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02/03/2006 09:39:08 AM · #1 |
I have never shot swim and dive before , however I have been assigned a meet tomorrow for yearbook, which I am being paid for and I can't stop thinking about the challenges it will pose such as lighting and where to shoot from, if I can use flash. So if anybody has experience with shooting swim or dive teams, could you please lend some help
Message edited by author 2006-02-03 09:39:44. |
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02/03/2006 09:41:44 AM · #2 |
i'm not sure how you did it, but your thread didn't have a title. i made one up for you.
(i've never shot a swim meet before, but i know that jmsetzler has.) |
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02/03/2006 09:42:39 AM · #3 |
sorry about that.
Message edited by author 2006-02-03 09:49:37. |
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02/03/2006 09:43:01 AM · #4 |
Polarizing filter, I would have thought, if you have enough light!
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02/03/2006 09:43:44 AM · #5 |
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02/03/2006 09:51:53 AM · #6 |
Indoors make sure to have fast lens/lenses/lenz. Two cameras, one with a wide and the other with a long lens.
Go to the venue before hand and find the angles. Every venue is differant.
Ask the coachs if you can use flash, or any othe venue type management.
If possible, set up your wide angle in a postition where it won't be touched by passerbys, nail it down good (not real nails of course), and use a remote switch to get your pix, that way you can hold onto your long lens to manuever with.
Sports photography is based on emotion, make sure to include facial expressions, body language, and when they are ready to dive always include every appendage within the frame.
Time the dive, have your camera on a fast burst rate so that you can capture the diver from the moment they leap, to the very second they reach the water. This gives you alot of flexability in choosing your frames for edit.
Have alot of memory, and shoot RAW.
If you don't have the equipment, rent it.
Hope this helps.
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02/03/2006 09:55:01 AM · #7 |
| American Horse, thatnks for the tips but one question, why RAW? |
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02/03/2006 10:01:47 AM · #8 |
Originally posted by Mstark24:
American Horse, thatnks for the tips but one question, why RAW? |
I am guessing that you want to do this more often. First impressions are key. Just like trying to get a date with a girl.
You can probly get away with a Large JPEG if you are giving your pix to your client without editing, but the issue of artifacting is not wanted in sports photography. So, to keep the pix clean RAW is better.
RAW will do this better than JPEG. Sure, you are limit on the amount of pix to snap, but in the long run you are better off. Get more memory, or at least an IPOD to download during the meet.
RAW can be adjusted in post much better than jpeg to get the exposures that you were after, and when you are done editing, you can always convert to jpeg.
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02/03/2006 10:13:45 AM · #9 |
Originally posted by Mstark24:
American Horse, thatnks for the tips but one question, why RAW? |
Also, in your typical indoor pool area, the lighting is all over the board. White balance is impossible to get right. Shooting at or toward one end of the pool is usually much different than shooting the other end. RAW will let you easily adjust the white balance. |
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02/03/2006 10:50:24 AM · #10 |
just some quick notes...
forget shooting raw! your 20d large jpg is more than adequate. you're shooting for a yearbook, not an advertising client. you are going to need all the speed you can get, and you don't want to lose shots while waiting for the buffer to write to the card.
you probably will not be allowed to use flash near the diving boards, so don't plan on it.
go early and take your whole bag. take test shots with each lens until you find the one that is going to give you the reach you need with the speeds you need. for swimming, you're going to want at least 1/200 or faster. for diving, you're going to want 1/500 or faster. depending on the lighting, you'll be shooting iso800, 1600, or possibly 3200. your 20D will do a pretty good job with the noise reduction, but, the further you are from your subjects, the more detail you are going to lose at the higher iso.
if you are concerned about white balance, read the manual about setting a custom white balance.
one of the main factors is whether or not the light is going to be even from one end of the pool to the other.
look at as many pictures of swimming events as possible to get an idea of what type of shots you want to get before hand. do NOT just show up at the pool and expect to start shooting. make sure you get a schedule ahead of time to know what events are when. know who are the best swimmers and what lanes they'll be in before their races start. find out what the divers are going to do during their dive before they get on the board. if you think you'll just show up and start capturing the action as it unfolds, you'll probably miss half the shots you need. on the other hand, if you are prepared, you can not only get your shots, but you can have fun doing it...
good luck, and be sure to post up some results! |
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02/03/2006 11:53:54 AM · #11 |
As skip says - forget RAW. And use Auto white balance.
