'New Carolina' playing in Williams-Brice with new signage...
posted by Gameshots, 9/30/2009 09:56:00 AM
Lately you've probably noticed the players, and some fans, referring to the team as 'New Carolina' as the players and coaches have taken the task personally to make needed improvements. Likewise, Williams-Brice Stadium has also been receiving improvements and up-grades. The new signage (shown in the first five pictures in this blog) on each of the four corner ramps lends a dramatic improvement to the gameday atmosphere. One of the players, while standing on the sideline two hours before the first home game, told me, "Wow! This looks more than ten times better!". I was in complete agreement with the statement. Today's Blog addresses a question from the message board as well as brief comments and information about a wide variety of photos from the last two games. Also, a 'story behind the picture' will be shared that you may find interesting.
What better way to honor achievements than by replacing the plain concrete ramp walls with colorful banners? Each of the four corners now have garnet, black, and white signs with names and statistics that are worthy of special recognition. One corner welcomes you to Williams-Brice and honors the Heisman Trophy winner, George Rogers. Other corner ramps are devoted to the Offensive leaders or Defensive leaders or for coaching achievements. The 1969 ACC Championship is shown on the edge of the South Stands (on the left side, possibly leaving room for anticipated future championships).
The South-East Ramp (behind the Visiting Team Band).
Having the players names, and meaningful statistics displayed, is doubtless a great motivation for the players. Whether you are a current player, and/or contemplating quitting the team before graduation for the lure of the NFL, or a recruit thinking that his family would be incredibly proud to see his name on the wall. The signs and banners can be motivators but they also improve the appearance of Williams-Brice Stadium and photographers find them to be excellent backgrounds for crowd shots.
The South-West Ramp (behind the '2001' entrance).
The North-East Ramp (behind the Carolina Band).
The view from the endzone in the South stands (from below "'The Zone").
I have been asked about what shutter speed I use when I shoot. I will give a few brief illustrations in this blog but the answer will often vary depending on a variety of factors.
Three main questions to consider:
1. What is the lighting? The upcoming game with Kentucky will be the first game NOT under the lights this season (12:30PM start).
2. What type of action am I shooting (high speed or very limited motion)?
3. What depth of field is desired? (How much of the photo should be in sharp focus.)
Day games are usually a photographer's delight. Almost anyone can get a great picture, even with a cheap lens, a disposable camera or a cell phone camera. A professional will adjust camera's settings to take advantage of the brighter lighting. The ISO will typically be reduced to something between 100 and 320. Depending on the depth of field desired in a particular group of photos, the shutter speed may well be in the range of 1/3000ths of a second or greater. Note: it is NOT always desirable to freeze action to that extent as a certain degree of 'blur' shows motion nicely. A case in point, you cannot, generally, photograph the wind. But, you can photograph the effects of wind as it blows leaves, grass, snow, etc. A slower shutter speed is often desired with moving water, waterfalls, waves, etc.
A note on weather conditions: Rain is NOT usually a fun environment to shoot in. However, harsh shadows can be a problem with bright sunlight and are seldom a problem with cloudy or rainy skies. In sunlight, colors are brighter but are duller or more muted in wet conditions. Rain, especially heavy rain, can allow for some great pictures. One thing for sure, a variety of 'trade-offs' occur whenever the weather conditions change.
By the way, EXIF information is captured and embedded with each digital image. It can be useful but also misleading. For instance, I have three lenses that could be used to take a 200mm image. The EXIF image information could state that my image was shot with the f-stop of f6 (for instance), which would be accurate. However, that is only PART of the story. Each of those three lens, I just mentioned, are very different and produce noticeably different results.
Each lens is Canon brand and quality and each one could shoot an f-stop of f6 but one could shoot an image as fast as f2, another f2.8, and the third one a relatively distant f4.5. One is a 'prime' (non-zoom) and the other two are zoom but all three have 'image stabilization'. These factors all contribute to producing a dramatically different image. Just a word of caution when interpreting EXIF information and trying to read too much into a specific detail. You must know the lens that is mounted on the camera.
This brings me to mentioning the camera body. Finally, with EXIF info, you need to be familiar with the camera body as well. Some cameras handle high ISO speeds exceptionally well and others, quite simply, do not. Also, a wide variety of software is now available to reduce the 'digital noise' of higher ISO photos, thankfully.
In summary, I generally try to maintain a minimum shutter speed of between 1/500th and 1/640th while keeping the ISO as low as feasible. None of this creates a problem until you are shooting sports action 'under the lights'!
