What the Heck am I doing wrong?

Or am I just expecting to much? I am not happy with my last BB shoot. I am sure

it was all me but I feel to many of the shots are blurry or soft. Maybe it was

setting it at 1.4 and 1.6 but crap that's why I bought that lense. Sure now I

can shoot in lower light but everything is soft. Just seems no end to the trade

off. I am thinking I should sell everything and get a Mark III. Or is there

something better?

-- "Maybe it was setting it at 1.4 and 1.6 but crap that's why I bought that lense."

 

Welcome in the world of shallow depth of field. ... The "24" on the shirt of the guy with the ball seems reasonable sharp ... the ball seems to suffer from motion blur a bit (was eventually rotating a bit) and all the rest isn't within depth of field. You could have rased ISO a bit more (640 isn't that much) but thats about it.

I agree with Rainer, the extremely shallow DOF when shooting at f1.4 is likely the primary culprit here... I would guess you were ~15 feet from the subject? If so, then you'd only have 18.3 inches of DOF, of which only 8.7 inches is in front of the subject. Assuming you focused on the numbers on the jersey, that would explain why the ball is soft, it's likely outside the DOF window. Also agree that bumping ISO would help as well, with the D300 ISO 800 or even up to 1600 for sports action should result in printable images. 1/400 of a second may also not be fast enough to completely freeze the quickest motions. The solution may also simply rest with the lens, you could have a bad copy that's soft when shot wide open. I definitely would NOT dump everything you have now in favor of the Mark III, if you're planning to spend that type of money on a FF body you'd be better off with the D3 IMHO.

Flash would have significantly improved the shot.

Raise your ISO. everyone keeps talking about the D300's great low light performance.

With my D300 and f2.8 lens I shoot at 1/400 and ISO of 1250. I brighten up maybe 1 stop in Lightroom, add touch of sharpening and noise reduction in LR also.

400 ISO is way too low.

ditto on the DOF - advatanges and disadvantages - using a 1.4 lens.

 

Steve

Indoor amateur sports can be really difficult. The light in the gyms usually stinks, and you usually can't use flash to help. (Even when somebody would not object, you probably should not use flash. These are amateurs, not pros, and if you flash as somebody's coming down from a jump and the flash causes them to be distracted momentarily, you could actually injure somebody.) NOTE that I'm talking about amateur sports. I'm not a pro sports shooter, but I do know that the light in the pro arenas is dramatically better. By the way, the pro photographers may actually have the disadvantage when it comes to positioning.

 

Anyway, given the difficulty of shooting indoors, I don't think your photo is all that bad. You're never going to get it to look like you shot it in a studio, because, well, you're not shooting in a studio. So you may wish to lower, not your standards, but your expectations from this kind of shooting.

 

That said, you probably can improve things.

 

Looks like you're shooting with a Nikon D300 (nice), f/1.4, ISO 640, at 1/400th sec. There are five things you can do. Three of them are done in the camera.

 

1. Boost that ISO. It's my understand from all the reviews I've read that your D300 has very good high ISO performance, so take advantage of what you've got! I routinely shoot around 1100, and sometimes have to go up to 1600. I recommend that you bump to 1100 and give it a try. You'll get almost an extra stop.

 

2. Slow down the shutter. 1/400th sec is nice, close to ideal, but something has to give, perhaps more than one thing. I find that I can take sharp photos indoors at shutter speeds that are much slower than that: I typically shoot around 1/250th sec, and sometimes slower. A blurry hand or ball or foot can actually be a nice touch in a photo. NOTE: For best results, you must also take into consideration point #5 below.

 

3. Stop down the lens's aperture a bit. Two reasons to do this. First, you get more depth of field. At f/1.4, boy, you really have to have the focus right on the money--and even then, only one small part of the photo will be in focus. Stopping down to f/2.8, of course, makes only a small difference but it's significant nonetheless. The other advantage is that most lenses are not at their best at the extremes. I mention this, but to be honest, this second advantage is no big deal. The increased depth of field will be noticeable; the increase in lens acuity and image quality probably won't be. Now, how do you "pay" for this decreased aperture? By taking my advice in items #1 and #2 above, which could get you two full stops or more. You'll give one of these stops back (so to speak) by moving from f/1.4 to f/2.8 and still come out ahead.

 

The next two bits of advice occur outside the camera--and I add that they are MUCH more difficult to implement.

