First pictures with 85mm 1.8

[Todd Caswell]

After about 6 monthes of looking for a good used 85 I baught a new one last week, most of the used ones were selling for almost new prices. I got a chance to try it out Friday night at a buddy of mines daughters figure skating show. The lighting conditions were about as bad as it gets for the show, all the lights off except a spot light. I tried a few at 3200 ISO on my 50D and I could tell right away there was alot of noise. I backed it off to ISO 2000 and was able to get a 1/250th at 1.8. For the conditions I feel they turned out OK at best. Any suggestions other than a flash?

[finnbay]

Lovely shots!

[Dbl]

Todd,

I'm in a bit of a hurry this morning but I will get back to you with some suggestions latter this afternoon.

[Dbl]

Todd, one of the things you have to deal with when shooting in poorly lighted venues such as this is noise. Here is the generally accepted mantra of low light sports shooting, "it is better to have a noisy shot than one that is blurry because of slow shutter speeds". I see you were down to ISO 1600 and 1/160s in aperture priority. With any action you generally need to have at least 1/320s to help with freezing both action and help against shutter shake.

The real reason to have an 85/1.8 is to have a sharp lens that is capable of giving you those faster shutter speeds at lower ISO's than would be possible with other lenses. They were also shot in aperture priority, when indoors like this with light conditions that are not changing manual mode will give you more consistent results. You will notice the bright lights in the backgrounds of some of these shots, they will throw your camera meter off in giving you the correct exposure on your subject. As she skates around different backgrounds will give different metering. This is why manual works so well inside of rinks. Most rinks will have slight exposure differences from one area of the rink to another but with a spotlight following your skater the exposure should be fairly constant.

I hope that helps you a bit, don't be afraid to crank up that ISO to help your shutter speeds. The 50D does a credible job at 3200 ISO and works at 6400 ISO in a pinch when you need to get a shot. Keep shooting!