The basics of sports photography

Learning goal

You will be able to calculate the shutter speed needed to freeze an athlete's motion, starting from the athlete's speed, their distance, the lens's focal length and the direction in which they cross the frame. You will explain why a player running across and a player running toward you call for different durations. You will know that at the top of a jump the motion almost stops for an instant, and time the shutter release to that moment. You will lock continuous focus on the subject before the action begins and have it follow through the movement, and while leaving the light to the camera with shutter priority and auto ISO, you will keep the duration in your own hands. You will keep the faces of players of different skin tones in their own tones against white jerseys and a shiny court, and take the first step of the sports and action track.

The question

On Saturday your friend stands in the university sports hall, behind the sideline. The jeweler's nephew takes the ball and goes on a fast break, reaches for the basket in two steps and drops the ball into the hoop. Your friend presses the shutter release, but on the screen the nephew's arms are a blurred smudge, a gray trail in place of the ball, and their face soft, a little behind the focus. On the next break your friend presses the release a little late and the ball is already in the net. The bowls and rings used to wait; here nothing waits. What is the secret of not missing the moment?

Context

In the shutter speed section you saw that a short shutter speed freezes motion and a long one makes it flow, and that a subject crossing sideways blurs faster than one coming toward the camera (Lesson 8.5). In the autofocus section you tried the difference between single-shot focus, which finds and locks the focus once, and continuous focus, which follows the subject and keeps renewing the focus (Lesson 10.2). While getting to know memory cards you also learned that the buffer the camera holds frames in before writing them to the card slows the burst down when it fills (Lesson 15.2).

Sports photography fits all of this knowledge into a single second. Over seven lessons this track will take up equipment, reading the game, position, bad light, panning and moments of emotion. The foundation of them all is here: a duration short enough to stop the motion, and a focus that runs after the motion.

Simple explanation

How short a duration is needed?

Image-plane speed is how far the image of a moving subject travels across the sensor in a second. This speed depends on the subject's real speed, their distance, the focal length and the direction of the motion. Imagine shooting a player running at six meters per second from ten meters away, with eighty-five millimeters on full frame and from right at the side. Their image slides across the sensor at about fifty millimeters per second. For an edge that looks sharp on full frame, this slide has to stay around three hundredths of a millimeter. For that, the duration must be a little shorter than a thousandth of a second.

If the same player runs toward you, their image doesn't slide sideways on the sensor, it only slowly grows; a five-hundredth of a second is often enough. Getting closer to the player or fitting a longer lens, on the other hand, increases the image-plane speed and calls for a shorter duration. That is why there is no single "right" shutter speed for sports. For a runner crossing sideways, a thousandth or a two-thousandth is safe. For someone coming toward the camera, a five-hundredth can be enough. Because the arms and the ball move faster than the body, freezing them always calls for a shorter duration.

When does the motion stop?

The apex of a jump is the highest point an athlete leaping into the air reaches after finishing their rise and before starting to fall. At that point their vertical speed drops to zero for an instant. The body almost stops; only the arms and legs keep moving. When a spike, a block or a hurdle is shot at its apex, the same shutter speed gives a much sharper body than at takeoff or landing.

This apex is also the most readable moment of the motion in the viewer's eye: the athlete at the highest point, arm stretched out, the ball about to leave the hand. Burst shooting helps catch this moment. But even ten frames per second leaves a gap of a tenth of a second between frames, and the apex can fall into this gap. Starting to press the release just before the apex pays off more often than relying only on the burst.

How does the focus keep up?

Early acquisition is continuous focus locking on the subject before the action begins and following it through the movement. The moment the player takes the ball, the focus point is put on their body and the button is held down. The camera renews the distance throughout the break, and predictive tracking also guesses where the player will be the next instant. If the focus starts being searched for only at the moment the player reaches for the basket, the moment has passed by the time the camera finds focus.

The light can be left to the camera with shutter priority and auto ISO. You choose the duration; the camera sets the sensitivity to get the brightness right. In halls, white jerseys and a shiny court pull the camera's metering down. On dark skin this means the face sinking into shadow and the eyes not being picked out. Light skin, meanwhile, shifts to a pale gray along with the white jersey. The light overhead also darkens the eye sockets. Setting the compensation to plus two-thirds or one stop and looking at the faces zoomed in during the first frames keeps players of different skin tones in their own tones in the same game.

