I will admit from time-to-time I take advantage of my position. For instance today I ‘borrowed’ a photographer’s field pass from the Sports Department and headed to the Yale Bowl for the Yale-Cornell football game.
This was my second time photographing football and like my first time it was very frustrating. A 300mm lens (which on my camera shoots like a 480mm lens) provides an extremely narrow view. There are probably people who pan to the action and click. It didn’t come easy to me.
On top of that there were a boatload of marginally soft shots or shots where the autofocus point wasn’t where I wanted it! This may be a camera adjustment I’ve missed. It’s back to the manual to make sure.
Finally, my lenses are slow. That limits my finished photos in a variety of ways with the most problematic today being depth-of-field. Often the background was in focus, making it very difficult to separate it from the action. Fast lenses have produce a shallow depth-of-field and blurry backgrounds.
Did I have a good time? Absolutely. I enjoyed the game which was played under ideal conditions. There were also a bunch of photographers I know and it’s good to see and learn from them.
I’ll be back to try again.