso, is it not a useful tool to use?

OOI.
 
fracster said:
Why not use auto iso Cedric? If the camera can cope with high iso, is it not a useful tool to use?

OOI.
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I don't use it Frac. High ISO is becoming less of a problem all the time. so I'd sooner the make the choice myself.

In this instance though Chris has set auto ISO, used TV and set a shutter speed of 1/650th., which means the camera is going to maintain that exact speed by varying the ISO and/or the aperture.

The only pic I've looked at the EXIF for ( last one I edited) shows it was 1/650th at f/6.5,a nd 3200 ISO so the camera has probably stopped down to 6.5 to maintain 1/650th. ( Only one f stop larger would have given a shutter speed of 1/1300th - 2 stops would have given 1/2600th.

I dunno what the max aperture of Chris's lens is, but he could have been getting much faster shutter speeds than he was. Hope that makes sense?
 
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TBH I use it in Ap Priority. The nikon system lets you set the minimum shutter speed and max ISO, it will try to keep at or above that SS by varying the ISO, the aperture never changes.If it reaches the max iso it will start to drop the SS.


I think that makes sense.....:thinking:
 
It would make more sense to use it in aperture priority to me anyway frac.
 
fracster said:
TBH I use it in Ap Priority. The nikon system lets you set the minimum shutter speed and max ISO, it will try to keep at or above that SS by varying the ISO, the aperture never changes.If it reaches the max iso it will start to drop the SS.


I think that makes sense.....:thinking:
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You can do something similar with the 1D series, but with the 7 it's a bit of a lottery. I did try it once but I found that the results were more random than Zebedee! :D
 
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