Algonquin at Wachusett, Playoffs - 2016.11.04

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It took me a little longer than usual to post the photos for this game because we headed to New York City for the weekend immediately after the JV game. I broke 1000 photos for the first time during a game and I think that they came out pretty nice. I started out the game with the 5D Mark III fitted with the EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM lens but the camera seemed a bit sluggish and I felt like I was missing shots during the quick action. I could not figure out what was going on but attributed it to the cold weather and switched to the 7D Mark II since it has a much higher fps. When I got home I figured out why the camera was so slow - I had the 5D configured to save photos in RAW from a previous shoot I was doing. I wish that I had figured this out at the game because I think that the photos taken with the 5D are better than the ones taken with the 7D. See if you can tell which are which. Anyway, the lights at the Wachusett stadium are much better than the ones at Algonquin so I did not have to do as much post processing and noise reduction and was able to follow my standard workflow.

Algonquin vs Westborough XC - 2016.11.01

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It took me quite a while to post these photos because I have been so busy at my job that pays the bills. I arrived at the meet midway through the girls race so I did not get as many photos of that race. It was a little difficult getting decent pictures today because of the harsh sunlight (the sun is so low in the sky it created very harsh shadows at the finish line) so I had to get creative in using the trees as blinds and running between multiple locations to get the best angle. Most of these photos were shot with the 7D Mark II fitted with the EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM in manual mode with the aperture set to f/2.8 - f/3.2, auto ISO and the shutter speed between 1/1000 sec and 1/2500 sec. I did not have to do much post processing other than trying to deal with the shadows - I tried to pull the shadows up and pull the highlights back.

Algonquin JV vs St. John - 2016.10.29

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The weather at today's game was nearly ideal for photography - it was not too sunny, it was not raining and dark like the varsity games, it was just right. Cold and overcast conditions provide enough light that I can shoot at a low ISO level and don't create harsh shadows like the ones I had to deal with at the Cross Country meet that I shot at earlier in the week. All of these photos were shot with the 7D Mark II fitted with the EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM in manual mode with the aperture set to f/2.8, a shutter speed of 1/1250 sec to 1/1600 sec and auto ISO. The ISO values were typically between 250 and 400. I did the typical post-production work in Lightroom but I did not really have to do too much other than crop and make small adjustments to the white balance, exposure and highlights/shadows. Overall I am pretty pleased with these photos, especially compared to the photos from the varsity game.

Algonquin vs St John's - 2016.10.28

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It took me quite a bit longer than usual to post the pictures for this this game because the photos took a lot more work to process. This game seemed tougher to shoot than the Wachusett game that was also played at home at night and it is a little daunting to go through 900 underexposed and dark pictures to get down to the 50-100 best shots. I was able to go through the 850 JV pictures in less than 2 hours and I posted them before dinner the same day. The varsity field at Algonquin is extremely dark and I think that my 5D Mark III was having metering issues resulting in underexposed pictures so I was forced to revert to the 7D Mark II even though I know that it has inferior low light performance. My basic setup was the same that I use for most JV games, which are all played in daylight. I used the Canon 7D Mark II fitted with the EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM in manual mode for almost all shots. I tried to keep the shutter speed at 1/1000 sec to freeze any motion and the aperture at f/2.8 and allowed the camera to automatically set the ISO, limited to 12,800. Tonight most shots were at 12,800 even in the center of the field so I had to do a bit more noise reduction in post processing. I had to throw away all pictures in the end zones from this shoot because they were just terrible. The best part of the whole night was that Sam, my son who plays for Algonquin, got into the game for the last 5 minutes. Hopefully there will be more of that in the weeks and years ahead.

Midland-Wachusett League XC Championships - 2016.10.26

Photos to Download - Girls JV
Photos to Download - Boys Varsity
Photos to Download - Boys JV

Meet Results

I was able to make it to the League Championships to get the start of the Varsity boys race but I feel bad that I missed the Varsity girls. It is tough making it to meets in the middle of the afternoon on a Wednesday for a working schmuck like myself. Most of these photos were shot with the 7D Mark II fitted with the EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM in manual mode with the aperture set to f/2.8 - f/3.2, auto ISO and the shutter speed between 1/1000 sec and 1/2500 sec. My backup for close up shots and some of the shots in the woods was the 5D Mark III with the EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II lens also in manual mode. The exposure settings were similar to the 7D but I had to push the ISO up to 4000-5000 in the woods because it was pretty dark and overcast later in the meet. I hope the late fall foliage provides a nice backdrop and taking these pictures in the late fall with temperatures dropping into the 40's brings back a lot of memories of running cross country back in the day. Cross country is probably my favorite sport so it is fun to photograph.