 

4. The light in amateur gyms isn't just inadequate, it's also usually very spotty, very uneven. So, case out the gym and try to identify where the light is coming from and then, if you have some choice about where you position yourself, position yourself so you get the best light. For example, some of the gyms I shoot in have a line of clerestory windows at the top on one side or both sides of the gym. If there's just one of these rows of windows, and assuming you're shooting during the daytime, putting those windows behind you may provide a slight advantage. If there are two sets of windows, figure out which one is on the sunny side of the building and put those windows at your back. But there are lots of other things to look for. The overhead lights in many gyms vary in intensity. See if you can take advantage of that. NOTE: This bit of advice isn't exactly optional--you should do this if you can--but sometimes you simply can't. If you can't, if you have no choice about where you stand or sit, well, then forget this until the next game in a different gym.

 

5. Practice and experiment. Not optional. Experiment with different lenses, different camera settings, different positions in the gym (say, standing on the sidelines vs shooting with a longer, fast lens from the stands). And practice! In particular practice your shutter technique, especially working on knowing WHEN to press the shutter. It's true that 1/400th sec is a better choice than 1/180th sec if you want to freeze the action completely. But it's NOT true that you can't get a sharp picture at a slower speed. With practice you can learn how to trip the shutter at a moment when the action is going to freeze itself--when the player is at the top of his jump, or right BEFORE he makes a fast break. It's hard to explain, not because it can't be analyzed after the fact but because it's hard to tell you how to anticipate that instant. You just have to do it through hundreds and hundreds of shots. I'm not a virtuoso myself, but I know I've gotten much better every year--and I remember being given this advice myself years ago.

 

I do nearly all of my indoor sports shooting with a Pentax K10D in Pentax's special TAv (shutter + aperture priority) mode. I set the camera to, say, 1/250th sec and f/2.8, and the camera automatically adjusts the ISO for me on every shot. I don't know your camera but I've been told that Nikon's counterpart to this is to use M with auto-ISO. If you do indeed have that option, give it a try. Otherwise, I'd suggest shooting the first period or first half of your next game at f/2.8, 1/200th sec, and ISO 1100 or even f/1600. Try it and see whether you like the results better than what you've got so far.

 

Good luck.

Everything is a little bit of a tradeoff, as mentioned, but the steps above seem to make sense. My thoughts:

 

shoot at f/2 or so, maybe f/2.8 for decent depth of field. f/1.4 is usually too shallow. ISO 640 is too low too. 1250 will yield better images and allow for f/2, 1/400 in that light. I would probably go to 1600 to start. I think 1/400 is a good place to start, but you may like 1/320 better with more DOF, or 1/500 better if the ISO noise doesn't bother you.

 

The newer cameras will change this all... I have f/1.4 lenses too, but I recently shot a competiton at ISO 6400 with a f/2.8 zoom lens because it made more sense. (D3) the D300 should allow for ISO 1600 with very few issues, and make taking pictures a little easier... The D400 (or whatever) will likely solve even more of these problems...

 

Good Luck!

I'm to slack to read all the replies but as everyone has said, DOF is too shallow but you should be able to raise your ISO to at least 800 or more. It looks a touch under exposed too.

With a D300 you should be shooting at least 1600 if not 3200 ISO. That will give you the flexibility to use f/2 or so and still get a faster shutter speed. Previous Nikon bodies were perhaps not up to use at high ISO (perhaps hence these cautious folk advising using no more than 800-1250), but the D300 certainly is. You may have a little work to do in image processing post capture, but don't let that deter you: the end result will be much, much better.

The newspaper I shoot for gave me this equipment to use: Nikon D70s, 18-70mm f3.5-4.5, and a tokina 80-200 f2.8. The camera could be 'ok' with better lenses but because they refuse to provide anything else I use my canon 20D with my 85mm f1.8 on it for sports - except football. I've found that if I set the camera on manual with shutter speed at 1/200 or 1/250, iso800, and f-stop at 2.2 (I don't go below as finding focus is often a time waster) I get damn good pics - something the sports editor now loves me for. Every now and again I up it to iso1600, but don't open the aperture any more.

 

I NEVER use flash during a game. I've heard that players don't really notice it but I just don't believe it. I don't want to be the reason the game is stopped and the ref ends up throwing me out in front of a huge crowd.

 

I'm getting a 5D to use for weddings and I've not thought of it for sports, but it does have the reputation for low noise in low-light shooting.

One word about flash photography at pro events - some of the buildings are usually strobed from the rafters so the photogs can use a transmitter to fire the strobs. These lights are so subtle that you can barely notice them at floor level, even when you are looking for them. So, don't get too hung up on comparing your pics to pics taken at pro events. They may have an advantage with the lighting.

A lot of helpful info here. As an example, I find I can go as low as 1/320 second to reasonably stop action. On the D300, ISO up to 3200. I try to have the f-stop f/2 or higher for improved DOF.