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02/03/2006 12:10:35 PM · #12 |
Originally posted by coolhar:
And use Auto white balance. |
Urg. Why would you ever use auto white balance.
It takes seconds to set the right or at least an appropriate white balance.
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02/03/2006 12:15:31 PM · #13 |
Originally posted by Gordon:
Why would you ever use auto white balance. |
some places are lit with different types of lighting from one place to another. and i figure i paid enough for the camera for it to at least figure some things out for me ;-)
i wounldn't recommend it for weddings, studio, or portrait work, necessarily, but in a pinch, it seems to do quite well. |
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02/03/2006 12:56:07 PM · #14 |
Mstark24: I've shot thousands of pics at our swim team's meets and practices. 99.9% of our meets have been outside. Is yours inside or out?
Anyway, my experience outside---there is PLENTY of light (at least here in New Orleans in the summer in the afternoon) and any lens will do for speed. You may want to go for an f2.8 or something to blur a background for a portrait or something else for a special effect, but you wont need it for shooting the swimmmers/divers in general.
Now, if you're shooting indoors, that's a different story. Then FAST lenses are the way to go.
You'll want SPEED for shooting multiple shots, especially for something like butterfly where the swimmers may only breathe (bring their head above water) once the whole race. So yeah, jpg so that you can burst mode lots of shots and catch that one with the face out of the water. A good butterly (or "fly") swimmer is a beautiful thing to behold...
Multiple shots during a dive can also be cool.
White balance: again, our meets are outside, so auto does just fine.
Lens reach: a good 300-400mm should be fine to get some up close shots even if you have to be a little away from the pool. If you can get right up to the edge, of course anything will do. I can get out onto the pool deck most places we swim to shoot, but I still like a long lens so that I can stay back some of the time and people don't get "camera shy".
Opportunities: while most of the action is in the pool, there are lots of good shots to be had out of the water too. At the clerk-of-course, on the pool deck, at the starting blocks, at the stroke judges table, at the coaches table, etc. Look for interactions between the swimmers out of the pool. Those are some good "personality shots". Walk around and get some candids of people while they are not in the pool. You can get some really nice stuff this way. Again, a long lens helps you get them without them changing their behaviour by knowing you are there.
One piece of advice, stay out of the way of the stoke judges!!! They typically roam the edges of the pool. Not only will it tick them off if you block their view of the swimmers, if you/they don't see each other, there could be an embarassing stumbling event which could end up with you/them/your camera in the pool! Not a good thing! :-)
And it's loads of fun to shoot these things. At least I think so, but I know a good many of the kids on our team given that I've been doing it for 4 years. So we have a good time. You should have fun. Enjoy!
Doug
Message edited by author 2006-02-03 12:59:50. |
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02/03/2006 01:04:29 PM · #15 |
Oh, yes, as SkipRow said, get a "heat sheet" so that you know who is swimming in what lane, in what heat, in what event. I typically make notes on the sheet every so often as I shoot. Noting down what image number I just took at that point.
Especially when a mom comes up and says "Can you get a picture of my Johnny, he's swimming breast in a little while." Then you can look ahead and find his event/heat/lane and note down the image number(s) after you take it.
But again, don't get so wrapped up in shooting EVERY heat of EVERY event that you miss walking around and getting shots of people out of the pool too.
Doug |
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02/03/2006 01:10:42 PM · #16 |
Depending on the pool, there may well be underwater observation points - you can get some interesting angle shots there.
