Fun at T-Ball Tuesday night - pic heavy!

[polarsusd81]

So my girlfriend's niece Zoe started playing T-Ball this year and I had to give it a shot. Out came the 1DII and the 70-200 f4L. The light was very nice late evening light and the action was non stop. Well almost anyway.

There will be two posts, 17 images total. The first post is comprised of the stuff happening around the field and running the bases. The second one will be batting practice (for me with the camera that is).

This first one is Zoe

Getting some base running advice from Dad.

High five, or whiff!

[polarsusd81]

Batting practice. Some pretty cool shots in here.

This last one isn't batting, but it was one of my favorites from the night.

[Canon Guy]

Wonderful series! You really captured what it's all about.

[Dbl]

Tom, you have discovered the first thing to get yourself in trouble with the Mark II. You trusted the LCD! With the exception of just a few shots everyone of your photos is underexposed, by at least 1/2 or more stops! I opened just one up in CS4 and the histogram is jammed up to the left.

One thing you will have to learn is to not believe what you see on the LCD, trust the histogram. I've got at least 100,000 shots with the Mark IIN and I still have a hard time believing what I see, but I have learned that the histogram does not lie. The other thing that is nice to know is that each of the vertical lines or zones on your histogram equates to almost exactly 1/3 of a stop with this camera. So it makes it very easy to get your exposure back on track by looking at the histogram.

Here is one of your shots in CS4, you are about 2/3 of a stop underexposed.

I've noticed that I rarely shoot without +1/3 EC with this camera. Its been to Canon and calibrated and the meter checked out and I still shoot almost every shot with +1/3 EC. It will take a while to get used to what this camera will do and not do and how it reacts exposure wise in various scenarios. You are well on your way!

[polarsusd81]

I did purposely underexpose at 2/3 last night so you are very correct, but I guess I did it for the wrong reason. I was looking at the first couple images, and noticed a lot of blinkies. Thanks for the tip, that is very helpful information. When I first checked the shots, half the scene was blinking as overexposed. Then I went to -1/3 and was still having issues. I went to -2/3 and it seemed to be solved. I guess a little more time behind the eyepiece will get me a little more confident.

Are you going to be at the National Sport Center anytime soon? If you are around on a week night, I might have to hop, skip, and jump over there if you wouldn't mind.

[Dbl]

OK, then I would say don't worry too much about the overexposure warning. I generally want some of the highlight exposure to be blinking. Just check the histogram, that is what is important. If you have a spike all the way to the right touching the edge even that won't matter much.

Make sure you are exposing for the faces, that is what matters with any sports shot. The only thing that will cause a blinky with your shots is possibly the lettering on the jerseys and the sky, neither one really matters!

Here is one I shot the other day that was backlighted with white uniforms. The LCD was blinking like crazy but I ignored that and just looked at where the curve was on the histogram and what was up against the right edge. You can see the small spike touching the right edge, that is his left pants leg in the sun and the white on the cap. I think it was shot in Av with +2/3 EC. It still shows up as a fairly large area of blinkies on the LCD, but don't trust it!

I was just up shooting a soccer game at the Sports Center last week, I'm not sure when my next shoot will be up there but I will make sure I let you know ahead of time.

[eyeguy 54]

well that was way over my head lol I like the 3rd and 4th hitters faces. nice shots

[Birdsong]

The first batch is cute--kids doing what kids do! A few real Charlie Brown baseball kinds of things. The ball stopped in action is pretty cool in the second. Underexposed?? Welcome to my world. I will probably not be shooting sports, or own that camera, but I can take parts of the tutorial and apply them, I think? Don't blow out the white of the flower or the bird's wing, but nonessential areas can be overlooked in order to expose the essential correctly in tricky situations, I assume. Thanks for the time it takes, Dan, to put that kind of response together, and Tom, for putting your work out there for us to both enjoy and learn from.

[mmeyer]

Great shots Tom! I am looking forward to the upcoming baseball season for my son and my daughters first year of T-ball.

[Dbl]

Birdsong,

I think you've got the all the pertinent facts down perfect! There rarely is one perfect way to take a photo, you have decide what result you are after as Tom did here. I am just offering up another perspective and one other factor to consider.

You are correct, if shooting a white bird don't blow the whites or you lose the detail! When shooting an athlete with a white uniform don't worry about blowing out the uniform, make sure you correctly expose the face. Look at each subject and what look you are after and you likely will have to a compromise in how you approach the shot.

[MN Shutterbug]

It's too bad modern cameras aren't high tech enough to handle a lot of contrast. It's heck to have to choose. When it comes to shooting a bird with blacks and whites, and you have bright sunny conditions, you don't have many options except to shoot earlier or later in the day.

Tom, I like the action shots.

[Brooky]

Priceless shots. Thanks for sharing.