Shooting Water Skiers

[tim_kong]

I have a question about shooting water skiers from a moving boat, to be

precise, from the boat that is towing the skiers. Its my 1st time shooting

water skiing action and I noticed that I have a lot of mis-focus shots. The

reason being that I was on a moving boat during the shoot and its rater

difficult to keep the focus spot on the skiers. A slight bump and my focus

point is away from the subject. So my question is how can I shoot sharp pics

of skiers from a moving boat? BTW, I was using AI servo in my shots. Do you

think its a good idea to use manual focus instead of AI servo? Can I say

preset the focus manually at the desired distance and lock it? And what f-

stop is required to allow me sufficient DOF to keep the subject sharp? Hope

my question makes sense and any form of reply/advise is greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

[ronald_moravec1]

The distance from the boat to skier never changes as the tow rope is

fixed, therefore focus one time and turn off AF.

[nikos peri]

I have done my fair share of these. FWIW, I will most often get AF to lock onto the skier once he is up and out of the water, still behind the boat. Then, I'll switch the lens to manual for the rest of the pass. I repeat the process at nearly every pass (switching back onto AF to focus) as the moving and bumping around can move focus off (and my skiers usually shorten the rope after each pass).<p>

For f-stop, if your lens is sharp enough, try staying one stop from wide open. For one, this will help you keep your shutter speed fast enough (and you really want very fast!) and for another, your backgrounds will be pleasantly OOF. From the boat I use an 80-200mm at around 90-100mm on a Nikon digital, and I'm usually at f/4.<p>

Interestingly, looking through my waterski shots here I realize that none posted are from the boat! It's an angle you easily get bored with I guess.<br>

http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=506720

[nikos peri]

Found one, although not terribly recent.<div></div>

[planetxsport]

Hi, shooting from a boat is a great challenge. Had a go at this on three different days this Summer.

 

Choose the calmest day possible and also and area without other boats wakes. Propped myself against the interior boats side and shot standing. Had the camera set on continuous, fast AF and fired away.

Holding the shutter release half down locks the focus, so tried this at times.

 

 

Also tried my nikon 70-200mm lens with both VR on and off. Had better results with VR off as find VR slows the AF a bit.

Do experiment a bit!

Got my best water ski shots from the shore with a fast telephoto lens.

 

Will certainly give the manual settings a go also next Summer as per the suggestions above. Have added a couple of water ski/wake boarding shots to my portfolio.

Capturing wakeboarding can also be good practice as we have the boat going a bit slower, so AF has a fraction longer to focus. Got plenty of usable shots and more practice resulted in more usable shots.