Advice needed for shooting indoor hockey photos | Sport Photos | Photo Forum

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January 22, 2015

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Hello dear members,

Im verry new to photography, just a week a go i bought a Nikon D3200, im aware that this is not the best camera in the world but i want to try to get the best out of it.
I did read the manual of the camera and viewed the 5 first lessons from this and other sites.

One of the reasons i bought the camera is that i love to shoot sport (hockey) photots.
My question is what do you guys recommend for settings especialy for indoor hockey with low light?
How slow can you go on shutter time without becoming the object blurry?

Thanks in advance,

Cheers Gerard

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January 23, 2015
11:25 am

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Hi Gerard. Welcome to the forum.

To shoot sports and hokey in particular, I would use pretty fast shatter speed, probably at least 1/1000. But it all depends how fast they are moving. To get more light I would choose the biggest aperture possible on your lens. Usually sport photographer use fast telephoto lenses like Nikon f2.8 70-200mm (which is not cheep) or even longer. It has widest aperture of f2.8, which lets you compensate a bit for loss off light with fast shutter speed. Then you have to adjust your ISO accordingly to get good exposure. So depending on your skill, you might not always wont to go f2.8, since it might be much easier to miss the focus in this case. For a lot of people f4 might be a better choice.

What lens to you currently have?

January 23, 2015
11:37 am

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Thank you for answering

I have the standard 18-55 VRII lens wich came standard with the camera.
I did use 1/1000 and 1/800 and with smallest F possible but that result to an iso of 6400 or even 12800.
So the pics really became noisy even to noisy, i hoped i missed something.
The focussing was no problem 99% where ok.

Hope you have a trick to lower the iso value

Thanks in advance

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January 25, 2015
8:07 am

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Unfortunately no tricks here. It is limitation of equipment. You could try to shoot at a bit slower shutter speed and see is you can still freeze the action. This will bring ISO down a bit. You could also try to reduce noise in post. Also you could underexpose slightly and then brighten it up in postproduction. Just make sure you shoot RAW. Do you have any post processing software. I personally love Lightroom.

January 28, 2015
10:26 am

https://www.flickr.com/photos/124867436@N03/sets/

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January 22, 2015

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Thanks for the advice
What i tried on last session:
Set the camera in to Sport mode (Which will select the fastest shutter speed possible) the ISO to 3200.
I found out the you need at least a shutter time off 1/320 to get a good freeze.
As the light in indoor is not stable (broken lights on the sealing) this seems to be the best settings for now.

Maybe you can look at the photo’s and give some critic (keep in mind im doing this for only 2 weeks )

Thanks in advance, Cheers Gerard

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January 28, 2015
10:51 am

mscharff

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I was thinking a different sport :-). I might try brining the ISO back down some and fixing the under exposure in post.

January 28, 2015
10:57 am

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Not bad. It looks like you were able to get the best out of the equipment you have. No problem with frizzing an action. The shatter speed needed to freeze an action will also depends on the distance to the subject, besides the subjects speed. So it is good that you experimented with shutter speed. There is some noise, but it doesn’t bother me too much.You can always reduce it in post. Lightroom does a great job. It would be nice to have some longer lens to get closer and get blurry background, but in general You did a great job!

January 28, 2015
11:37 am

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Thank you so much for looking!

I will get Lightroom for post processing to enhance the pictures more.
For another lens i was thinking about the Nikon AF-S 55-200mm VR F/4.0-5.6G DX ED (after watching you lenses lesson )
Again i know its not the best but you can buy them here for about 150 euro and within the budget.
Do you think it will do the job? in a few weeks the outdoor season is coming and also want to use that lens for it.

Thanks in advance, Cheers Gerard

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January 30, 2015
3:44 pm

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it is not the idea lens, because of the aperture F/4.0-5.6, but you can’t beat the price. We all have to start somewhere. As a beginner I would not be smart to go and buy all the expensive equipment.

February 2, 2015
5:49 am