Boxing Event

Hi all

I'm new to the site and would appreciate any advice from anyone photographed a boxing event. I was invited to a boxing event not as the main photographer but to simply take as many photos as I wanted and was able to stand ringside.
My camera is a D700 and D7200 using a 50mm f1.8 lens. I put my D700 ISO 6400 f2.8 and with no flash, the shutter speed I was getting varied up to 250. I didn't want to go above ISO 6400 in case the photos came out too poor to edit the noise out also the lighting wasn't too good, I do shoot in RAW. When viewing my photos on the monitor they were quite good but what I did find is where I focused on the boxer facing me using AFC d9, maximum shutter speed was quite sharp but his opponent wasn't as sharp as I had liked.

I did swap for my D7200 with 50mm but was at times too close so switched back to D700

Any advice on what settings would improve the quality of all round sharpness

I did submit this thread by mistake in the Photography Business ( My apologies)

Many thanks

Saturation is too high. Are you shooting vivid?

As for the sharpness, that is an issue of depth of field. The only way to expand your depth of field is to tighten down the aperture f/3, f/4, etc... to increase the depth of field. However, it's a vicious circle. With a tighter aperture, increased depth of field, you will have less light. Kind of leaves you with having to use flash or knowing how dark you can shoot on your D700 and still pull it back from the shadows. Sports are generally shot at 1/500th+, which still puts you back to the lack of light issue. OR get a D4 LOL.

Shoot RAW, adjust temperature to look more natural vs yellow, shoot faster. Like 4-640 not 200.

I did use vivid forgot I had it set to that. I had ISO up to 6400 and although I use Lightroom and good at removing noise I didn't want to go above 6400 not sure what they would have come out like if I'd have up the ISO. The only way to get faster shots was to go above 6400. It was my first attempt at this sport although thinking of it now I should have tried a few shots at a higher ISO. D4s in my dreams. If I get the chance again I'll try some of the things you said. I use a battery grip and can put a different tray in to hold 8 AA batteries that should give me 8 frames per sec

Moab Man nice images on your Flickr

johnmac said:

I did use vivid forgot I had it set to that. I had ISO up to 6400 and although I use Lightroom and good at removing noise I didn't want to go above 6400 not sure what they would have come out like if I'd have up the ISO. The only way to get faster shots was to go above 6400. It was my first attempt at this sport although thinking of it now I should have tried a few shots at a higher ISO. D4s in my dreams. If I get the chance again I'll try some of the things you said. I use a battery grip and can put a different tray in to hold 8 AA batteries that should give me 8 frames per sec

Moab Man nice images on your Flickr

Click to expand...

Thank you for the compliment on Flickr.

As to your picture. I really really suggest you take your camera off of vivid. When you first start, and most have done it, you want to capture that color. Unfortunately, ESPECIALLY with skin colors, it just destroys the image. Better off learning the various tools in post to bring up the colors you want without destroying skin tones.

I don't know what the raw files look like, but I would suspect you could leave all your setting where they are, bump up your shutter speed a click or two, and with a raw file still pull back the darker areas.

Good luck and don't give up.