Need a good lens for friday night football

[Patrice]

Alright guys....I shot my first Friday night football game last night. I had no idea what I was doing, so looking for pointers. I have never shot action photography before and not skilled enough to do full manual yet. Here are the pics.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/tiaobrienphotography/sets/72157647248541596/

Not much to critique, you did an excellent job. Nice lens choice! (Of course I'd say that, I have one also). As for striving to go 'full manual', what for? Photos won't necessarily get any better because of it. Today's Nikons metre exceptionally well, heck look at your photos, those are difficult scenes on which to nail the exposure and yet your camera managed it fine. Aperture auto and shutter auto, even program mode, are there to be used and to your advantage.

Keep going and enjoy the games.

 

[tia81280]

Thank you! I guess just to get better control of my pictures and know for sure i know what I'm doing lol. the lens/camera really did all the work for me, besides you all telling me to pump the ISO up. Thank you!

 

[curtyoungblood]

I sort of quickly flipped through your images on flickr. I think you need to work on finding peak action. There aren't a lot of images where players are about to either tackle each other, avoid a tackle, make a move, or something like that. That's the kind of stuff that make strong sports images. Also, it is really difficult to critique several hundred pictures. If you want meaningful feedback, pick your best 4 or 5, process them, and post them up for critique.

 

[robbins.photo]

I sort of quickly flipped through your images on flickr. I think you need to work on finding peak action. There aren't a lot of images where players are about to either tackle each other, avoid a tackle, make a move, or something like that. That's the kind of stuff that make strong sports images. Also, it is really difficult to critique several hundred pictures. If you want meaningful feedback, pick your best 4 or 5, process them, and post them up for critique.

Just a guess but I'm thinking this is a lot more about capturing images of her own boys than it is about capturing peak action. Any action involving her boys is "peak" to her, since she's not really shooting these for the local paper or sports illustrated.

 

[curtyoungblood]

I should probably start off by saying I'm not a parent, so there's likely a lot I don't really understand here.

I get the desire to get photos of your own boys, and I think it is an important thing to do. I also think that it is important to strive to get the best photos of your children you can while you're doing it. Personally, I think it would be far more valuable to have a handful of really great pictures of them from throughout the season than a whole bunch of decent ones. (For the record, I'm making a theoretical argument here, not commenting on the quality of your photos). I can definitely see that the OP is having a lot of fun shooting her sons playing football, and that is a wonderful thing. I'm just hoping to help her to make nicer photos. To that end, let me be a little more specific than I was previously.

If I were shooting a specific player, here's how I would approach it. If that player is a linebacker (which I feel like you said he was), I would position myself at about the line of scrimmage (maybe 5 yards behind it for safety), and focus on that player. Keep the focus on him throughout the play, and start shooting when it looks like he's about to make a tackle, get involved with a pass, or take on a block. Offensively, if the player is a running back, I'd do something similar, but start shooting when he approaches a defensive player. I'd think the ideal shot would be him putting a move on another player, where you can see the defender on the ground and missing a tackle.