Hi all,
I occasionally do some part time event/sports photography (have covered Equestrian, athletics, cycling events etc). However I seem to have an issue with focusing and I'm trying to figure out whether this is a technique problem or a gear problem (I have a pro quality lens coupled with a consumer/prosumer body).
Lets take an event I covered yesterday, which was a cycling event. Here I used my Nikon D90 (11 focusing points, I think just the center point is crosshair, not sure what this means though!) and Nikon 70-200 f2.8 VR-I. Light was relatively low, so I was operating at ISO 1000-1250 and f/2.8 to get a shutter speed around 1/500s. I got a ratio of around 40%-50% in focus - which I desperately want to improve so I can then work on getting better compositions!!
These are the technical settings I was using:
1. Aperture: f2.8 for all the day
2. Continuous autofocusing mode enabled all day
3. Auto focusing mode: through out the day I tried single point, dynamic (camera can switch to another focusing points), 3D tracking (a more advanced version of dynamic I think). I think single point or possibly dynamic worked best for me. 3D was ok but would also randomly select a rider at the back of a pack. The flip side was I think that the compositions weren't great - obviously very central with single point center and when I used off an center point there was an even briefer moment when the composition looked well without excessive space at the top or bottom of the image. No time to focus and re-compose
4. Mid way through the day I switched to using burst shooting to try ensure I got at least one photo sharp of each rider (this helped but obviously I have many more photos to go through to select the best version).
5. I tried decoupling the AF on from the shutter button and assigning it to the AE/AF lock button, i.e. when I pressed the AE/AF lock button the autofocus would engage.
6. Impact of composition on focusing: tried head-on and 45 degree to the rider. Just to be clear, my method was to press AF-on and move the camera with the rider (if necessary) and then fire off a continuous burst when I thought the composition would be reasonable.
7. A thought also just struck me - I had VR enabled on the 70-200 lens - maybe this might have been contributing to slower autofocus?
8. I realised at least a few times as I moved the camera to track the riders I might have inadvertently focused on the background rather than the rider. Maybe I should shoot less and have very defined compositions in mind?
So my question is there anything obvious I might be doing wrong from a technique perspective or would a new body like a Nikon D600 or Nikon D800 really improve my shots considerably?
Here are some of the images I was happy with:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
I occasionally do some part time event/sports photography (have covered Equestrian, athletics, cycling events etc). However I seem to have an issue with focusing and I'm trying to figure out whether this is a technique problem or a gear problem (I have a pro quality lens coupled with a consumer/prosumer body).
Lets take an event I covered yesterday, which was a cycling event. Here I used my Nikon D90 (11 focusing points, I think just the center point is crosshair, not sure what this means though!) and Nikon 70-200 f2.8 VR-I. Light was relatively low, so I was operating at ISO 1000-1250 and f/2.8 to get a shutter speed around 1/500s. I got a ratio of around 40%-50% in focus - which I desperately want to improve so I can then work on getting better compositions!!
These are the technical settings I was using:
1. Aperture: f2.8 for all the day
2. Continuous autofocusing mode enabled all day
3. Auto focusing mode: through out the day I tried single point, dynamic (camera can switch to another focusing points), 3D tracking (a more advanced version of dynamic I think). I think single point or possibly dynamic worked best for me. 3D was ok but would also randomly select a rider at the back of a pack. The flip side was I think that the compositions weren't great - obviously very central with single point center and when I used off an center point there was an even briefer moment when the composition looked well without excessive space at the top or bottom of the image. No time to focus and re-compose
4. Mid way through the day I switched to using burst shooting to try ensure I got at least one photo sharp of each rider (this helped but obviously I have many more photos to go through to select the best version).
5. I tried decoupling the AF on from the shutter button and assigning it to the AE/AF lock button, i.e. when I pressed the AE/AF lock button the autofocus would engage.
6. Impact of composition on focusing: tried head-on and 45 degree to the rider. Just to be clear, my method was to press AF-on and move the camera with the rider (if necessary) and then fire off a continuous burst when I thought the composition would be reasonable.
7. A thought also just struck me - I had VR enabled on the 70-200 lens - maybe this might have been contributing to slower autofocus?
8. I realised at least a few times as I moved the camera to track the riders I might have inadvertently focused on the background rather than the rider. Maybe I should shoot less and have very defined compositions in mind?
So my question is there anything obvious I might be doing wrong from a technique perspective or would a new body like a Nikon D600 or Nikon D800 really improve my shots considerably?
Here are some of the images I was happy with:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
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