Sports photography refers to the genre of photography that covers all types of sports.
In the majority of cases, professional sports photography is a branch of photojournalism, while amateur sports photography, such as photos of children playing association football, is a branch of vernacular photography.
The main application of professional sports photography is for editorial purposes; dedicated sports photographers usually work for newspapers, major wire agencies or dedicated sports magazines. However, sports photography is also used for advertising purposes both to build a brand and as well as to promote a sport in a way that cannot be accomplished by editorial means.
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Equipment used for sports photography is a Digital Single Lens Reflex camera (DSLR), with high shutter speeds. Interchangeable lenses that have 50mm and can be zoomed or changed to 300mm zoom, depending on the type of sport. Lenses are very important, to reach closer or farther as fast as possibly to stay with the game play. A monopod or tripod for stability and extra batteries are essential.
Preferred camera bodies for the modern sport photographer are those with fast autofocusing ability and a high frame rate (usually 8 frames per second or faster). The current flagship sports cameras produced by Canon and Nikon are the Canon EOS-1D Mark IV and the Nikon D3S, and these are the most popular in professional sports.
Different sports favor different lenses,[1] but sports photography usually requires fast (wide aperture) telephoto lenses, with fast autofocus performance. Fast autofocus is needed to focus on movement, telephoto to get close to the action, and wide aperture serves several purposes:
However, extremely wide apertures (such as f/1.2 or f/1.4) are more rarely used, because at these apertures the depth of field is quite low, which makes focusing more difficult and slows down autofocus.[2] The main distinction is between outdoor sports and indoor sports – in outdoor sports the distances are greater and the light brighter,[1] while in indoor sports the distances are lesser and the light dimmer.[2] Accordingly, outdoor sports tend to have longer focal length long focus lenses with slower apertures, while indoor sports tend to have shorter long lens lenses with faster apertures.
Both zoom and prime lenses are used; zoom – generally in the 70–200, 75–300, or 100–400 range – allow a greater range of framing, while primes are faster, cheaper, lighter, and optically superior, while being more restricted in framing.
Apertures of f/2.8 or faster are most often used, though f/4 is also found, particularly on brighter days. Particularly visible are the Canon super telephoto lenses, whose distinctive white casing (to dissipate the sun's heat) is recognizable at many sporting events. Of these, the Canon 400mm f/2.8 is particularly recommended for field sports such as football.[1][3]
This varies with sport and preference; for example golf photographers may prefer to use a 500mm f/4 as opposed to a 400mm f/2.8 as it is a lighter lens to be carried around all day.
Sports photographers, may use remote cameras triggered by wireless shutter devices (i.e. Pocket Wizards) to photograph from places they could not otherwise be, for example in an elevated position such as above a basketball basket, or to be in two places at once, i.e. at the start and the finish - such as at horse racing.
Location is often important for sports photography. At big events, professional photographers often shoot from VIP spots with the best views, usually as close to the action as possible. Most sports require the photographer to frame their images with speed and adjust camera settings spontaneously to prevent blurring or incorrect exposure. Some sports photography is also done from distances to give the game a unique effect.
Shutter speed is critical to catching motion, and thus sports photography is often done in shutter priority mode or manual. ISO speed is often high (to allow faster shutter speeds), and may be left in auto.
Photos are often taken in burst mode to capture the best moment, sometimes in combination with JPEG rather than RAW shooting (JPEG files being smaller, these allow longer bursts).