This picture was taken with at 1/500ths of a second with f-stop of f2.2 (on a lense that is capable of f2).
Shot at 1/500th of a second (to help with the fireworks), 24mm wide-angle at f2.8.
Crowd shot at 1/500th of a second, 24mm wide-angle at f8 (for greater depth of field).
Faster shutter speed of 1/640th, f4, 75mm lens used and the image has been cropped making the image appear to be more zoomed.
Shot during warm-ups, limited action so I used 1/400ths of a second with f-stop of f2.8 for greater depth of field (on a lense that is capable of f2).
At the edge of the endzone, you are often guessing (as is the defense), pass or run, in the near corner or going all the way to the other corner. The key is to be as flexible as possible, have a good guess and hope that the official does not obscure your angle on the play. This picture was shot at 1/500th of a second, with the 24mm-70mm wide-angle zoom lense (zoomed to 70mm) at f2.8 to capture Stephen Garcia diving over the goal-line for the touchdown.
This picture was shot nearly the length of the field, with an ISO of 3200, at 1/500th's shutter speed but the f-stop was f3.5(which gave better depth of field focus while adding a little bit of digital noise due to the higher ISO value). It was a planned trade-off.
The photo, of Coach Shane Beamer and Eric Norwood celebrating, was shot from the other side of the field. I used an ISO of 1600, with 1/500ths shutter speed and f-stop of f2.8 on the prime (non-zoom but with image-stabilization)300mm lens.
Sometimes when concentrating on taking a picture, getting the image framed correctly, sharp focus, and such, the obvious isn't always obvious until later when you study the image that was captured. This picture was taken during team warm-ups. Another photographer and myself were standing on the sidelines, several feet away from the field, talking to each other.
After I had been shooting the quarterback and receiver drills, I changed 'targets' to take a few quick pictures of Coach Steve Spurrier. Suddenly, the other photographer exclaimed to me, "Coach is pointing at us and wanting us to move!". We then quickly moved. What had happened was that the players changed the passing pattern and the receivers were now going to be heading directly toward us running an 'out pattern'. No doubt, we were both embarrassed to be called out but really appreciated the "heads-up" from the always vigilant Head Ball Coach.
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Gameday atmosphere improving at Williams-Brice...
Lately you've probably noticed the players, and some fans, referring to the team as 'New Carolina' as the players and coaches have taken the task personally to make needed improvements. Likewise, Williams-Brice Stadium has also been receiving improvements and up-grades. The new signage (shown in the first five pictures in this blog) on each of the four corner ramps lends a dramatic improvement to the gameday atmosphere. One of the players, while standing on the sideline two hours before the first home game, told me, "Wow! This looks more than ten times better!". I was in complete agreement with the statement. Today's Blog addresses a question from the message board as well as brief comments and information about a wide variety of photos from the last two games. Also, a 'story behind the picture' will be shared that you may find interesting.
What better way to honor achievements than by replacing the plain concrete ramp walls with colorful banners? Each of the four corners now have garnet, black, and white signs with names and statistics that are worthy of special recognition. One corner welcomes you to Williams-Brice and honors the Heisman Trophy winner, George Rogers. Other corner ramps are devoted to the Offensive leaders or Defensive leaders or for coaching achievements. The 1969 ACC Championship is shown on the edge of the South Stands (on the left side, possibly leaving room for anticipated future championships).
The South-East Ramp (behind the Visiting Team Band).
Having the players names, and meaningful statistics displayed, is doubtless a great motivation for the players. Whether you are a current player, and/or contemplating quitting the team before graduation for the lure of the NFL, or a recruit thinking that his family would be incredibly proud to see his name on the wall. The signs and banners can be motivators but they also improve the appearance of Williams-Brice Stadium and photographers find them to be excellent backgrounds for crowd shots.
The South-West Ramp (behind the '2001' entrance).
The North-East Ramp (behind the Carolina Band).
The view from the endzone in the South stands (from below "'The Zone").
I have been asked about what shutter speed I use when I shoot. I will give a few brief illustrations in this blog but the answer will often vary depending on a variety of factors.
Three main questions to consider:
1. What is the lighting? The upcoming game with Kentucky will be the first game NOT under the lights this season (12:30PM start).
