how to rugby festival

[plutonio]

Hi
wondering if you guys could give me some advice please, my son's team are holding their annual rugby festival and would like to have a stab at shooting it.
What setting should i use? Al Servo? iso? etc
any help, tips will be most appreciated.

i have a 5DmkII and the lense i have at my disposal are EF 17-40mm f4 L, EF 24-105mm f4 L, EF 50mm f1.4, EF 70-300mm f4.5-5.6 DO IS, Speedlite 580 EX II

[paul linton]

Re: how to rugby festival

For action shots 70-300mm, set camera to AI Servo plus high speed shutter (3.9 fps for 5D ?) This Lens is good for action and individual head and shoulder portraits,If you want team shots use one of your wideangle with a bit of fill in flash, I did a similar event last weekend I'll post them in the sports section.

Paul

[colin C]

Re: how to rugby festival

Great advice from Paul. I can only add the following:

• Keep the shutter speed high. 1/500sec or higher if you can.

• Your 70 - 300mm will be an f5.6 lens, so try to stop down to f8 if you can to be in the sweet spot of that lens.

• To use the above settings, you may need to increase the ISO, but your 5D will handle that with ease and still provide good quality shots.

• This may sound odd ................ shoot with both eyes open!

On that last point, shooting with a telephoto, the image in the viewfinder is magnified and you are concentrating on that. If you can keep your non-dominent eye open, it will give you a wide angle perspective so that you can anticipate where the action is going to be and be ready for it. It is a little awkward at first, but you do get used to seeing the magnified image superimposed on the wide angle.

Hope that helps.

Colin

[plutonio]

Re: how to rugby festival

thank you both for the tips, i have posted a few of my photo's in the sport section "rugby festival 2"
i would be delighted to get your thoughts.