Express Action Sports

Is it something that pays off when you take action shots? Or, is it as helpful when taking landscape photos?

IS can help when you need to take a relatively long exposure time which is not normally achievable hand-held.

The rough rule that people use is to try and not use a shutter speed longer than the focal length you’re shooting at. For example. Shooting with a 200mm telephoto lens, most people can hold it no longer than 1/200s to take a steady exposure. Depending on the version of lens, the same person may be able to take the same shot with a shutter speed as long as 1/25s with assistance of IS which is particularly handy in low light environments such as indoors when flash photography is not possible.

Some lens which are geared up to sports photography (such as the Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8 IS) even have a second IS setting allowing you to pan horizontally whilst smoothing your vertical movement.

I do sports (action) photography with a Nikon D80 (thinking of upgrading to the D300 btw) … I want to get a faster lens and am considering the Nikon 70-200mm f2.8 VR or the 80-200mm f2.8 (without VR).

Given that the new vibration-reduction model costs about twice as much (around $1,700, I think, versus $900) … would it be worth getting for my purposes (handheld sports photography)?

Really, my question is: Since I always use fast shutter speeds (always faster than 1/200, usually more like 1/1000 or more) is there any advantage to VR, or is the fast shutter speed itself enough to essentially eliminate the effects of camera shake?

Appreciate any input on this…

If you are only using this lens for sport photography and absolutely nothing else, and you are constantly using that very fast shutter speed, then the VR is not really going to be much of an advantage for you.

If, however, you plan to use the lens for things other than just sport photography, perhaps for portraits or scenic photography, the VR would come in handy especially for hand-holding some longer-exposure shots.

Hope that helps you out some 🙂