Un millième de seconde :sports de tir et action rapide

Que vous soyez un fan de sport ou non, si vous êtes photographe, vous vous retrouverez probablement à prendre des photos d'une action compétitive rapide à un moment donné.

Si vous avez l'habitude de photographier dans un environnement agréable et contrôlé, comme un studio, ou si vous êtes habitué à la photographie de rue, où vos sujets marchent probablement à un rythme normal et relativement lent, photographier un événement sportif peut être difficile.

Vos sujets refusent de rester immobiles; l'éclairage est presque toujours loin d'être idéal, et vous devez souvent jockey pour un bon endroit où vous pouvez voir la meilleure action.

Ou peut-être êtes-vous un fan de sport ou le parent d'un jeune athlète en herbe dans ses années de formation, et vous aimeriez simplement savoir comment utiliser cet appareil photo que vous avez reçu pour Noël pour capturer de grands moments.

Quelle que soit votre situation, vous pouvez prendre de nombreuses photos d'action de qualité, à condition de faire un peu de préparation et de garder quelques éléments à l'esprit. Pour vous aider avec tout cela, nous avons dressé une liste de conseils et de considérations pour prendre de superbes photos de sport et d'action.

Tout dépend de l'emplacement

Arrivez assez tôt pour repérer un bon endroit. Recherchez les endroits où se déroule l'action la plus intéressante. Vous devez être en mesure de voir l'action si vous voulez la photographier.

Soyez conscient de votre passé. Essayez de vous positionner de manière à ce que les arrière-plans de vos images soient nets et ne détournent pas l'attention de votre sujet.

Envisagez de prendre quelques clichés du lieu lui-même. S'il vous arrive d'avoir un objectif grand angle dans votre sac, enclenchez-le et obtenez quelques gros plans du terrain, du court, de l'arène, etc. Ils sont assez faciles à prendre, alors pourquoi ne pas avoir un peu plus de contexte ?

Quelques notes sur l'équipement

Utilisez un zoom. De nombreux photographes suggèrent d'avoir un objectif qui peut zoomer jusqu'à au moins 200 mm. You don’t want to have to crop your photos too heavily.

Consider using a monopod. I’ve extolled the virtues of the monopod many times before. They’re easy to carry around and move with while shooting. They provide a lot of stability without the mobility issues a full-sized tripod entails.

Set your camera to continuous burst mode, then shoot in short bursts. I typically like to take 3-5 pictures per burst. Bursts longer than that mean you’ll have a lot more nearly identical photos to sift through afterward. If that doesn’t bother you, feel free to shoot longer bursts.

However, if your memory card is on the slow side, your camera will freeze occassionally as the card saves the images. You can use a memory card with a fast buffer, however, to alleviate this issue. Make sure it has a lot of room, and pack plenty of extras. Those images stack up quickly.

If you’re still having issues with your camera freezing up while it processes photos, consider shooting in JPEG instead of RAW. You’ll lose some quality and some post-production options, but your images will save to your memory card faster, and you’ll have more storage space.

Know Your Camera

Know the exposure settings in your environment before the action begins. Don’t waste time checking your images on your camera’s screen. If you have your settings dialed in before the action begins, you won’t waste time looking at the tiny screen on your camera, subsequently missing the action.

If you’re shooting an indoor event, also take some time to check your white balance. Indoor events, especially in gymnasiums, often have a mix of different terrible light sources, such as fluorescent and tungsten lights.

Get to know your camera’s shutter delay. On most DSLRs, this isn’t too much of an issue. But there is always tiny delays that can add up – the delay from your eyes to your brain, the delay from your decision to press the shutter and your finger actually moving, and the delay from when you press the shutter release to when the shutter actually fires.

When you’re shooting fast-moving action, these precious micro-seconds could mean the difference between the shot you’ve always dreamed of snagging and wasting space on your memory card.

Focus!

Use your camera’s zone auto-focus system. Practice with it until you can switch areas with little thought. Set your camera to Continuous Focus. In this mode, as you hold your shutter release button halfway down, your camera will continuously adjust to keep your selected subject in focus as he or she moves.

Practice prefocusing. This means that you predict where your subject is going and focus for that spot. This works best if you have a static object on the same plane as the spot where you expect the action to go down. Prefocusing might be tricky to get the hang of, and it might not prove useful in every circumstance. But knowing how to pull it off can really come in handy.

Shoot with shallow depth of field. Keep the focus on the subject; the person with the ball or the runner who’s out front. The key is to minimize anything that might distract your audience from the intended subject.

Conveying Motion

Action is all about movement, right? So what’s the best way to capture movement? Typically, this means using a high shutter speed. I’d personally keep it no slower than 1/500 to 1/1000. Don’t be afraid of bumping up your ISO if you don’t have enough light for  a high shutter speed. Image noise is typically more acceptable than blurry subjects.

Master the panning shot. This means following your subjects as they move, shooting while you do so. Make sure to match your movement speed to your subject’s and follow through with the motion after you’ve got the shot. You might find a slower shutter speed helpful here. The end result is that your subject is in focus while the background is blurred, conveying a sense of movement.

Other Ideas

Keep an eye out for small, yet emotionally telling moments on the sidelines. Teammate and crowd reactions can sometimes provide some great context for the event.

Change your point of view. It’s often a good idea to get low and shoot up. This can add some drama to your shots.

Find out beforehand what the rules for photographers are. Many venues prohibit the use of flash, and many will have rules about where you’re allowed to be. Do a little research before going to the event to save yourself an awkward confrontation with a security guard later.

Do you have experience shooting sporting events? What are some tips you’ve found helpful? What gear do you use? We want to hear from you in the comments below.