PeterN writes:

On 9/18/2012 1:05 PM, David Dyer-Bennet wrote:
Savageduck writes:

On 2012-09-17 15:38:02 -0700, PeterN said:

On 9/17/2012 2:02 PM, David Dyer-Bennet wrote:
Robert Coe writes:
snip


One of the things DX taught me is that the 200mm limit on good lenses
that weren't both huge and expensive was more technological than user
preference.

My 80-400 Nikon is sharp and clear. The only issue sis very slow focus.

You can say that again!
...and low light performance is abysmal.

If you have good light and little need for fast focus it is great.

I use the Sigma 120-400 to shoot roller derby in indoor arenas. Luckily
the main one I shoot in is pretty well lit -- I was shooting 1/350 f/5.6
ISO 6400. Shooting from track level (the whole arena is flat, no way to
get higher than standing), players get in front of each other a lot, so
the AF gets a real workout, losing and reacquiring the target
constantly. This Sigma is an unltrasonic, though, so it focuses quite
fast. (Was about half the price of the Nikon, and generally got better
reviews at the time I bought it. It's done very well for me at the
price point. Obviously it has a smaller zoom range.)

I've been invited to do a roller derby shoot. I had planned to use my
70-200 with a 1.7 extender. Any tips?

It's a fun sport to shoot. I think it's easier to get adequate derby
shots than baseball, football, or basketball. For one thing, there's no
"ball" or other magic token that moves around much faster than the
people and which you have to keep track of. (The very best shots for
any sport are all equally hard of course -- how good it can be just goes
up with what's possible to the very best photographers.)

I use my 70-200 bare a lot, and with a 1.4x some, more than I use the
120-400, so if you can get trackside you'll be fine on reach I think.
Although lighting varies with the venue of course, and the one I know
best is probably brighter than average.

Lots of people shoot off-camera flash for derby. That has benefits (if
it's permitted) if you can rig it well and have enough flashes and radio
triggers, but I haven't gone to that yet; partly because the available
light where I shoot is good enough to handle it well. If you *are*
using off-camera flash, you can adjust the exposure to put the
background a stop or two below the players, which helps remove
distractions; I like the look.

Even direct flash can produce tolerable results (if permitted). I shot
a dozen that way as a test, and was able to edit them up to look quite
nice. It was constraining to have to think about repeat rate, though.
I couldn't do more than three or four shots at full repeat, and even two
a second (manually triggered) ran the flash down fairly soon. Also,
pushing shoe-mount flashes to their limit really can melt them:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/carak/1439774570/.

At least at the bouts I go to (fairly small league), there are often
lots of children around, sometimes the children of players and sometimes
just spectators. Children are of course photographic gold :-), if
you've got a use for feature pictures as well as the action shots. Also
*parents* of players fairly often.

Look into the really basic intros to the sport (Wikipedia will do) --
that's enough to get started in photography (if you don't already know
about it). Basically, the two "jammers" (the ones with stars on their
helmet covers) are the ones the "pack" (everybody else) needs to block
or assist, so essentially everything of interest happens right around
one or the other of them. So keep your eye and lens on them during play
and push the button when appropriate :-).

There really is some use for high-speed sequence shooting. Often when
you see something *start* to happen you'll shoot (you don't know where
it's going or who is about to skate into the frame and block the view),
but then it develops rapidly into something even more interesting -- say
the skater behind the one just knocked off her feet now trips over the
downed skater and also goes flying, or something. Be a shame to miss
it! I configure my camera for max frame rate (that's camera-specific,
but for me it includes things like 12 bits per channel rather than 14; I
need the smaller files for speed more than I need the dreamily smooth
tonality!), but have trained myself to shoot single or even fairly quick
multiple single shots more than just mashing the release. But being
*able* to mash the release when I need to is also very important.

Here are my shots from four bouts last Saturday
http://dd-b.net/dd-b/SnapshotAlbum/data/2012/09150-bruise/. That's
from 1440 that made it onto my computer (I mostly don't take the time to
erase in-camera, but if I happen to notice a technical dud when I have
time to push the button, I will).

(Apologies if anything I've said is insultingly basic. I'm guessing
what level of advice might be useful, and it's easier for you to skip
stuff you already know than to do another go-round to get more info in
some area so when in doubt I've included more info.)
--
Googleproofaddress(account:dd-b provider:dd-b domain:net)
Snapshots: http://dd-b.net/dd-b/SnapshotAlbum/data/
Photos: http://dd-b.net/photography/gallery/
Dragaera: http://dragaera.info