As promised, a sequence of shots taken at yesterday’s ball game. I was attempting to capture a play in a series of shots, in this case a failed attempt to throw out a runner at second base. I had the camera set on continuous shooting and by simply holding down the shutter and aiming the camera where the scene was unfolding, I was able to capture the following six shots. They show the second baseman reacting to a very high throw, catching the ball and still attempting to put the tag on the baserunner. Alas, he was too late and the runner slid in safely.
I had some questions about camera settings after posting yesterday’s blog. Sorry to have overlooked that; I’m including it today. Sports photography is about high speed, “freezing” the motion. In order to do so requires a very fast shutter speed. I achieved that by putting the camera in Shutter Priority mode, that means fixing the time the shutter remains open for each shot at a chosen time interval, in the case of these photos, 1/1000 sec. With the shutter speed fixed, the camera adjusts the aperture to achieve the correct exposure. With the abundant light available yesterday, the aperture setting was consistently f5.6. As the day progressed, shadows from the grandstand lengthened over the field and it was necessary to increase exposure compensation to offset the effect of the shadows.
Many photographers would prefer to shoot action a little more slowly, introducing some motion blur to give a sense of movement. That is achieved by simply choosing a longer shutter opening. The next picture was taken at last week’s Giants game and shows the effect of a slower shutter speed on the image. The batter, Freddie Sanchez makes contact with the ball. The ball, the bat, Sanchez’ upper torso and right leg all show motion blur. Those areas of the photo not in motion; his left leg and the Reds’ players in the background are sharp
This shot was taken with a shutter speed of 1/125 sec. and a resultant aperture of f9.0.
Fast exposure or slower. Stop motion or a little motion blur. A matter of preference.