Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Woodyg3" data-source="post: 544719" data-attributes="member: 24569">I have been shooting at track meets, road races and cross country meets for many years. Many years ago sports photography helped me to earn a few extra bucks in college. Here are a few random thoughts...I use AF-C, nine points is probably fine. I normally use shutter priority, stopping the action is normally the goal. If you want to do some panned motion blur shots, then you can still use shutter priority. Another option is to go manual and use auto ISO, which would be especially good when it starts getting darker. I shoot in continuous mode and fire away. Even at 6 shots a second you will be surprised how different each shot is, and even that there will be small differences in focus sharpness. Fire away and pick the best shots later.I try to shoot at 1/1000, but 1/500 will stop the action pretty well. Head on to the subject, you can get away with 1/250.BTW, VR really isn't needed. The subjects will be moving, so you will either have fast enough of a shutter speed to freeze them, or else you are going to have motion blur of one kind or another. When it's darker I would try to pan with the runner and use the fastest shutter speed you can get away with. Flash is an option, but it will probably be very annoying to the runners, so I would use flash sparingly, if at all. Zooms are good so you can get several shots of a runner as they approach and still fill the frame.The faster primes will help when it gets darker. Good idea.Compositionally, I try to get the runner's full body and legs/feet in the shot, with more room in front of the runner than behind, or with the runner dead center. You can and will crop, so leave a little extra room. Try many different angles, and try to keep as much clutter as possible out of the shot. You also might want to try to include interesting things in the background such as people cheering, any landmarks, the start/finish line, people timing or officiating, etc. My most "famous" shot is one of a runner winning the national championships cross country meet with mountains in the background as she crossed the finish line. Scouting out your location ahead for good places to shoot from is obviously quite helpful. Including things in the picture that "tell the story" of the event are always a plus. Getting down low is a good camera angle, so shooting from one knee is often optimal. This sounds like a long event, so if I were you, I would try all kinds of shots in many locations. It's fun to get creative and come up unusual perspectives. Sorry if I've rambled. I hope this helps a little. Have fun!</blockquote>

Verification