On Saturday, July 14, I photographed the third annual Indy Criterium cycling competition and festival, making it through all 11 competitions and a fun kids' race, a long, eight-plus-hour day on which I also set a personal record for volume of total pictures taken in one shoot -- almost 4,700. Such is the "luxury" of digital cameras -- there is no film cost overhead to worry about; you just have to be sure you pack enough memory cards.
Before ever leaving the house Saturday, I made a couple of choices with the memory of another very long day -- the White Lick 5K Mudathlon near Anderson on June 30 -- still firmly in mind. Two things distinguished my experience at the mudathlon -- I left my sunscreen in the car and I used my heavy Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L IS lens, most of the time without benefit of a monopod. I had the monopod that day, but it would not stand firm in the mud, plus ... the assignment I had made it impossible to get the shots I needed without moving a lot, and the monopod proved to be an impediment to that.
So on Saturday, for the Indy Crit, I elected to use my much lighter -- and, in terms of focal range, more versatile -- Tamrom 18-270mm f/3.5-6.3 Di II PZD VC lens. The versatility precluded me from needing to lug around a second body equipped with a lens with a shorter focal range, my Canon 24-70mm f/2.8L. Another decision I made was to move my point of focus, in pack shots of riders, away from the lead rider to the center of the pack. And still another decision was, for the first time ever, to shoot in Small RAW format. I used to shoot in Large RAW, but for so many sports outings, the huge file sizes proved unnecessary. I've shot in Medium RAW for several months now, and those file sizes are more manageable and take up less space on the home computer. But I sensed I was going to shoot a lot Saturday, and I decided to go small to keep my memory-card changing and post-event tracking to a minimum. I'm glad I did it, but ... I won't do it on a regular basis; I'll continue to shoot in at least Medium RAW format unless circumstances dictate otherwise.
Oh, yeah: I applied the sunscreen before leaving the house!
Now that I've gone through all my pictures and posted them online at my SmugMug site, here's what I feel about my decisions on gear:
*** Physically, electing to to use the Tamron was a wise one. I got around much easier, and that was key because I moved around a lot, as I knew I would because I've done it before at loop-course cycling competitions. I must have circled the mile-long figure-eight route at least seven times during the day. Not having a second camera body and/or a first body with a heavy lens did my anatomical body a huge favor. I didn't have nearly the back and shoulder ache I recall having after a long day of using the Canon 70-200mm at the mudathlon. Plus, the Tamron could get my closeup and long-range shots, saving me time from switching from one camera to another.
*** I think the quality of images using the Tamron was not as good as I would have gotten with my Canon lenses, but I would not go so far to say that the drop-off was a large one. The oft-changing natural lighting proved to be a bear to work around all day, but even the prolonged cloud cover periods never compromised my camera settings enough to make me seriously wish I had the faster Canon f/2.8 lenses, though it came close a couple times. The real question is whether I'd do it again for a similar outdoor shoot. The answer is: I'm not sure. If I knew I had a long day ahead of me like Saturday and/or that I'd be moving around a lot and taking lots of pictures, I'd have to give using the Tamron serious thought again. But if it were a relatively short shoot -- four hours max -- I would turn to the Canons to optimize image quality.
*** I got some interesting results using the center of the pack as a point of focus -- I was getting far more riders in the back of the pack in focus -- but it did bother me that the lead rider or two were not in focus. So I'm likely to not repeat that experiment and next time push my ISO to higher levels to secure a smaller aperture that will enable me to get more riders in focus behind the lead rider. Now ... if I only had not twice forgotten to return my shutter speed to 1/400 or 1/500 until halfway through both the second Men's 3/4 and the finale, the Men's 1/2/3 events (I'd reduced it to 1/250 to grab either podium or festival candid shots in the lulls before the races), I might not have had to throw out so many blurry shots. But, I don't think I'm the first who's been caught napping doing something irksome like that. But like I said, it was a long day.
I lead off today's post with a scene from a crash involving two cyclists about midway through the Men's Masters (age 40 and over) competition. The spill involved teammates on the McDonald's Racing team on Market Street between Illinois and Meridian streets, the southern-most point on the course on downtown streets. One of the riders, Michael Savory of Miamisburg, Ohio, got up in short order and resumed racing. Impressively, he finished 11th. The other, face bloodied, pulled off the course and conferred with race officials and spent time examining his damaged bike. According to the posted official results, there were no DNFs (did not finish), but I don't see his bib number (241) listed in the results, so I presume he did not return to the competition.
Above: A group in the Women's 4 race that includes (second from left) Team Bicycle Exchange's Kristin Siebenlist, Indianapolis, an alumna of Marian University's heralded cycling program.
Fabulous photos and great to see you posting again. Hope all is going well!
ReplyDelete