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Question from Kristin: “I’m having a hard time getting sport pictures not to turn out blurry.”
Stephanie: Try using back button focus
Mark: Technique I also use is to use fast shutter speed 1/1000 and open the aperture to F/3.5 or even F/2.8 in lower light
Aaron: Servo mode and a fast shutter speed. Also, a kit lens won’t cut it!
Donna: You need a higher shutter speed.
Stephanie: I shoot a lot of sports. And the truth is your ratio of “good” will be much lower than portraits. I shot with a canon so I can only speak to that but the main thing I learned is to used your center focus only. It completely changed the outcome of my pictures. Of course your lens and camera play a great deal into the quality of your photos but you can still get good shots with a lower end camera. Also will depend on how well you know the sport and what to watch for. It really is about practice! Google is a great resource for tips on sports photography.
Brandon: Back button focus is definitely something you should use. It locks your focus so you’re not waiting for the camera to re-focus when you press the shutter button. And if you try using shutter priority or manual mode, you can try the rule of thumb of keeping the denominator of the shutter speed no lower than the focal length you’re using. So if you’re at 250mm, don’t go any slower than 1/250. Be careful with larger apertures as you might cause the depth of field unintentionally on the wrong subject… like your friend/ son/ daughter’s opponent instead of on your kid, friend, etc. Higher shutter speeds will definitely help freeze the action, but you can capture a little bit of motion blur by using slightly slower speeds. For example, seeing a slap shot with a little motion blur on the stick usually looks better than a completely frozen shot. And yes, practice practice practice!
Melissa: AI Servo, high shutter speed, high ISO (especially at night), good lens with a wide aperture–go as wide as possible, center focus only, and finally set your drive on high speed continuous. Servo and H continuous allow you to track your subject without having to refocus and get off many shots. It’s not like portrait shooting at all.
Melissa: (I think servo actually disables the grid completely. Since servo tracks focus on a moving object a kid could be running straight at you and your camera would automatically keep her in focus as she got closer and closer.)
Kristin: I just bought a Canon 60d. I am the yearbook sponsor
Katherine: Up the iso, noisy photos are better than blurry
Mildred: jpeg instead of raw.
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