sports action

[melsphotography]

I shoot sports action at night lacrosse for a  High School which would be better the 70-200mm 2.8 is or the 70-200mm non is . I shoot between 800-100 2.8 6400 so would it be cost effective for the is or would I save money and still get sharp

photos

[Mykolas]

Hi melsphotography!

Thanks for posting.

If you will be hand holding the camera at all, I think you will find the EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM lens the better choice.

[ebiggs1]

Lets see how can I put this?  Ah, I have it, there is no better lens made, period, than the Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM Lens.   If it can't do it, it can't be done.

[ScottyP · Accepted solution]

I must agree. Not cheap, although it has come down a lot since I paid $2,500 for mine, but worth it.

I wasn't sure from your post what variant of 70-200 choice B was, but if you are already at ISO 6400 you definitely don't want to go to an f/4 lens. Dim light sports are such a challenge on equipment.

[Ben2]

I shoot touch footy at night with not great light.
What settings should I be looking at?
Currently using f2.8 1500 shutter speed and 1600 ISO.
Also have a tripod.
Any advice would be great.

[wq9nsc]

Low light sports are a challenge and I am somewhat happy to see the end of my daughter's indoor soccer league.  They play in a very poorly lit (dim and uneven via high intensity lighting reflecting off the ceiling) inflatable dome and the field is regulation high school size.

The best setup I have found after several games was using my 70-200 F2.8 with a 1.4X extender providing F4 maximum aperture.   The 200mm telephoto end just isn't enough for a lot of the action even with me moving around so the 1.4X converter with its one stop loss is pretty much required. With F4 aperture and 1/500 shutter speed I have the ISO at 16,000 which is very usable with the 1DX Mark ii but I would love to be able to use a lower ISO.  I shoot RAW images in full manual mode but I do have to push half a stop for some of the images because of the uneven lighting.

I may bite the bullet and pick up a 300 2.8 before next indoor season and try shooting primarily with a prime.  It is so nice to shoot the outdoor games with bright lighting and much more sideline room.  I often use a 400mm F5.6 outdoors which works well for covering a large part of the field but not only is it far too slow for dim indoor conditions the restricted movement in the little soccer dome means it is also too long for a lot of coverage and I think 300mm will be perfect with the ability to turn it into a 420 f4 with the 1.4X.

Rodger