Manual Settings for Sports Photography

Sports Photography Settings on a Landscape Photographer’s Blog

The title sounds strange on a landscape photographer’s page.

Like any parent or grandparent with a camera, there are many sports photography opportunities with the kids/grandkids in sports.

Originally always used Aperture Priority

Ever since the kids were little, I always used Aperture Priority (AV) for the primary setting, with single focal point and evaluative metering.

These settings I used with my first digital camera, Canon Digital Rebel, and maintained them with the Canon 5D, 1DsMIII and now the 1DxMIII.

At the time, the grandkids were playing in the outdoor youth leagues.

Conditions never changed much, and things generally worked well.

And then the sports moved inside.

I started noticing shutter speed issues when the sports went inside, such as youth basketball.

The gyms they tended to be quite dark.

Manually Increased ISO

Darker gyms dictated increased ISO levels.

By this time I was using the 1DsMIII - and still learning its limits.

Lenses were always f/2.8, shooting wide open again with aperture priority.

With that camera, I never liked the outcome of using the higher ISO levels above 1000 (as I remember). Too much grain for my desire.

Processing in Lightroom often softened the faces more than desirable.

Unfortunately, with these two concerns, the shutter speed was effected.

Switched to f/2 or faster lenses

Still shooting with the 1DsMIII, I started using faster lenses. The first was the Canon 85mm f/1.4 L IS.

With little kids basketball, we were sitting under the basket, or practically on the court on the sidelines, so being close was never an issue.

This worked well in low light gyms, typically shooting at f/2.0.

Switched to Canon 1DxMIII

As the older grandkids started playing high school sports, I took many more pictures under different conditions.

The basketball games and track meets were much faster.

With the slower 5 FPS on the 1DsMIII, I was missing too many shots. Indoors, with low light, I still had the excessive (for me) grain and/or slower shutter speed issue.

I switched out to the Canon 1DxMIII, for a number of reasons, including speed (now 16 FPS with 99 shots before buffering), and the ability to shoot and higher ISO settings.

Though mentioned in the product information, shooting at much higher ISO levels provided great results, far better than I would have imagined.

Clarity of the images was superb.

Tv and Av

Using the Custom Settings feature on the Canon 1DxMIII, I experimented with many different settings, primarily Aperture Priority though at times also Shutter Priority.

In situations where players went from sunlight to shade, or changing light inside, I still had the issue, especially when compensating for the darker conditions,

In Aperture Priority (Av), the shutter speed would naturally slow down in darker situations, causing motion issues.

In Shutter Priority (Tv), the aperture would adjust in brighter areas to provide greater depth of field than desired.

Testing - Manual with Auto ISO

I have recently started testing sports with manual settings for both shutter speed and aperture, leaving the ISO at auto to “self-adjust” given the lighting conditions.

At the present time, I’m experimenting with this as the sun is setting early on late afternoon soccer games and the lights come on within the stadium.

This is departure from my landscape settings, where I also shoot manual, though set all three, shutter speed, aperture and ISO, single capture at a time, with 2 second delay on a tripod.

My Manual Custom Setting Test for Sports

It’s my custom “C1” setting on my camera.

• Shutter speed: 1,000 second

• Aperture: f/2.8

• ISO: Auto

• Single point metering on the subject’s eye, or face if distance

• Multi-shot sequencing

• Camera is hand-held

With this setting, the aperture is maintained for the desired shallow depth of field, the shutter speed is consistently maintained for capturing fast action, and the ISO is self-adjusted to the variable lighting conditions under the lights of the outdoor soccer stadium.

The experiment continues

This is still very much in “testing phase”. Though the results tend to be promising, they are not yet conclusive.

The next game I plan to test again, shooting the first half with this configuration, the second half with Shutter Priority.

The experiment continues.