2. What type of action am I shooting (high speed or very limited motion)?
3. What depth of field is desired? (How much of the photo should be in sharp focus.)
Day games are usually a photographer's delight. Almost anyone can get a great picture, even with a cheap lens, a disposable camera or a cell phone camera. A professional will adjust camera's settings to take advantage of the brighter lighting. The ISO will typically be reduced to something between 100 and 320. Depending on the depth of field desired in a particular group of photos, the shutter speed may well be in the range of 1/3000ths of a second or greater. Note: it is NOT always desirable to freeze action to that extent as a certain degree of 'blur' shows motion nicely. A case in point, you cannot, generally, photograph the wind. But, you can photograph the effects of wind as it blows leaves, grass, snow, etc. A slower shutter speed is often desired with moving water, waterfalls, waves, etc.
A note on weather conditions: Rain is NOT usually a fun environment to shoot in. However, harsh shadows can be a problem with bright sunlight and are seldom a problem with cloudy or rainy skies. In sunlight, colors are brighter but are duller or more muted in wet conditions. Rain, especially heavy rain, can allow for some great pictures. One thing for sure, a variety of 'trade-offs' occur whenever the weather conditions change.
By the way, EXIF information is captured and embedded with each digital image. It can be useful but also misleading. For instance, I have three lenses that could be used to take a 200mm image. The EXIF image information could state that my image was shot with the f-stop of f6 (for instance), which would be accurate. However, that is only PART of the story. Each of those three lens, I just mentioned, are very different and produce noticeably different results.
Each lens is Canon brand and quality and each one could shoot an f-stop of f6 but one could shoot an image as fast as f2, another f2.8, and the third one a relatively distant f4.5. One is a 'prime' (non-zoom) and the other two are zoom but all three have 'image stabilization'. These factors all contribute to producing a dramatically different image. Just a word of caution when interpreting EXIF information and trying to read too much into a specific detail. You must know the lens that is mounted on the camera.
This brings me to mentioning the camera body. Finally, with EXIF info, you need to be familiar with the camera body as well. Some cameras handle high ISO speeds exceptionally well and others, quite simply, do not. Also, a wide variety of software is now available to reduce the 'digital noise' of higher ISO photos, thankfully.
In summary, I generally try to maintain a minimum shutter speed of between 1/500th and 1/640th while keeping the ISO as low as feasible. None of this creates a problem until you are shooting sports action 'under the lights'!
This picture was taken with at 1/500ths of a second with f-stop of f2.2 (on a lense that is capable of f2).
Shot at 1/500th of a second (to help with the fireworks), 24mm wide-angle at f2.8.
Crowd shot at 1/500th of a second, 24mm wide-angle at f8 (for greater depth of field).
Faster shutter speed of 1/640th, f4, 75mm lens used and the image has been cropped making the image appear to be more zoomed.
Shot during warm-ups, limited action so I used 1/400ths of a second with f-stop of f2.8 for greater depth of field (on a lense that is capable of f2).
At the edge of the endzone, you are often guessing (as is the defense), pass or run, in the near corner or going all the way to the other corner. The key is to be as flexible as possible, have a good guess and hope that the official does not obscure your angle on the play. This picture was shot at 1/500th of a second, with the 24mm-70mm wide-angle zoom lense (zoomed to 70mm) at f2.8 to capture Stephen Garcia diving over the goal-line for the touchdown.
This picture was shot nearly the length of the field, with an ISO of 3200, at 1/500th's shutter speed but the f-stop was f3.5(which gave better depth of field focus while adding a little bit of digital noise due to the higher ISO value). It was a planned trade-off.
The photo, of Coach Shane Beamer and Eric Norwood celebrating, was shot from the other side of the field. I used an ISO of 1600, with 1/500ths shutter speed and f-stop of f2.8 on the prime (non-zoom but with image-stabilization)300mm lens.
Sometimes when concentrating on taking a picture, getting the image framed correctly, sharp focus, and such, the obvious isn't always obvious until later when you study the image that was captured. This picture was taken during team warm-ups. Another photographer and myself were standing on the sidelines, several feet away from the field, talking to each other.
After I had been shooting the quarterback and receiver drills, I changed 'targets' to take a few quick pictures of Coach Steve Spurrier. Suddenly, the other photographer exclaimed to me, "Coach is pointing at us and wanting us to move!". We then quickly moved. What had happened was that the players changed the passing pattern and the receivers were now going to be heading directly toward us running an 'out pattern'. No doubt, we were both embarrassed to be called out but really appreciated the "heads-up" from the always vigilant Head Ball Coach.
Link to this entry - Discuss this entry - Return to Blog Home
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Paul Collins. Paul has been a GamecockCentral photographer since 2005, with a focus on Gamecock football, men's basketball and baseball. He may be reached by email at paul(at)gamecockcentral.com. Replace (at) with @.