Ice Hockeys photographers

Hello

I am from Ireland, and next week, I'm off to Finland to take Ice Hockey images,

any good tips, and are you a Ice Hockey photographer?

 

Here is some of my Irish sports images (Hurling)

http://www.ephotozine.com/u25815/gallery/664036

 

thanks

 

mike

a fast camera...and a fast lens. (at least f2.8)

ISO 1600. and don't go slower than 1/320

i had a look at your hockey pics, great images

Decide if you want shots of the goalie saving the shot, or the guy making the shot - Most action happens down the right hand side of the rink so if you want the goalie making the save, you are on the right side when you are facing the goalie, somewhere around the blueline. If you want the guy making the shot, then you want the same position on the other side of the rink.

 

Typically, you will want to be at the opposition end so that you get shots of your team scoring, and you need some from your end so that you can get your goalie making the save.

 

Better shots if you can get down to ice level, you can shoot through the glass, but make sure you find a section where it isn't too beat up and then keep the lens close to the glass. Some glass has a tint to it which robs a couple of very valuable f-stops.

 

Most hockey rinks are the dark hole of Calcutta, so fast glass and high ISO. Unless you are shooting something that will be run on TV, in which case there will probably be lots of light. White Balance can be an issue also - depending on the rink it will probably shift from one end to the other. Fortuneatly, the home team usually wears white so you have a built in refernce point in all your shots.

 

If you are down at ice level a 28-105 f2.8 is good enough, if you have to shoot from the stands, you will need a 80-200 f2.8, or even a 300 or 400 f2.8.

Shoot raw white balance is usually horrible in most rinks around here with sodium and fluro mixtures.

 

I use 800iso which is the max for my d2hs even then noise ninga still gets a work out. I shoot app priority almost exclusivly and get around 250th with fast 2.8s which are always wide open.

 

I like to position myself in the picture below when shooting the attacking team, we do run plexi glass at many local rinks they use nets which get modified for me to shoot which helps but you need to stay alter for stray pucks and elbows which takes some getting used to through a 70-200.

 

Warm up drills are always good for slap shot pic's.

 

I believe once you master crapy light and fast paced hockey most other sports become much easier to shoot, it was frustrating at first but worth sticking with to improve your photography I have all my new shooters doing hockey for at least a season and the skill level by the end is increase dramatically.

 

Have fun and shoot RAW.<div></div>

hockey shot.<div></div>

Thanks for your help, I'm 100% ready now to take the pics of the ice Hockey in Finland in two weeks time, I'm going to be working on 4 games over two days, after working on the worlds fastest outdoor sport here in Ireland, Ice Hockey should be good fun. I like fast sports, and lets hope my images will be not bad lol. In Hurling I shoot about 500/1 to 1600/1 at 2.8 or 4.0/f, about 300mm to 400MM.

Its going to be hard to take photos with plexi glass, I'm sure I'll have to wash the glass!!, they should have a hole for us photographers.

Have fun mate enjoy the trip and post some results.

 

cheers

Mark

mark, i'll post them, and it will be good fun--

 

thanks

one more note.... always shoot in Manual Mode! Why?

The light doesn't change - If you are using AV mode you will have to +1 or more when lots of ice is visible and -1 for the player wearing a black jersey close-up! Keep It Simple.

 

Get the right xposure for every shots by using the manual mode.

Denis> I'll use Manual Mode, and take my laptop with me as I can see the images very fast. I'd like to take more ice hockey pics, i'm looking at alot of youtube ice hockey videos to get my mind on cue.

Marski Cup 2007, Finland

 

Here are some of my images from Ice Hocky in Finland (my 1st time doing ice hockey)

 

http://www.irishphoto.org/photo/icehockey.html<div></div>

I had a good time taking ice hockey images

 

good game