Ringling Brothers Circus

manaheim

Jedi Bunnywabbit
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Can others edit my Photos
Photos OK to edit
Ok, I'm very curious to see what people have to say here.

I don't know how many of you have ever tried this, but taking pictures at the Circus is a real bugger.

Figure:
  • Very dark with high-contrast spotlights and such.
  • Inconsistent and rapidly moving light.
  • Rapidly moving subjects.
  • Generally quite a distance from your subject.
Regardless, I was pretty pleased with the results. My goal was to get the best possible saturation of colors, low noise, and low blur as much as possible.

Not ALL of the photos that I like fit all of these requirements, but these are the ones that I particularly liked.

These were taken with a Nikon D300 and a Nikor 70-300 4.5/5.6 lense. All pictures were at ISO 1600 or greater, and most were at ISO 2000. I had the high-ISO noise reduction set to normal or high.

I did make a point to attempt to overexpose the images just slightly to reduce noise on the subject of the shot. Generally speaking this worked pretty well, but it was challenging to get a fast exposure (to compensate for the long focal length of the lense and fast moving subjects) AND to overexpose the shot... even at ISO2000. I was terrified of going up to ISO 2400 because I know the D300 noise reduction starts to fail up in that area.

Obviously, a faster lense would help, but I was very pleased with the results. This is actually only my second time using this particular lense. Not bad for a relatively inexpensive Nikor.

Feedback welcome and appreciated. Don't hold back.

I'll post the actual images in a reply to this thread so if you open this and see nothing, give me about 10 mins and look again. :)
 
Here they are...

=== 1 ===
circus1.jpg


LOL, I just noticed the EXIT sign... I should probably remove that! :lol:

=== 2 ===
circus2.jpg


=== 3 ===
circus3.jpg


=== 4 ===
circus4.jpg


=== 5 ===
circus5.jpg


=== 6 ===
circus6.jpg


=== 7 ===
circus7.jpg


=== 8 ===
circus8.jpg


=== 9 ===
circus9.jpg


=== 10 ===
circus10.jpg


>>> (continued in next post) <<<
 
=== 11 ===
circus11.jpg


=== 12 ===
circus12.jpg


=== 13 ===
circus13.jpg


=== 14 ===
circus14.jpg


=== 15 ===
circus15.jpg


=== 16 ===
circus16.jpg


=== 17 ===
circus17.jpg


=== 18 ===
circus18.jpg


=== 19 ===
circus19.jpg
 
I really like 6 & 18.
Yeah, definitely a difficult subject, but I think you did well!
 
I really like 6 & 18.
Yeah, definitely a difficult subject, but I think you did well!

Thanks. 18 was funny because it was a totally failed shot... wrong camera alignment and poor exposure... and then a little tweak and it came out kinda neat and wound up being one of my favorites as well. Figures. :lol:
 
Wow, I'm really bummed... no comments? I stayed up till 2 putting this together. lol
 
Considering all the limitations and obstacles, I think you did a great job! My camera would have just completely crapped out on me. At 1600, my pictures are total crap!

I think #18 is my favorite as well :)
 
Considering all the limitations and obstacles, I think you did a great job! My camera would have just completely crapped out on me. At 1600, my pictures are total crap!

I think #18 is my favorite as well :)

Thanks. To be fair this is my third try at this (if you count the time I tried to do it with my point and shoot)... I couldn't have gotten them even this far without a lot of research and tons of good tips from folks here on TPF.

I was surprised how much of it was my method and not my equipment, though ... I can't be TOTALLY sure of that since I used my new cam and its famous for high ISO handling.
 
Try playing with the levels in photoshop, to get rid of that washed-out colors look in some of them. otherwise, they are quite good considering the circumstances.
 
Try playing with the levels in photoshop, to get rid of that washed-out colors look in some of them. otherwise, they are quite good considering the circumstances.

The funny thing is I did. The dropoff on detail was so harsh that when I came down from where they are even a touch, I instantly lost so much of the detail. (which is actually how I got 18... I dropped it and was like... ooo... cool!!! and just went with it! :lol:)

Still, I'll give it a shot again since you suggested it. To be fair, I was doing these at 2 AM... you never know how it might come out if I was actually awake! :lol:

Thanks for the comments.
 

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