Nikon D5100 questions

[rjm522]

Greetings all....new member and my first post.

I recently purchased a Nikon D5100 with the 18-55mm lens and the 55-300mm lens. I primarily use the camera for sports photography of my children, who play high school level Lacrosse. I currently use the sports mode on the camera dial as Lacrosse is a very fast moving sport. I also like the ability to shoot continuously. I have gotten some really good shots of the boys scooping, running and shooting the ball but know there is more to the camera then I am using. I have purchased the book "Nikon D5100 for dummies" and am in the process of reading through it. My head is spinning with information. I get that in order to get the best pictures I need to take creative control of the camera and adjust some - or all - of the settings but the task seems daunting. Yesterday all the shots I took - using the sports mode - were way to bright compared to last week's game pictures. The sun was lower in the sky - late afternoon game - so I don't know if that any influence. Luckily Picasa has an auto contrast button that seemed to even things out. The focus was not all that clear on some of them either.

My questions are many but I will start with this one. What aspect of creating the picture do I start with? I want action shots of the children playing a fast moving game. The size of the field is almost the same as football and the parents are restricted to the opposite sideline from the players so I can't move around too much to get the shots. The games are held outdoors in bright sun to cloudy skies. I only use the zoom lens due to the distance I am away from the subjects. I briefly fiddled with the "S" selection on the dial, but the picture came out black. I then tried the "A" position but the shutter took a long time to click and the picture was blurry. I have moved focal points, put a polarized lens on the end of the zoom to help with glare as well as a UV filter but alas I know I can take a better picture. Any suggestions you all might be able to offer would be greatly appreciated. I need something web based as opposed to taking a class due to my work schedule.

Thanks in advance to all who respond. BTW, I went from a small point and shoot to this Nikon so i am NOT well versed in the art of photography.

 

[Big Mike]

Welcome to the forum.

Firstly, I think you need to learn about 'exposure' and how a camera works. There are plenty of good resources to gain this information.
In a nutshell, there are three things that control the exposure of a photo. The shutter speed (length of time), the aperture (size of the hole in the lens) and the ISO setting.

The way that motion is captured (sharp or blurry) has to do with the shutter speed. The faster (shorter) the shutter speed, the less blur you will have. Also note that blur can come from motion of your subjects, or motion of the camera (holding it in your hands, for example).
So to get sharp shots of your kids on the field, you need a fast shutter speed. Ideally, you would want something like 1/500, but you might be able to get away with something like 1/125 or maybe slower (longer) if they aren't moving. But, to avoid motion blur from the camera's movement, the rule of thumb is to have a shutter speed that is the same (or higher) than the reciprocal of the focal length. So when shooting at the end of your 55-300mm zoom, you would want a shutter speed of at least 1/300.

So knowing that, you can keep an eye on your shutter speed. It's displayed in the viewfinder as you're shooting. (and probably on the LCD screen as well).

But the problem with just dialing in 1/300 as a shutter speed, is that you'd have to compensate for the exposure, by using on (or both) of the three exposure tools (aperture and ISO). To help get a faster shutter speed (or compensate for it) you will want to use the largest aperture that your lens can do....that would be the lowest F number. You lens (at 300mm) is limited to F5.6. In photography terms, that isn't very big at all...it's a limitation of your lens (and part of the reason why your lens wasn't super expensive).
So after that, your last resort is to turn up the ISO. The trade off off for that, is digital noise (gritty images). The higher the ISO, the more digital noise you will get, but that's better than blurry.

So, you could put the camera into S mode. Then select 1/300 as your shutter speed. The camera will probably set the lens to it's maximum aperture (F4 to F5.6) and it might set your ISO as well...but it may not be enough to get good exposures (you might end up with underexposed photos).
This is essentially what the sports mode does. It makes it a priority to use a faster shutter speed, but if the light isn't bright enough, you won't be able to get very fast with the shutter, and you'll end up with blurry images.

The best way for you to get around this (with the gear you have), is to manually set the ISO to a rather high level. You could try 1600 or higher, if you camera will allow that. That will allow you to get more exposure with a fast shutter speed...but in low light, even that may not be enough.

The bottle neck here is your lens. With a maximum aperture of F5.6, it really limits how fast of a shutter speed you can use. That's why pro sports shooters, use lenses that have larger maximum apertures. For example, popular sports lenses are things like 300mm F2.8 or 400mm F2.8. F2.8 is actually 4 times larger than F5.6, which would allow for a shutter speed that is 4 times as fast, thus allowing them to freeze the motion of the subject. But of course, those lenses cost several thousand dollars each.

There are cheaper alternative lenses, but they still aren't inexpensive. So unless you can afford to shell out for a better 'sports' lens, then you're best (only) option is to turn up the ISO on your camera.

 

[KmH]

You have to become familiar with the exposure triad; shutter speed, lens aperture and ISO, how they relate, and the nuances each setting has. You also need to have an understanding of a 'stop' of exposure.

I used to shoot field sports for money. I used A, aperture priority (see your D5100 user's manual) instead of S (shutter priority) because I was more concerned about controlling the DOF. I also set the ISO to AUTO (see your D5100 user's manual). That way the camera then controlled both the shutter speed and the ISO. All I had to do was keep an eye on the shutter speed displayed in the viewfinder to make sure it stayed at or above 1/500 of a second which is about the slowest shutter speed that can stop foeld sports action. If some dark clouds rolled by I might have to briefly manually adjust the ISO to keep the shutter speed up.

By the way you also have to use continuous auto focus, AF-C (see your D5100 user's manual).

 

[Big Mike]

I used to shoot field sports for money. I used A, aperture priority (see your D5100 user's manual) instead of S (shutter priority) because I was more concerned about controlling the DOF. I also set the ISO to AUTO (see your D5100 user's manual). That way the camera then controlled both the shutter speed and the ISO. All I had to do was keep an eye on the shutter speed displayed in the viewfinder to make sure it stayed at or above 1/500 of a second which is about the slowest shutter speed that can stop foeld sports action. If some dark clouds rolled by I might have to briefly manually adjust the ISO to keep the shutter speed up.

Good points. When I'm shooting action or sports, I don't use shutter speed priority mode (S) (Tv on Canon) either. I would also tend to use aperture priority, not necessarily for the DOF that I wanted (although that's part of it) but because I know that if I'm manually selecting the largest aperture, I know that the camera will give me the fastest shutter speed.

 

[MTVision]

My D5100 user manual came on a cd just so you know. It came with a paper one as well but it was very small. The one on the CD is about 300 pages!

 

[Big Mike]

Many camera come with a quick reference guide, separate from the manual. Most manuals are at least 300 pages these days.

 

[subscuck]

To piggy-back on what Big Mike and Keith have already said, at this point I think you would be better served by a book dealing with the fundamentals of exposure. I'd recommend "Understanding Exposure" by Bryan Peterson. It's readily available and geared towards the beginner. I think you'll get far more out of a book like that than a model specific book.

 

[rjm522]

Thanks to everyone that replied. I picked up the book Understanding Exposure yesterday and am half way through it. I have already taken pictures in the M mode and reading the book has really helped me to understand the exposure process. I am looking forward to this weekends games so I can try my hand at panning and action shots. You folks have really helped a lot.