A day at the Ely Nordic ski races (13 images)

[Steve Foss]

Hey all:

Attached to the 10-day-long Ely Winter Festival were today's Nordic ski races at Hidden Valley.

It's been awhile since I went out and had a real shoot. Was feeling pretty useless with tons of writing to do and not much photography, so went for the challenge of action sports again. It felt great to get out there again and rub elbows with folks after being squirreled away in my office for what has seemed like years.

All the adult ski racers were shot with the Canon 30D and Canon 100 f2.8 macro. The rest were split between that combo and the Canon Digital Rebel XT/Canon 100-400 L IS. Great weather. About 20 degrees, even light, nice light snowfall for texture.

All images shot in manual mode by metering off snow and pushing histrogram to the right just short of blowing out the snow.

These are in no particular order.

[mmeyer]

Great stuff Steve. It looks like a good day of shooting!

Thanks for sharing

[WifeKidsandDog]

Nice shots, Steve. I like the vibrant colors, it looks like a fun event. I really like the last photo, something about it appeals to me.

Great work with all the action shots, too.

[finnbay]

Great images! I see you used the 100mm for some of them. Looked like it worked very well!

[Steve Foss]

Thanks, Mike, Cheryl and Ken. It was indeed a lot of fun.

The action photos are what they are, and they dominate the series because it was, after all, a race. But my actual favorite type of people photography involves the three portraits in this series, and I'd have been inclined to post more portraits except that it was, after all, a race.

Thanks again for looking and commenting, you all.

The 100 macro is an outstanding fast sports lens. Aside from its wicked sharpness and f2.8 aperture, it focuses like lightning. And a Canon f2.8 lens or wider offers medium and entry-level Canon DSLR bodies a quicker and more precise focus than other lenses when using the center focus point. On a day like today with low light and snow falling, it made a difference.

[buzzsaw]

Your metering method is spot on as is everything about these images! Very nice work!

[Dbl]

Great work Steve, 3,4 and 8 are top-notch! I spent my time indoors shooting baseball

[Paul]

I really like the picture of the little kid after the wipe out. He has a surprised look on his face.

[Jim Almquist]

All great shots but my favorite one's are the team racing pics. Steve did MIke Manlove start the ski club or just had a unfortunate accident ?

[yakfisher]

Nice work Steve. I've been wanting to get out to shoot, but it seems every time I have the opportunity the light is beyond mine and my equipment's abilities.

[Steve Foss]

Thanks, everybody.

Jim, Mike Manlove was a widely known and well like outdoorsman who died unexpectedly last year while hiking one of his favorite trails. The chalet at Hidden Valley got a huge makeover, and the emblem honors Mike. As far as I know, he did not start the Hidden Valley Ski Area.