Either that or get a waterproof housing and get in the water! |
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02/03/2006 01:49:40 PM · #17 |
Originally posted by skiprow:
Originally posted by Gordon:
Why would you ever use auto white balance. |
some places are lit with different types of lighting from one place to another. and i figure i paid enough for the camera for it to at least figure some things out for me ;-)
i wounldn't recommend it for weddings, studio, or portrait work, necessarily, but in a pinch, it seems to do quite well. |
Also, some of the HS gyms where I have shot basketball have a certain type of lighting - sodium vapor I think - that cycles thru a range of color as it goes from first being turned on to it's maximum brightness. This can take as long as 5-10 minutes, or longer, for them to get to max. These lights are equiped with circuitry that turns them off when they overheat and then automatically restarts them after a short interval, thus restarting the light color cycle. The overheating and shutdown becomes more frequent as the bulb gets closer to the end of it's useful lifetime. At any given time a gym will have a dozen or more of these lights capriciously going thru differing stages of this cycle. You could do a custom white balance setting using a card at the beginning of a game only to have a wide variety of WB in your shots when you get them onto the computer for editing. Using Auto white balance is convienient and is a way to try to introduce a constant into the equation. You may still have to make a white balance correction when you do your editing but you are more likely to be able to use the same correction for all your shots (perhaps hundreds of them). It probably isn't quite as accurate as doing a custom setting but it seems to adapt to changing conditions very well.
I think that using your highest level of jpeg and Auto white balance are standard practice for most sports photojournalists shooting indoors. Probably not at the level of a Sports Illustrated guy shooting the NBA, but for daily newspapers down to the soccer-mom-in-the-bleachers, it seems like a good compromise.
Message edited by author 2006-02-03 13:54:01.
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02/03/2006 02:54:15 PM · #18 |
I shot my first swim meet last week for the local newspaper. It was an indoor meet and the light was not adequate for photography without a flash.
Some Rules:
Do NOT fire your flash until the swimmers in each race hit the water. When the starting buzzer sounds, there is a strobe fired for a visual queue to start the race. Make sure that you do not confuse the swimmers by firing your flash. Talk to the race officials before the start of the meet. Tell them who you are, why you are there, and acknowledge to them that you are aware of the starting strobe and will not fire your flash until the swimmers hit the water. They will appreciate you for this.
I shot everything with my 70-200 lens. I didn't see or find a need for anything wider than that. I set my camera up in manual mode at iso 800, 1/250" @ f/2.8. My photos came out fine.
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02/03/2006 02:55:51 PM · #19 |
Originally posted by Gordon:
Originally posted by coolhar:
And use Auto white balance. |
Urg. Why would you ever use auto white balance.
It takes seconds to set the right or at least an appropriate white balance. |
I have found that this is a waste of time, especially at a swimming event. Since the flash is going to be required, you will create more color problems than you will solve by setting a custom white balance. The flash is already balanced and setting a custom will cause any ambient light that gets exposed behind the flash to be off color.
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02/03/2006 02:57:28 PM · #20 |
Originally posted by coolhar:
Originally posted by Gordon:
Why would you ever use auto white balance. |
Using Auto white balance is convienient and is a way to try to introduce a constant into the equation. |
But that is exactly what it doesn't do. It is a way to ensure that the white balance will be different on every shot and a batch correction will not work. |
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02/03/2006 03:00:07 PM · #21 |
The flash on the starter is for the timers, if they are using manual timers. The swimmers go on the sound of the horn, the timers start their stopwatches on the flash. The swimmers are looking down at the water before the start, not up at the starter. But they tell the starters to start their watches when they see the light, not when they hear the beep.
Don't ask me why they do it that way, as when you are 10-20-50 ft away the difference between the time travel for the speed of sound and the speed of light is beyond trivial. But they do it...
If it's a big enough meet, they use touch pads and don't need timeres, but they typically still have some for backup in case the touchpads fail.
So yeah, it's a good idea not to flash at the start to confuse the timers (if there are any there).
Doug
Message edited by author 2006-02-03 15:06:23. |
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