help, action shots?

jazzitupphotography · Jan 17, 2009

So I like to take pictures of my horse, but whenever I take action shots of him, his legs appear blurred. I was wondering what I've been doing wrong?

I have a 450D with 18-55 mm with IS.

ann · Jan 17, 2009

what was the shutter speed?

jazzitupphotography · Jan 17, 2009

Can't remember, these pictures were taken back in december. I guess that would help haha.

What would be the ideal shutter speed for action shots with horses?

Overread · Jan 17, 2009

ideal is a fast as you can with action

generally your wanting as fast as you can get - so sometimes you have to take compramises:

1) upp you ISO - noise is far better than blur - you can reduce noise in editing and work with a shot to get a reasonable result - with blur you can't remove it

2) if your shooting in an auto or semi auto (like aperture priority mode) then use exposure compensation to underexpose the shot - that will make the camera choose faster shutter speeds - though sometimes you have to go for full manual mode and dial in the speed to get it (which might mean you get an underexposed shot

3) use a wider aperture - of course this can lose you your depth of field in a shot (area of photo in focus) and with closer shots of big animals like a horse its sometimes something that you can't have the option of for some poses - side on head shots you can normall get away with a smaller depth of field - wider aperture (smaller f number)

4) flash - horses are like any other animal; some blink - others ignor - some run 100 miles from it - and some attack. You won't know till you try - inside it will give you the added light you need for a faster shutter speed without having to increase ISO and opening up your aperture

jazzitupphotography · Jan 19, 2009

Thanks Overread, that helped a lot.
I'm going to go out tomorrow and experiment with my shutter speed/aperture and ISO, and I'll give my flash a go. I'll try to remember everything you suggested! thanks

brileyphotog · Jan 20, 2009

you can cheat the shutter speed a little bit depending on the gait...obviously a horse at a trot is going to have less leg blur than a barrel racer booking it full speed. depending on the shot though, sometimes i think blur helps to convey the speed. obviously you don't want every picture like that though - refer to suggestions above

bdavis · Jan 20, 2009

faster shutter will keep the legs crisp. Although, having the body of the horse sharp and the legs blurry (like when the horse is in a full gallop) is a really cool effect.

jazzitupphotography · Jan 26, 2009

OK so I shot all of these with a fast shutter speed (from 1/100 to 1/160) and kept my ISO at 1600 (the highest it will go) I didn't mess much with the aperture, kept it around f5. There was almost no light in the arena. I'm not happy with these shots.. just wondering what I could do next time. I edited them a bit on Photoshop, but didn't have time to do much with them. Just upped the brightness/contrast (yes they were initially darker)

OK this is the worst of the day..

ksmattfish · Jan 26, 2009

I don't know squat about photographing horses, but I'm guessing to freeze a moving horse crisply you are looking for shutter speeds faster than 1/250th. I'd probably start test shooting at 1/1000th myself.

Indoors where there isn't much ambient light any flash may actually do a decent job of freezing some movement. Outdoors or where there is a lot of ambient light you'll need a upper end flash that allows for high speed sync. Without high speed sync your shutter will be limited to slower speeds when using a flash.

If you are going to be shooting indoors without a flash you'll need a fast (large aperture) lens. For zooms this means f/2.8, and it'll have a bigger price tag too. Fast prime lenses are often much cheaper and even faster than zooms. The Canon 50mm f/1.8 costs about $80, and is a great cheap option for low light shooting.

Anytime you are shooting into a very bright light source, like the windows to the outdoors, the camera is probably going to goof it on it's own. Either set the exposure manually, increase exposure comp, or learn to use the exposure lock button. You can point away from the windows, lock the exposure, and then recompose.

Along the same lines, when you are shooting into the dark tell your camera to under expose a little bit (raise the shutter speed). While underexposure can lead to noise issues, I think a decent shutter speed is more important here. Also with the available light it's a somewhat dim scene in reality, so it's okay that the photos would reflect that.

Overread · Jan 26, 2009

Pretty much same agains as Matt said - flash might be your only option for good lighting in those indoor conditions - just remember to test it first without the rider

gsgary · Jan 26, 2009

Your problem is your lens it is not capable of shooting horses indoors it is not fast enough you need minimum F2.8 and at iso1600 i don't think that will be enough, i was shooting dog agility indoors this weekend and i was at ISO3200 F2.8 1/320 and that was only just fast enough
http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/photojournalism-sports-gallery/153956-5d-dogs.html

here are some horse shots of mine to give you an idea of what shutter speeds you need Gary Clarke : photos : Bramham Horse Trials (Canon 10D)- powered by SmugMug
hover your mouse over the picture on right and click photo info

jazzitupphotography · Jan 26, 2009

here's what I got with the flash. I didn't like how it looked on my LCD so I didn't use it again.

I thought it just looked like something I'd taken with my point and shoot. Oh well, in a few months our 10 feet of snow is going to melt and I'll be able to take some outside.

what do you guys think of these?

Overread · Jan 26, 2009

Might be that using a flash diffuser would help a lot with using the flash - that should help counter the harsh lighting of it. Out of interest do have a proper flash (like a speedlite) or is it a popup flash on the camera? If it is the former then something like a lumiquest softbox would help - the latter I would say you can use some folds of toilet paper (white) held infront of the flash (elastic bands work well at this provided that the band does not cover the front of the flash).

As for the other shots I think they are working out better

A few look a bit soft and I would ask if your doing any sharpening after resizing for the internet (you really should since it does help restor sharpness in a shot after resizing) - also possibly a faster shutter speed, but I can't tell what speeds you were shooting at for those - no exif data on the uploaded shots.

bigtwinky · Jan 26, 2009

I was at a friend’s horse farm in Maine over the holidays and took some pictures of horses both in doors and outdoors.

The main problem you are having is that your lens is not good enough to take low light pictures. By good enough, I’m thinking that the aperture of the lens cannot get wide enough to allow enough light to come in, which in turn will allow for a faster shutter speed to freeze the horse’s action.

The light in those indoor riding arenas is just horrible.

The 50mm 1.8 is a great lens for lower light photography and its cheap. As stated, its around $80 USD.

If you are sticking with your lens, I’d go for more stationary shots, poses and such, like you did in your last set. And wait for the snow to melt and head on outside where the light should not be much of a problem.

TheUndisputed · Jan 26, 2009

For your focus issue:

If you are using auto focus, make sure your camera is set up to focus on the entire matrix and not one focal area. I would also set the metering the same way, and increase your shutter speed. Action shots are kind of hard to capture if you are using a focal point, because the camera is moving.

For your flash issue:

Diffuse the flash some how, it is extremely harsh. If you are using an external hot shoe flash, see if it has a filter slide in it. I just took a peice of white copy paper, cut it to the filter size, and slid it into the filter slider. It works perfect. Now, if I need a flash, it gives the area soft light instead of hard, direct light. If you are using your pop up flash on the camera, tear a peace of CLEAN white T shirt off, and wrap it around the top of the flash and tie it down with a rubber band. Depending on how strong your flash is, depends on what thickness you need to use. On mine, I have to double layer it, because the flash is HARSH on my cam, so I fold the T shirt over and put 2 layers on top of the flash bulb. Oh yes, and make sure not to have any wrinkes in the T shirt piece over the bulb, it will mis direct light in your shot.