Lakewood Varsity Football vs Leuzinger

Friday Night Lights

First night game of the season finds me at Lakewood High as they go against Leuzinger.

I have to say this was a very tough game for me and I felt like an armature shooting it.  I brought a two camera setup, which I just don't do.  I had my Canon 7D mark II with the 300 f/2.8L and my Canon 1DX matched with the 70-200 f/2.8L.  I found myself only using the 70-200 a couple of times and felt I wasn't getting the shots I wanted with the 7D mark II, so I decided to switch lens and go with the 1DX and 300 f/2.8.  The down side is I lost a lot of range by using the 1DX, which is a full frame camera.  I will admit I am happy with the shots that did come out and how the 1DX handled the noise, just not so happy with the lack of range.  I can now see why so many photographers sold their 300 f/2.8 to get the 400 f/2.8 when the 1DX first came out.

Another issue I had was I kept pushing the wrong button while trying to focus.  I have the camera set up for back button focus (BBF), but I kept hitting the exposure button, which is right next to the button I have setup for the BBF, which was just killing my shots.  Needless to say I was getting rather frustrated with it.  I need to do some adjustments prior to the next game and hopefully clear the issue up.

Finally the team I cover, Lakewood High, had a rough time moving the ball and didn't make a lot of open field plays and they missed a bunch of passes.  Hard to really capture the action when your team isn't giving you much, but I did walk away with some nice shots.

Here are my favorites from the game.

Lakewood Freshmen Football vs Leuzinger

Football has officially started for me yesterday.  Covered the Lakewood Freshmen vs Leuzinger game at Lakewood High School.  I will admit my timing was way off and I just couldn't get into my groove, but I did walk away with some nice shots that I can be happy with.

Not too long ago I bought a Canon 100-400 f/4.5 - f/5.6 to use with my wildlife photography.  Can't afford a Canon 500mm or 600mm and I wasn't happy with the Sigma 150-600 f/4.5 - f/6.3 so I went with the Canon 100-400 to give me some added range.  I am happy with it and my wildlife photography so I thought I'd give it a try with my first football game.  The one thing I was concerned about was shooting at a larger larger aperture.  I found that the background was fine and blurred enough to meet my needs, but it wasn't as fast as I would have liked with focusing.  I had every intention of bringing a second camera with my 70-200 f/2.8, but decided to simply bring the one lens (100-400) and see how it goes.

Below are some of my favorites from the game - enjoy.

Lakewood Varsity Football vs Leuzinger

Football has officially started, well it actually started two weeks ago and needless to say I'm a little bit behind.  In the last four years Lakewood, which is the school I cover for the local paper, has gone through 3 coaches, so I didn't and don't have any high expectations for this season of football.  I actually expect that the next two years minimally will be rough years for Lakewood. 

Week one - Lakewood vs Leuzinger at Leuzinger High School.

Below are some highlights from the game.

Lakewood Varsity Football vs Leuzinger High

This is the last preseason for Lakewood. This week they found themselves on the road pitted against Leuzinger High in Lawndale. This is a new school in Lakewood's path for an undefeated preseason start.

With a new school came uncertainties for Lakewood in the first quarter, but once they got the ball rolling they didn't stop and finished the preseason with a 44-0 victory over Leuzinger.

Now sit back and enjoy some shots from the game.

Now what is Friday Night Lights without the cheerleaders, well it's nothing to be honest. So here are some shots of the girls who give it their all each night while boys are on the grid iron.