winter nordic ski racing photography

[skip_wilson]

<p>I will be photographing racers at a cross country skiing race event in two days with a Nikon D90 with and without an SB600 speedlight, and am wondering if I could get some advice re: white balance setting, focus mode, exposure compensation and if I use a flash, the appropriate settings on the speedlight. I will be shooting with Matrix metering. Thankyou in advance. </p>

[elliot1]

<p>For maximum flexibility, especially with regard to white balance and exposure, shoot RAW</p>

<p>There are probably too many other variable (with regard to distance and lighting) to give you specific settings that will work. But matrix metering should work. Using the center point in AFC mode should give you excellent AF results (I believe that is the only cross type focus point that the D90 has.). If you find you are not getting the results you expect, try the dynamic focusing modes keeping the center point as the center of the group.</p>

[bruce_brown]

<p>Skip: What lens? Also, I am a huge believer in going to the scene BEFORE the event to look things over, see the terrain, decide how you are going to move around, and shooting a few test shots before (in this case) the cross-country skiers "hit the fan" ... It will do wonders for your blood pressure the day of the event.</p>

[soeren_engelbrecht1]

<p>I have limited experience in shooting ski-ing, I must admit - just the kids toboganning :-)<br /><br />I do, however, recommend that you consider manual exposure, if you are under fairly constant lighting conditions (specifically, <strong>incident light</strong>, i.e., the light that hits the place where your subjects are). Even the much-applauded Nikon Matrix metering can be fooled into varying the exposure wildly, if you are following skiers in constant (incident) light that are sometimes framed on a white background and sometimes passing in front of dark trees.<br /><br />As an example, the last time we were out with the kids, I found that 1/500 and F/5.6 @ISO200 gave me a nice looking histogram for an "average scene" (Head-and-shoulders of wife posed before a mixed background in overcast weather). I kept that setting for the next 30 minutes, and everything came out fine. Do shoot in RAW, yes.<br /><br />I wouldn't consider a flash. Including the rapidly varying distance, there would probably be too many variables for the flash to calculate upon - so likely again wildly varying exposures - and you might annoy the skiers a lot.<br /><br />I don't know the D90 focusing system, som by all means try the various C-AF modes. But also consider the ancient art of pre-focusing. If you are in the same place most of the time, it's probably easy to lock the focus on a nice place in advance, then just trip the shutter, when the skier is in the right place.<br /><br />Hope this helps :-)<br /><br />Soeren</p><div></div>