Express Action Sports

I am looking for a good camera to take fast action shot basically to use during games like basketball, volleyball, football etc. The camera must be able to take indoor sport photo as well. Please help me out. Thank you.

Good quality action photos in low light situations means you need a DSLR – no P&S will really perform well in those circumstances.
Outdoors on a bright day just about any camera will do a reasonable job.

I’m really into photography and I have the money to buy a pretty nice camera. Nothing like 2,000 dollars or anything, but I want to know what type of camera would be good with taking action shots like skateboarding or alot of movement, but also takes really nice portrait pictures too. Help please! 🙂

Get yourself a 35 mm, SLR (Single Lens Reflex) film camera.
A Canon EOS Rebel will do what you want for about $400.00 and it is both automatic as well as manual.
For the sports shots you want; you have to get a fast film, and preferably a fast lens, (about another $400.00) but the lens that does come with the camera should do the job you want quite adequatly.
Use an film speed with an ISO of 800 and for dusk scenes an ISO of 1600 should do. The 800 ISO can be purchased in many stores, but the 1600 ISO has to be bought from a camera shop. But not one that is a franchise like Blacks or Wal Mart. The independant camera stores will be more likely to stock those fast films.
You can get a 3200 ISO film as well but it only comes in black and white and I think that only Kodak makes it.(it’s a really fast film, you can take night scenes with that one!)
The 800 & 1600 ISO film can be bought in colour film and I would suggest Fujicolour for colour film but Kodak for all your black and white films.
For your portraiture photos use a slow speed film of 100 or 200 ISO.
You can get as low as 24 ISO in black and white film and that gives you an extreme amount of detail. However the lower your ISO the more light you will need to use it! Okay?
The higher your ISO the less light you will need.
The higher the film speed the more grainy your negatives will be, hence you will have grainier photos than a film speed of 100 ISO.
The Canon EOS is the most common SLR the students of photography buy. It’s a good strong camera and it does take good photos. It can be geared to work with a fast film to take action photos like the skateboarders you want to catch.
All the best to you in your endeavours.
EDIT: A lot of the youth today go with the digital cameras but I would caution against that. Although film looks like it is going out of style I can assure you that it will be around for a very long time. Digital cannot compare with a film speed of 800 or 400 ISO and it will be decades before they produce a digital camera that can come close to the quality of an 400 ISO film. Although the digitals give you immediate gratification it loses out in quality. Film may be more expensive in the short run but in the long run? It is the best choice.

I am looking for a camera to shoot HD photos and videos of horses (mainly jumping). How is the SX40 with sports/action?

I can’t speak to the video side but being a partially controllable camera, if you can set your shutter to at least 1/500 and can adjust your ISO for arena light (usually terrible) then you might do alright.

I am interested in buying a camera to take still photos of horses jumping, dogs jumping, and basically sport events. Do you have any ideas of what kind of camera I should be looking for or links to a good camera would be great!! thank you
x

I would recommend a medium-high end Digital SLR Camera (DSLR). A Nikon D60 will do the job. This camera takes exceptional pictures. It can seems like it stops time to take the photo.(The photos are that clear). Another plus for this camera is that it’s not hard on the wallet.

I am trying to decide between these 3 cameras. D40, D80, D100. I want a digital camera that takes the best looking photos, action photos of sports or animals in motion would be great if thats possible. I would also like it to have a nice zoom. I want to be able to blow up a photo poster size if it turns out nice. Any suggestions would be great since I dont really know what all the specs mean yet.

All three will do what you want .. the D40 may be the best choice because it has all the features you will need to get started yet leave you enough money left over so you can add an additional lens sooner. The D40 with a AF-S 18-55 mm ED lens is just under $470. For shooting sports and animals you can either buy the AF-S 70-300 VR lens or just get the D40 with a 18-200 mm VR.

You will want to go into a camera store and look at those combinations to see which you like the best.

By shooting in RAW + JPEG basic you will have the best of both worlds … you can edit your images down to the best of the best and then use the matching RAW file to produce high quality JPEG or TIFF files to be made into posters.

If you want to make sure the camera will do what you want, take a SD memory card with you into the store and shoot a couple of images in RAW + JPEG with both the D40 and D80 … take the card home and then make a high quality JPEG from each camera and then take them to your lab and see which one will make the best poster. The lab canl help you decide.

I’ve tried setting to Action/Sport, but the pics still come out blurry.

You can’t. The Samsung Epic 4G is a phone with a $10 camera thrown in for fun.

The built-in camera is pretty decent for what it is (reviews: http://www.engadget.com/2010/08/16/epic-4g-review/ , http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2367811,00.asp ) but it doesn’t compare to a $200 point & shoot camera, never mind a dSLR. That’s what you’d preferably use for action/ sports, or any other kind of photography where performance matters.

Not to be a wise-ass, but there’s a reason that pro sports photographers use $5000 cameras ( http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/655574-REG/Nikon_25466_D3S_Digital_SLR_Camera.html ) with $9000 lenses ( http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/520639-USA/Nikon_2171_AF_S_Nikkor_400mm_f_2_8G.html ).

i was wondering are there any good websites where i can find some cool Action Sports photos

try with one of the websites listed here: http://geocities.com/stockphotoadvisor/

I have a sports photography business, open since 2003. We have grown well over the past 4 years but would like ideas on building more business. We specialize in youth sports photography, not just still pics but concentrate mainly on action photos. We do local advertising via new papers, our website gets decent traffic and our repeat business is good. Any ideas to generate more would be great!

Have you considered offering your photos on t-shirts, etc? Cafepress.com is a great place for that. I do weddings and nature photography. I keep the wedding site private and set up 3-4 pictures on a product, let the family do their shopping for a week, then move on to the next wedding/family. Here’s where my nature shots are

http://www.cafepress.com/naturalphoto

Click on one of the photos for an example of the type of products.
The products are of nice quality and you don’t have to do anything but upload the shot. They do all the rest.

I have an Olympus SP-600 UZ digital camera, and am having difficulty taking action photos at night under stadium lighting. I’ve tried increasing the ISO but get a lot of graininess. Please advise as to the settings I should be using. Thank you!

Unfortunately there is not a whole lot you can do. You will have to jack up the ISO. This is going to increase the noise or graininess. The only other advice I can give you is to use the largest aperture you can (smallest F#). This will allow in the most light.

There is a reason why sports are shot with very large expensive lenses. It is simply too dark for most cameras and lenses.

A hobby of mine is to take pictures of soccer and hockey games. I would like a really good quality camera that could get right up close in the action with no blurriness or anything like that. I usually see people taking pictures with those big black cameras. What are those for? What is the pricing? Where would I go to purchase it? Can it be used on vacation or are they specifically just for sports?

The "big black cameras" you’re referring to are called Digital SLR Cameras.

A Digital SLR would be your best option for sports action photos for these reasons:

1. Super fast focus when compared to Intermediate and Compact Cameras.

2. High ISO Capabilities which allow you to take high action photos in low light conditions, while still producing a clean, noise free images. Intermediate and compact cameras struggle the most with fast action photography in low light conditions.

3. Digital SLR’s also have Shallow Depth of Field compared to intermediate and compact cameras, which allow you to have an image where the Soccer player is in full focus, but the background is blurry. Here’s an example: http://www.blavish.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/top-ten-highest-paid-soccer-players-football.jpg

You can find entry level Digital SLR’s online at Amazon for under $500: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001CBKJGG/?tag=amazon-digital-cameras-20

And yes, Digital SLR’s are perfect for any occasion, wether you are traveling or taking photos at a birthday party.

Hope that Helps 🙂

Best Regards,
Dusty