High School Sports Photography

TSLevin95 · Mar 24, 2013

I'm going to be shooting a lot of outdoor sports for my high school for spring sports. I wanted to know how I can get the best picture quality for sport photography for high school games. Most games will be under the lights, which aren't too bad, but aren't the best. My shooting location is right on the side lines (lacrosse/soccer) or very close (baseball). My set up right now is a Nikon D600 body and I have a few lenses: nikon 70-200 f/2.8, nikon 80-400 f/4.5-5.6, and sigma 150-500 f/5-6.3. I also have a nikon 1.7x teleconverter and monopod.

What I need help with is what settings and equipment should I use to get the best quality, best sharpness, and overall best professional-like pictures with my current setup.

Thanks!

Overread · Mar 24, 2013

Get your shutter speed to 1/500sec at the very slowest and build from there.

Aperture priority mode - set the aperture as wide as can be and see what the light gives you for a shutter speed; if its not fast enough raise the ISO until it is. Note also read up and lean how to read the histogram and also look into the theory of "expose to the right" since chances are you'll need high ISOs and thus incur more noise whilst shooting action under dimmer lighting.

Ron Bigelow Photography Articles has a series of articles on these subjects that you can read more info on.