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I am using a D70 and a 70-200 Sigma 2.8. I have recently taken a few shots of my kids running and doing sport. Some of the shots are tack sharp whereas many others are soft. I know the lens has the potential to do good things and I want to take it there.

Q: What are the best settings for on coming moving objects such as a person running towards me in the range of 10-50 metres?

Assumptions: Good light, handheld or monopod

Issues: AF-C or AF-S, Speed, ISO, AF Area...and any others that you would recommend

Any suggestions greatly appreciated

Peter Mc

Peter could you post any examples, or even just the exif of the shots that appear soft ?

Generally AF-C is a better option as the focus will change as your subject moves. This is particularly the case if you are taking images front on, rather than side on. Also be careful of your depth of field, if you use the lens wide open (F/2.8 ), you will have a very shallow DOF meaning that areas on your actual subject may be out of focus, rather than the back ground.

If you are shooting in low light, then up your ISO to where ever you can get the shutter speed you require. I would imagine that you wouldn't need much faster than 1/500 for kids running. Try even slower for different effects.

You should be able to hand hold the camera with the sigma as it isn't a heavy lens, so I would avoid the monopod. However if you are taking shots at 200mm, then they may appear softer when cropped from camera wobble, so it really depends on what distance you are taking shots from.

What would be a good setting for a person running towards you? AFC, F/5.6 - 7.1 (around there anyways) and whatever ISO lets you get a shutter speed around 1/500.

Thats my advice anyways. Also, you could get rid of the sigma and buy a nikkor 70-200 VR. The VR feature is very handy for handheld images. I got rid of my sigma for a nikkor and haven't looked back. There are some who will tell you that the sigma is a soft lens (like many sigma lenses) but for what you pay for it, it's a good lens!

Good luck!

The "trap focus" technique may be worthwhile trying. I haven't used it myself but I could see it working in your situation. I regard this as a sort of variant on the half shutter depress prefocusing technique.

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read. ... ge=9479603


Working this through as I understand it. Say you want the runner to be in focus on the finish line. Head on shot. Focus on the finishing line. Lock this focus with AE-L/AF-L button. Now follow the chosen runner with the shutter fully depressed. When that runner gets into focus at the finishing line the shutter will fire.

A few provisos..

The shutter will fire when anything is in focus at the chosen sensor. So you probably need a longish lens to isolate the subject from the chosen focal length until they meet.

If there is a large DOF the shutter may fire before you want it too (but at least the subject will be in focus). This is the reason why I would not use it in showjumping (my latest photo project) where you want the horse to be at a certain position in relation to the jump when the photo is taken.

This explains things better than wot I can do

http://www.pbase.com/dlcmh/af_ae_config

Thanks Raskil and Craig.

I would post some but I am not sure where Pixipost has gone to. I seem to have lost the link and am trying hard to find it again.

I purchased quite a few lenses last year (12-24 Nik, 85 1.8 & 50 1.4 and VR 24-120) and have to do some engineering to be able to purchase a VR not to mention that the 70-200 is only about six months old...but I'm thinkin.

Thanks again for your comments.

I am not very happy with the 24-120 for such shots as it tends to vary in quality.

Peter Mc

Raskill is pretty much on the money. I try to combine as many of the following settings as possible for my sports/action shots:
- AFC
- Single area AF (in action shots your subject is usually centre frame).
- Minimum 1/500th shutter speed
- Minimum f6.3. F8 or more if you have the available light, the more DOF you have the better to allow for tracking and focus errors.
- Continuous shooting mode.

I agree all above comments from Raskill & Johndec.

Pls. note: shoot 100 frames and only get three of the best.

Birdy

I dont feel so bad then. 3% success rate. I've even beaten that a few times.

That's a good summary John. Most of the time I do some of that. I will try and increase the odds by doing all of it all of the time for fast shots.

Kind regards

Peter Mc