need held adjusting flash for night football

A couple of nights ago, I was shooting from the sidelines with my equipment and I

thought I was doing everything...okay. I was nervous. It was an outside stadium, the

nighttime lights were turned on and I was having a hard time getting a faster shutter

speed to freeze the action on the field. Here's what I have to work with:

Nikon F100. SB-28 100-300 f4 lens and a monopod. I was shooting 1600 film. I

had the camera set to Speed-priority and thinking that 1/250th was as fast as I could

go and still synch with the speedlight, I had it set on 1/250th. Naturally, the camera

picked f4 as an aperature and still told me through the meter that I would be at least

2 stops underexposed.

Well, I got my photos back today, and I'm really disappointed. There's enough light,

out to about 50-60 feet out, but all the action is blurred. 1/250th wasn't fast

enough. Now, while I was there, wondering about how I should set up my equipment,

I noticed a pro at the far endzone shooting with (naturally) georgeous equipment. He

was blazing away with a D1X and a 300 f2.8. I asked him what his settings were and

the said he was shooting manually, and that his camera's ISO had been cranked up to

3200, and that his flash output was scaled back to 1/8th or some damn thing.

Looking at his screen he was getting far better results than I (correctly) suspected I

was.

Here's my question: what was he doing shooting manually and with his flash scaled

back to some fraction of it's output? He obviously knew what he was doing and I

hadn't a clue how to get my shots to come out sharp. Yea...I counted it up; he had

two stops on me with is ISO setting and his lens, but....I keep thinking there has to be

a way for me to at least freeze the action with 1600 film, a decent camera and pretty

good flash. Can anyone explain how this night-sports puzzle works? Can I sync

faster than 1/250th with the SB-28? Is there a way I can shoot several frames in a

row and have the flash keep up with me on every shot? I'm so confused as to how to

make this work.

Much appreciated

James<div></div>

James ,looking at your photograph to me it looks like your problem is camera movement not shutter speed. The fact that the ground and background is not sharp tends to make me believe that you are swinging the camera thru the shot as you push the shutter. I have photographed many high school and Community college football games with less than usable light.A shutter speed of 1/250th will stop motion if its comming at you,not so well if its going past you.If you want to keep shooting a lot of prep football, I would suggest you get a faster lens.Many a game was shot with a 105mm 2.5 nikkor lens or a 180mm 2.8, these will give you a faster shutter speed. Then try shooting the peak of action,and if you can shoot it comming at you that would be best.

The pro you talked to had several things going for him that you did not. A fast lens,the ability to shoot available light.He then dialed the strobe down so he could just pop a small of light under the helmets,to fill in the shadows. By turning down the power the strobe could keep up with the fast burst he was shooting.Nightime sports requires some specialized cameras and lenses.If you are shooting color neg you might try pushing the film a stop or two,custom labs can do this with out a problem.good luck

Hi James,

I agree with Micheal, it is camera movement that is blurring your shots. Some of the feet

are sharp, they are moving with the camera but the feet that are on the ground (therefore

not moving) are blurred, so it must be camera movement. If the camera was still the feet

on the ground would be sharp at much slower shutter speeds. You need to practise

panning with your subject, to practise but not use film I used to keep a helmet inside my

center circle, keep following the action though your viewfinder like this and your arms and

body get into a motion, it sounds stupid and basic but trust me it works!

Other than that I don't think you have much to worry about.

Take care, Scott.

As Michael suggested a faster lens would help, a 70-200 2.8 would work good out to around 25 metres and would and give you another stop. The gear driven 80-200 2.8D is quite slow to lock on and would give more AF OOFS than a VR but has a nice postive manual focus, However the budget determins what we use and a S/H 80-200 2.8D could be picked up for a fair price (the two touch version is better).

As Scott suggested, plenty of practice to perfect your panning technique would also help. I don't know if you have had much experience with shooting a shotgun, but panning a camera is the same method, except you lock the focusing point on the target instead of leading it, when it all comes together and it is time to make the image, depress the shutter button gently while continuing to follow the action through the finder, Do dry runs on passing cars without film in your camera until you can establish a fluid style. It does not take to long to developed a co-ordinated pan.

If the lighting is constant and you can find a place where the action is coming to you and the lighting is on the faces of the players, (You may have to wait a bit at times) use a manual setting for shutterspeed and aperture, Set your flash to power reduction and try the setting that the pro using for a start, Personally I am not a burst shooter and can still get a couple or three timed shots as a sequence of action is unfolding with the camera set on single frame advance, it will also give your flash a little more time to recycle.

the only way to improve is ask questions and do it, cheers.