Friday Night Lights "Lakewood Varsity vs Jordan"

This was a tough game to watch and photograph as it appeared that our boys highly underestimated Jordan. Jordan had and shown a desire to play hard and win, while Lakewood appeared to just give up. They did make a strong attempt in the 4th quarter to come back, but it was too little too late with the Jordan Panthers winning 24-12.

I am out there to capture Lakewood in action and in the process I will often take pictures of the opposing team. I must say that Jordan's quarterback was one of the better athlete's I'd had the pleasure to watching and shooting. I can see this kid playing college and doing very well.

I give a lot of advice and help those who are just starting out with shooting sports action, but this post will show that I struggle with lighting like most of you who read my blog. During the day under pretty much any conditions I have a good grasp as to my lighting needs. I run into problems when the sun goes down and the lights are turned on.

This game was one filled with problems. In my last "Friday Night Lights" post I mentioned that I bought a flash extender, which allowed me to shoot at lower ISO's and faster shutter speeds. Well for this game I started out with the same setting I used last week. Camera set to manual mode at f/2.8, ISO 800, and a shutter of 1/400. After looking at a few shots I just wasn't happy with how my flash was working. The pictures seem darker and apeeared as if the flash was only exposing a part of the picture. So I spent a lot of time adjusting my flash settings until I was getting great light at a lower ISO and faster shutter speeds, but I was also getting harsh shadows.

Notice in this first group of shots the background can been seen and how the lighting appears uneven, especially in the first shot. Then you'll see the second group of shots and notice how the background is very dark with harsh shadows along the right side of the athlete.

So what this game did for me is show that I am always learning and really need to have a better understanding of my flash and it's settings. So if you follow my posts, get your manual out of their hiding spots and open them up. Understand the settings of your camera and flash.

These following shots were taken at ISO 640 with a shutter speed of 1/500. Now the players are nice and bright with little, if no blur, but there is a dark shadow along the right side of the athlete.