Visual evidence

Your friend sets the camera to shutter priority, to a thousandth of a second and to auto ISO. They choose continuous focus and a wide tracking area, and pull the compensation to plus two-thirds of a stop. The moment the nephew takes the ball, they put the focus on the nephew's jersey and hold the button down.

On the next fast break the nephew crosses from the side. At a thousandth the body is sharp, but the hand holding the ball has flowed slightly. Your friend brings the duration down to a two-thousandth. In the next frame the hand and the ball's seams are sharp too. When the nephew rises to the basket, your friend picks a frame from the burst they started just before the apex. The arm fully stretched, the ball at the fingertips, the legs in the air, the face sharp.

In the same game the opposing team's center, a tall player with dark brown skin, takes a rebound in a white jersey. In the first try shot without compensation, the jersey is white but the face a dark shadow. In the frame with compensation, the sweat on their forehead, their determined look and the warmth of their skin stand out. The nephew's olive-toned face is in its own color with the same settings too.

Common mistakes

Summary

The secret of not missing the moment is a duration short enough, chosen according to the image-plane speed, and a continuous focus locked on the subject before the action begins. Motion crossing sideways calls for a shorter duration than motion coming toward the camera, and the apex of a jump is the moment the motion stops for an instant and is most readable. Against white jerseys and a shiny floor, compensation keeps the faces of players of different skin tones in their own tones.

Mini assignment

In this assignment you will shoot someone running and jumping with different durations.

1. Ask a friend to run sideways in front of you at a field or a park, then toward you. Shoot both at a five-hundredth, a thousandth and a two-thousandth of a second and look at where blur begins.
2. Lock continuous focus on them before the run begins and hold it down. Also shoot once starting to search for focus at the last moment, and compare the two bursts.
3. Ask the same person to jump in place, and with their consent shoot the takeoff, apex and landing moments. If they wear light-colored clothes, set the compensation to plus and look at their face.

Check yourself

• At which durations did the run across and the run toward you stay sharp?
• Did the focus locked early, or the one searched for at the last moment, give more sharp frames?
• Is the frame at the apex of the jump sharper than takeoff and landing, and is the face in its own tone?

Glossary

Mini quiz

1. Why does a runner crossing sideways call for a shorter duration than one running toward you?

• A) Because they run faster
• B) Because their image slides across the sensor much faster
• C) Because there is less light
• D) Because focus is harder to find

2. What happens when you look at the same runner close up with a longer lens?

• A) The image-plane speed decreases
• B) The shutter speed can be lengthened
• C) The image-plane speed increases and a shorter duration is needed
• D) Nothing changes

3. Why is a sharper body obtained at the apex of a jump?

• A) Because the athlete's vertical speed drops to zero for an instant
• B) Because the athlete is closer to the camera at the top
• C) Because burst shooting is faster
• D) Because the focus is closer

4. Why can the face of a dark-skinned player wearing a white jersey stay in shadow?

• A) Because continuous focus misses the face
• B) Because the shutter speed is too short
• C) Because the player is too far away
• D) Because the white jersey and the shiny court pull the camera's metering down

Answers

1. B — When crossing sideways the image flows from one edge of the sensor to the other, while coming toward the camera it slowly grows.
2. C — As magnification increases, the image's path on the sensor lengthens and the duration must shorten.
3. A — At the top the rise ends, and before the fall begins the body almost stops for an instant.
4. D — Shiny surfaces cut the exposure and the face, especially on dark skin, darkens.

Summary card

• Image-plane speed: subject speed × focal length ÷ distance, depending on direction.
• Motion crossing sideways: a thousandth or shorter; coming toward the camera: a five-hundredth.
• At the apex of a jump the body stops for an instant; press just before the apex.
• Early acquisition: lock continuous focus before the action, hold it down.
• White jerseys and the court: set the compensation to plus, zoom in on the faces.

Bridge to the next lesson

After the game, the team captain looks at the frames and asks a question: why do the club photographer's frames at the edge of the court show the players so big, and their backgrounds so soft? Your friend remembers the long, white, heavy lens in that photographer's bag. Why a telephoto lens at the field? The next lesson takes up why lenses with a long focal length and a wide aperture matter so much in sports photography.