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Pictures at hockey games
First of all I like your Podcast!!!
Most of the time my pictures come out really good. But when you get into low light or tricky situations I stumble. I was hoping for some tips on taking hockey pictures.
My pictures with my Nikon N90s of past games come out looking bad like how a picture looks with a fluorescent light source. I figure I need to spot meter on a player and possibly lock exposure on that. It is hard because the ice is so bright. I have not really messed around with exposure compensation successfully and am not sure if that would help the over all color (temp) of my shots.
Also not sure if I should be using 100 ISO film because it is so bright or 400 and up. Any information would be great.
I liked episode 2 talking to the guy from "Low Overhead". His pictures are awesome!!! I see what he means about direct flash being harsh. I look forward to future episodes.
-Dave
March 2nd, 2006 at 7:14 pm
Dave,
Thanks for the compliments. My suspicion is that the cast you see is from the indoor lighting. Arenas often have fluorescent lighting which would explain the green color. If you are happy with the exposure (i.e. your shots are not coming out too dark) then the solution might be a simple color correction filter for your lens.
Exposure on ice is tricky because of the amount of bright white in the background. I recommend switching to manual exposure for this situation. A spot meter on a player might give you a good starting point. Exposure compensation may help as well, you would want to overexpose those shots. The camera thinks the scene is very bright, so it will set exposure to get a nice gray scene. This will render your darker subjects (players) too dark. Overexposing gets the whites to be white and helps you pick up detail in the darker subjects.
I general, I'd say go with the slowest film you can afford to use that still allows you to get the shutter speeds you want. With action shots, you'll want to shoot 1/250 or 1/500 depending on the lens you have. The shutter speed determines the aperture and film speed you need to get proper exposure. If your max aperture is f4 or higher, you might need fast film in order to get the shots. Keep in mind, the faster the film, the more grain you will see in your enlargements.