3 Quarters Today

My Life, my photography, my passions

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Summertime Sports Photography

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I am always trying to expand my photography skills and shoot different topics, events, and subjects.

It isn’t often I have full permission from my  daughter to take my camera (Canon Rebel  XS) to her softball game. So when I got the chance I took it, and did I ever experiment with night action sports photography. Not easy, but I finally did get the hang of it.  I set my camera on manual and just played until I got it right.

Summer Softball- photography lesson

The above picture was taken with at 1600 ISO, 5.6 F stop, and a 1/160 shutter speed, 75 mm zoom with a continuous burst with the camera file size at small for a faster response.  With the exception of the graininess at the high ISO I’m pretty happy with the results.

Pitcher concentration
Pitcher concentration

Again graininess with 1600 ISO, but right now I can’t see anyway around it, 800 was too dark with the needed shutter speed. The second photo was on large/RAW file size and was a little dark in the original image. With the lens resting on the fence I shot through the chain link at 300mm focal length, 1/160th of a second at a 5.6f

I increased the exposure in Lightroom, cropped the original horizontal shot to vertical, decreased the white and decreased the shadows. Don’t like how the grain distorts the background player, but couldn’t figure out a way to compensate.

Day of Softball and Summer
400 ISO,  1/125 sec, f10 focal 105mm  Aperture Priority

The last photo was obviously taken earlier in the night before the sun went down. All I did here was decrease the exposure, increase shadows, and warm the white balance. My camera tends to shoot cool (blue) and a the sun was glowing on all the players. I try really hard for realism in my editing and this is what my eye saw.

My daughter has played softball since T-ball in preschool starting at Elmwood-Murdock, then Lincoln Y-league, Eagle, and the past three years for Louisville. The Louisville team joined the Omaha league a few years ago and the first year they didn’t win a game. Competition was a little harder than their previous league and the girls had to try a little harder. The record the next year was about a 50:50 record.

A lot of the girls play on two teams, most of the teams are Select and have the intimidating matching travel bags, and “muscle” jerseys.  Most play school ball, but it doesn’t matter what they look like, can they play? My daughter loves the game, she only plays during the summer and she has a mean steal and isn’t afraid to use it and slide to where she wants to go.

Photography Tips

  • Anticipate your shots, know when the pitcher is going to throw.
  • Push your ISO as high as you need to get a 1/200 speed exposure
  • Use a lower aperture, backgrounds will blur, but you will accent your subject.
  • Use a tripod, monopod, or rest your camera on a steady surface. Fence gaps work well
  • Get the “personality” shots, the concentration of the pitcher, or first base.
  • Shoot in RAW for “still” shot, JPG continuous for action
  • Use your longest zoom for outfield shots, even 2nd base is a long ways off

I’m a big proponent of shooting in RAW, but there are many instances that a regular JPG photo will work just fine, especially if you taking the photos for yourself and just going to post to Facebook and share with friends. If you’re goal is to enlarge the photos, post them for sale, or use them commercially, then a camera with a wider range of options is necessary.

How to Photograph Night Sports

A Day at Work, With a Very Large Camera

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8x10 Large Format Film Camera
8×10 Large Format Transparency Camera

Here is something you don’t see very often, a large format, 8×10 E6 Film View Camera. At Hamilton Color Lab, located in Omaha Nebraska,  this isn’t used very often. But for high quality art reproductions which will be reproduced in a  40 x 40 foot canvas in this case, you need a camera format large enough to capture the detail and information.

After we develop the film (yes we still develop E6 slide transparencies)  it is then scanned on an Scitex Eversmart and digitized for outsource printing. The file size just for this one image is over one gigabyte and took over an hour to scan.

Most art reproductions we do at work are digital captures with a Canon 5D and a special lens made especially for photographing artwork, or flat images which eliminates lens distortion.

Below is the front of the camera, I know were curious and just itching to see more, so here is some camera eye candy for those film fans.

8x10 Film View Camera
8×10 Film View Camera

Dave Hamilton, owner of Hamilton Color Lab shoots with a Canon 5D on most days in the studio, but keeps his old Hasellblad camera, 4×5 Film Camera and this baby in storage for those unique moments. Not too many 8×10 View cameras in use anymore, and this one got quite a bit attention when it was brought out.

I know this post was a shameless plug for where I work, but I love working there and until I can get our company blog up and running I can’t resist sharing here.

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Week 1: Happy New Year 2012

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I’m going to try my 365 project again, but this year make it realistic and try the 52 Week project. I’ll still try and add extra postings in between as I learn more about my camera, have a recipe to post, or food pictures. But I’m setting myself up to succeed, with less stress.

Last year was my first 365 project and I made it to day 312 posting everyday, but then life got in the way. I still consider it a success.  I made some new friends, learned more about my camera and ultimately achieved my goal. I received a new camera. More on that later.

For today this week, it’s a simple Happy New Year 2012

Happy New Year 2012
Happy New Year 2012

Day 281-284: Life in the Lab, Hamilton Color

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Sso many interesting projects come through the door at Hamilton Color Lab I keep my Olympus camera on the counter at work.  (Sometimes it’s the only place I get my photo of the day)  I work the front desk, handle the customer service, the marketing, and the social media accounts which, at the present time includes a Facebook page, Twitter account and lately the Flickr account.

But, since my personal blog centers around photography I thought I would post a series here every now and then. Especially since some of my photos of the day are taken at work.

Graflex camera
Graflex camera a customer brought in to show and tell

Film is not dead, barely hanging on though. Hamilton Color Lab only processes E-6 slide film, our C41 machine literally caught fired a few years ago and it wasn’t worth the money to rebuild. But the film that is very much alive and cool again is vintage formats. We still receive large format film for processing including E-6 110, 120, 4×5 and occasionally 8×10 size slide transparencies.

Vintage check project
Vintage check project

We scanned the vintage small check  (lower left in pink) at a high resolution, created a vintage look in brown tones, printed it on cotton etching paper on an inkjet printer, matted and framed the piece. It will eventually go into the Woodbine Saving Bank newly remodeled bank.

Mid 1800's: Photo and art restoration and reproduction
Mid 1800's: Photo and art restoration and reproduction

The date on the back of this picture was 1841 and the genealogy of the family listed a son named “Benjamin Franklin ____” Isn’t that cool!  Benjamin Franklin was a celebrity of his day, and obviously admired enough to name their child after the man.