Algonquin vs Wachusett - 2016.10.23

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This game was one of the most challenging photo shoots that I have ever done because of the low light conditions on the field. The varsity field at Algonquin is significantly darker than any of the other fields that I have shot at requiring me to push the limits of the camera. I used the Canon 5D Mark III fitted with the EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM in manual mode for almost all shots. Typically, for a football game, I try to keep the shutter speed at 1/1000 sec to freeze any motion and if the aperture is at f/2.8 - f/3.2 then I can use ISO 6400 at night games and lower for day or well lit night games. Tonight, even at f/2.8, I had to push the ISO to 10,000 for most shots and even 12,800 away from the center of the field. The lighting in the end zones was so bad that I had to throw away several would be keepers of touchdowns because they were not salvageable. Overall, I am a bit disappointed in how the pictures turned out mainly because of how dark they are. I will chalk this game up as a learning experience and come up with a game plan for getting better results because I will be shooting a lot more night games at this field in the next couple of years.

Algonquin JV vs Shrewsbury - 2016.10.15

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All of these photos were shot with the 7D Mark II fitted with the EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM in manual mode with the aperture set to f/3.2, ISO 100 and and shutter speed of 1/2500 sec most of the time because it was very sunny the entire game. I performed basic editing in Lightroom CC 6.6.1 such as crop, lens correction, exposure and white balance. I finished up by pushing the highlights down to about -30 , the shadows up to about 50 and the whites and blacks to about 20-30.

Algonquin vs Shrewsbury - 2016.10.14

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I wanted to compare the 7D Mark II in low light to the 5D Mark III and since I shot the Leominster game with the 5D I shot this game with the 7D. The lighting at the Shrewsbury field was a bit better than the lighting at the Leominster field, by almost a full stop, so I figured that the 7D would do fine and the extra reach from the crop sensor would be nice. However, this was the last time I will shoot a night game with the 7D - I am not very happy with the pictures and believe they would have been much better with the 5D. I did set a new record for the number of pictures for a single event, mainly due to the high fps of the 7D. Previously I had shot as many as 350 pictures in a game but in this game I was just shy of 700 at 693. My keeper percentage was much lower than usual at just under 10%. All of these photos were shot with the 7D Mark II fitted with the EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM in manual mode with the aperture set to f/3.2, ISO between 6400 and 8000 and and shutter speed between 1/800 sec and 1/1000 sec when I could get it. Finally, I performed basic editing in Lightroom CC 6.6.1 such as crop, lens correction, exposure and white balance and I continued to experiment with the noise reduction capabilities of Lightroom and pushed them much further this time than last time.

Winds of Change

I will keep this blog as a central place to post links to the photos and technical information about the shoots but I have decided to switch from the Lightroom galleries to Smugmug galleries. I have updated the links in the posts to account for this. The main reason for this is that Smugmug offers a better platform for sharing and allows for users to purchase prints, books, cards and other merchandise using the photos. The photos will still be free to download but I have attached a small watermark in the lower left corner. Feel free to use the photos as you wish and share them with friends and family but please leave the watermark so that more people can find out about the site. If anyone wants a large print without the watermark please contact me to arrange this.

New website: www.crainphotos.com

Algonquin Boys JV Cross Country at Wachusett Invitational - 2016.10.08

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Most of these photos were shot with the 7D Mark II fitted with the EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM in manual mode with the aperture set to f/2.8, ISO set to 100 and the shutter speed between 1/1000 sec and 1/2500 sec. My backup for close up shots was the 5D Mark III with the EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II lens also in manual mode with very similar exposure settings. Wachusett Regional High School is set high on a hill and provided for some really cool back drops. From the photos you can tell that all of the hills were also fairly brutal on the runners and provided some dramatic facial expressions.