First Stab at Dog Agility Photography

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Steve Carter

Steve Carter

Member
I embarked on Nina's training program this past weekend at the Rainier Agility Team event in Elma.

Saturday's results were pretty nominal as I was limited to using my Canon 100-400mm f4.5-f5.6 lens. Most of the time I shot at ISO 3200 with my 40D, and while Lightroom 3 does an great job of noise reduction, the shutter speed necessary was just to slow to get anything close to sharp.

Sunday Nina lent me her 70-200 f2.8 lens and the dark building got somewhat brighter and my shutter speed somewhat faster.

Sunday I took something like 1500 images, deleted about 300. The remaining 1200 I pared down to about 200 reasonably good images. I hope the top 10% below don't bore people too much, but I would be interested in feedback.

Just to get this out of the way, I was limited is shutter speed, so I'm aware they are not terribly sharp and they might be a tad noisy, so comments on composition would be helpful.

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What a fun series! Composition makes it clear that dogs are the stars of each shot. The only distracting element for me is the bright yellow tunnel. It seems to snatch some attention from the dogs who share the frame with it. But, not much you can do about huge tunnels at an agility event. Very nice.
 
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Steve, considering the conditions you were working in, you done good!!!

now, this weekend, we'll put you in a barn with 1/2 the light of the last one, bump your ISO up to 12800 on a 50D and sit you ringside ... then the real work begins LOL
 
Nice shots Steve... Must have missed you by just a few minutes or so. I had to leave early to be in Lacey for an appointment.
 
I love how serious the shepherds look, and then the lab just looks like a goofball. Very nice job on capturing their expressions! The first shot, with the poles all lined up, is my favorite. I agree that the bright yellow tunnel is a bit of a distracting element as compared to the other shots with the jumps.
 


From where I sit, these are really great.

Having never seriously tried to shoot these four-legged rockets, your first attempt looks fantastic.

In the spirit of constructive feedback, I notice that most of the shots have the dog centered in the frame. Would it be possible to lead the dogs just a bit so they are given a little room in the frame to "run into"? That may be too much to think about all at once, but if you could do it I think the composition would be a bit more pleasing to the viewer. And the shots would be even more dynamic.

Just my usual $.02.
 
chitobeach said:
Steve these are really great action shots! How did you Post Process them?
Click to expand...

I used Lightroom 3 exclusively. All of the required, exposure adjustment (some near 2 stops), sharpening, noise reduction and of course cropping.

I use a free export plug-in called Mogrify, that creates the frame, copyright and watermark.
 
Mike-PDX said:
Having never seriously tried to shoot these four-legged rockets, your first attempt looks fantastic.

In the spirit of constructive feedback, I notice that most of the shots have the dog centered in the frame. Would it be possible to lead the dogs just a bit so they are given a little room in the frame to "run into"? That may be too much to think about all at once, but if you could do it I think the composition would be a bit more pleasing to the viewer. And the shots would be even more dynamic.

Just my usual $.02.
Click to expand...

Appreciate the comment. Nearly each shot was cropped to remove some distracting element of the arena, or the dog's handler. I normally try to keep the subject out of the center of the frame, but somehow on these shots cropping for the above reasons, caused the dogs to be more centered then I would like.
 
You are toying with us, Steve.

The composition on these shots is wonderful. Less than half of them have the dog centered.... just right I would say. The whole series works very well. Can't wait to see your second attempt. C.
 
Steve Carter said:
I used Lightroom 3 exclusively. All of the required, exposure adjustment (some near 2 stops), sharpening, noise reduction and of course cropping.

I use a free export plug-in called Mogrify, that creates the frame, copyright and watermark.
Click to expand...


Steve gave me the go ahead to play with one of his great shots. I processed in PS with Topaz plug in. I did not use any presets but rather manual adjustments to just increase detail strength 30% and a little more sharpen 15% and noise reduction to decrease ISO noise

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Thanks Steve for letting me play:D
 
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Mike ... most of the time, the shot is centered, because we use center point focus spot only on AI Servo and multi burst, it is more consistant (for the photog) to have the subject in the center because they move so fast

when I'm cropping on an ordered photo, I often will ofset the dog, so you can see where he's running but as shot, he should be locked on by that center target LOL
 
NinaS said:
Mike ... most of the time, the shot is centered, because we use center point focus spot only on AI Servo and multi burst, it is more consistant (for the photog) to have the subject in the center because they move so fast

when I'm cropping on an ordered photo, I often will ofset the dog, so you can see where he's running but as shot, he should be locked on by that center target LOL
Click to expand...


Makes perfect sense. I suspected something like that. Steve was originally requesting feedback on composition.

Thanks!
 
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NinaS said:
Steve, considering the conditions you were working in, you done good!!!

now, this weekend, we'll put you in a barn with 1/2 the light of the last one, bump your ISO up to 12800 on a 50D and sit you ringside ... then the real work begins LOL
Click to expand...


Barn? You talking about the Horse Expo this weekend up at the Clark County Fairgrounds?
 
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