Sports Photography

[jcs76]

I'm looking to shoot little league games, soccer games, etc. I'll be shooting in conditions with a lot of light given the fact that these sports are outdoors. My question is this....will a 70-200 f/4-5.6 be sufficient or would I be better off spending a little more for an f/2.8?

[Nill Toulme]

Yes, and yes.

Nill
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www.toulme.net

[rjgleason]

I'm looking to shoot little league games, soccer games, etc. I'll be shooting in conditions with a lot of light given the fact that these sports are outdoors. My question is this....will a 70-200 f/4-5.6 be sufficient or would I be better off spending a little more for an f/2.8?
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Sports are to be shot wide-open so the larger the aperature the better the result, potentially.  You dont want a cluttered background and shooting at the maximum aperture will greatly enhance your results.  Canon recently put out a 70-200 4.0 IS which is less in weight than the 70-200 2.8 IS and both provide excellent results.

Go IS when you handhold which is what I suspect you would be doing.

[stever]

in my opinion, sports is one of the few subjects that does not benefit from IS - shutter speed is determined by requirements for action which will invariably be significantly higher than required by hand-hold

i'd recommend the 70-200 f4 without IS (unless you have other applications that will benefit from IS) and you will get sharp images wide open at 200 for a pretty reasonable price -- the 2.8 will provide less depth of focus, but otherwise i doubt anyone will see a difference in the images

[jcs76]

Thanks for the input guys. I really appreciate the help.

[dseelig]

Thanks for the input guys. I really appreciate the help.
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IS is reallyonle for shutter speeds 1/320 of a second or slower otherwise it will not help. That said the 70-200 f 4 Lis or non is are both great lenses.

[macgyver]

I'm looking to shoot little league games, soccer games, etc. I'll be shooting in conditions with a lot of light given the fact that these sports are outdoors. My question is this....will a 70-200 f/4-5.6 be sufficient or would I be better off spending a little more for an f/2.8?
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The 70-200 is a great choice.  IS or not is your call, when shooting sports you will want shutter speeds over 1/500th (or greater) to freeze action and the IS mechanism probably will slow the focus a bit (so turn it off when shooting action, leave it on otherwise). One thing though, 200mm isn't long enough at all for most sports, especially soccer.  Given, you are talking little leage and the like, but still.

[Nill Toulme]

IS is reallyonle for shutter speeds 1/320 of a second or slower otherwise it will not help. ...
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What ever gave you that idea?

Nill
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