First Dressage / Show Jumping Comp - Any Advice?

neil_g · 23 Aug 2010

+1 about the 1Dmk3. about £1300 2nd hand will get you a pretty good one.

mike weeks · 23 Aug 2010

neil_g said:
okay so ideally to get anice bokeh to blur out the horrid backgrounds a lot of venues have so you should be shooting with a large aperture. Now day the rider is in the jumpoff so is cutting corners all over the place and you've prefocused for the center of the jump. If that rider is 1 or 2 meters away from where you've prefocused at 200/300mm you'll end up with a soft shot.

Even at f2.8 & 200mm a shift of 1 metre by the horse will not make the image soft (it is within the DofF) if you are shooting to get all the horse in the frame - I always prefocus on the centre of the jump - only exceptions are jump offs where I know corners may be cut but by then I will have already got saleable shots so I can afford to experiment.

Mike

neil_g · 23 Aug 2010

mike weeks said:
Even at f2.8 & 200mm a shift of 1 metre by the horse will not make the image soft (it is within the DofF) if you are shooting to get all the horse in the frame - I always prefocus on the centre of the jump - only exceptions are jump offs where I know corners may be cut but by then I will have already got saleable shots so I can afford to experiment.

Mike

i know we've had this debate before mike but im going to still respectfully disagree on the whole pre-focus thing.

in this day and age where AF tracking and lens speed have improved greatly (the 1dmk3 is a great example, the amount of focus tracking options is immense) i cant think of a single benefit of pre-focus only drawbacks.

mike weeks · 23 Aug 2010

Neil,

the OP does not have the camera lens combo that you have and therefore that is 2 reasons why pre-focus will suit them better. Next if they know they already have a suitable focus then all they have to concentrate on is composition and lastly they do not have your experience of timimg so whilst pre-focus may not suit you it is 4 excellent reasons to recommend that they use it

neil_g · 23 Aug 2010

mike weeks said:
Neil,

the OP does not have the camera lens combo that you have and therefore that is 2 reasons why pre-focus will suit them better.

but the OP is asking about bodies like the mk3 that has the tracking options. but even with my old 20D i used servo with no issues.

Next if they know they already have a suitable focus then all they have to concentrate on is composition

id like to think if taking on an event like this they have suitable knowledge of sports and would be able to compose a moving subject.

and lastly they do not have your experience of timimg so whilst pre-focus may not suit you it is 4 excellent reasons to recommend that they use it

as above.

but i think its a case of agree to disagree..