Nature Light Photo

Giving Back – Softball Against Cancer

Again, I look to Jeremy Cowart for my inspiration to use my photography for giving back to the community. Every year our school has a staff vs. senior softball game where all proceeds go to the Cancer Society. I offer my photography to the cause shooting each player as they take their turn at bat and also some of the plays out in the field. The biggest contribution I make is to take a picture of all the players on the field and then make 8×10 prints that thank the sponsors.

We all know someone who has had their lives touched by cancer. I know I have several. This was an opportunity to give back to them.

The players

Mr. Warren founder and coordinator of the game.

The Field and Crowd

Miss Kline at Bat

Saibrah White at Bat

Mr. Ermert Rips One to Right

The Staff - Winning Team

And for the record: the staff beat the senior 17-5.

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Senior/Staff Basketball Game

I was asked to shoot a charity basketball game between the seniors and the staff to benefit scleroderma victims. I like this kind of event. The kids have fun and so does the staff. Plus, it goes to a good cause. Here are a few images from the evening and a short analysis of the problems and possible solutions follows that.

You can see all of the images at The Nature Light Photography Gallery.

What Did I Learn?

This was a new challenge. I have never shot sports inside before. Water polo and swimming? Yes. Softball? Yes. Rodeo? Yes. But never indoor basketball.

I have read where the lighting situation inside most high school gyms is difficult. JEEZ!! Is that true!!!! My plan was to take my SB600 and shoot with a fairly fast piece of glass, the 70-200 f2/8. It worked. Kind of.

While the flash did freeze the action fairly well, focus was a bit of a problem. The lens wouldn’t lock on to subjects well and fast enough. I think this is due to the very low light conditions and the difficulty of following the subject.

I basically planted myself under one basket and shot from a seated position. The length of the lens made it difficult to keep the subject in the viewfinder as they came closer to my end of the court and the proximity of the players made good composition difficult. You can see my results here.

You can see the limited field of view and difficulty of composition.

I brought my 50mm f1.4 also, but it limited my ability to isolate the players or what I wanted to shoot. I also had the D70 kit lens, a 18-70mm f3.5-4.5, but I didn’t think that it was fast enough. But I wasn’t getting the shots I wanted or needed, so I tried it.

I was surprised. It focused quickly, the flash froze the subjects well, and the images were usable!! The subjects weren’t too close for a good composition and I could compose fairly well.

With a wider lens, the composition is better.

The only problem was that the on camera flash left some weird shadows behind the subjects. It’s not the lens, but me not utilizing the flash well.

Harsh shadows caused by on camera flash.

I think I really need a better flash, something like a SB900 and some sort of remote to fire it off from a distance. I have seen sports shooters utilize two flashes mounted on stands placed at the corners of the floor and triggered by remotes such as Radio Poppers or Pocket Wizards. I would like to try that set-up next time.

The bottom line is that next time I WILL get the flash off of the camera and try to get two flashes that I can work together to improve the lighting situation.

All-in-all, I think it was a good shoot. OH, and the staff won!!!

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