Express Action Sports

I am learning sports photography and would like some opinions on best settings for outdoor, sunny sports such as soccer, football and maybe baseball. I am going to starting by using an ISO of 100, f5.6, let the camera select the speed. I have a Nikon VR 70-200 mm. Your ideas and opinions would be great. Thanks

To be honest, I would FLIP the fashion in which you are planning on shooting. Faster subjects require faster shutter speeds. I recommend getting faster film, ISO200 would be good. If you have the option of selecting your shutter speed, and letting the camera select the FStop(Aperture) I would do that for now. Set your speed to a minimum of 1/250sec (I repeat, minimum). The higher the speed the better the stop action in the image. Another cool thing to do is to set the speed a LITTLE slower, 1/125, MAYBE 1/60, and then following (panning) your subject. Say it’s a soccer player. Then AS you are following the subject, keeping him in the frame, take the shot while still panning. You’ll get some really cool shots.

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.

Also,what are some other needed equipment for capturing action shots?

I have a Nikon D80 with 18-55 mm lens and 75-300mm lens.

For outdoor sports photography the 70-300 mm VR is an excellent lens

For indoor sports photography, I use the 70-200 mm f2.8 which is fast enough.

My friends who shoot NBA games usually include the 200 mm f/2.0 lens in addition to the 70-200 mm f/2.8

I’ll be specializing in outdoor, action baseball photography only (images like Sports Illustrated, the best you can get). My market will be primarily middle/high school and college, minor leagues if I can crack that market. I’ll be creating custom portfolios for individual players at first, but am open to photographing all players in the game and selling individual shots to them if requested.

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