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Photographing sports (was Re: [OM] Questions for the group)

Subject: Photographing sports (was Re: [OM] Questions for the group)
From: Jay Maynard <jmaynard@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 24 Jan 2000 16:03:31 -0600
On Mon, Jan 24, 2000 at 02:26:51PM -0600, Barry B. Bean wrote:
> I've found that using primes for sports tends to help me think "ahead
> of the game" and prepare my shots better. Naturally, of course, YMMV

Funny you should mention that...

I took my OM-4, MD 2, and Access (yeah, yeah, I know) 35-200/3.8-5.3 zoom to
the International Hockey League All-Star Game last week at the Compaq Center
(which is better known by its former name, the Summit). Two things about the
experience stand out in my mind:

1) 200 wasn't long enough. The lens spent pretty much the whole game racked
all the way out; I only pulled back for a couple of crowd shots.
2) Following the game was *hard*. I never seemed to be able to have the
right thing in the viewfinder when it was happening, but inevitably I'd
just miss the action. Not all of the time, but enough to be disappointing.

My seat is in the upper deck, front row, right on one blue line, so I can
see the whole arena pretty well; I need 300 mm to get a player to fill the
frame top to bottom, though, I think. Even so, that would seem to make the
following/anticipating the action problem that much worse, since it leaves
less room for error. It probably doesn't help that I'm new to hockey, having
followed it only for the past three years or so, and only started going to
games regularly this season.

I was planning on taking my Vivitar 100-300/5 next time. The Compaq Center
is well enough lit that I can get shutter speeds of 1/250 to 1/500 at f/5.3
on ASA 400, so a few rolls of Fuji 800 should do me just fine, I think.
Should I drop the zoom idea and use a 300/5.6 Celestron mirror instead?
(Figuratively speaking.) The Vivitar is much bigger; the mirror is about the
length of a 100mm Zuiko prime, lighter, and only a bit fatter (67mm front
filter).

What's a photographer to do? (Besides become a more experienced fan, of
course.)

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