Fast lenses for night action shots

sifro wrote:

Erik Baumgartner wrote:

I shoot in very low light all the time (theatre and music) and the 16-55 and 50-140 f/2.8s have been my go-tos for many years despite being a bit slower than the fast primes (which I also have). For what you’re doing, I’d absolutely use the zoom. If you shoot RAW (and if you want decent results, you should), the end result will typically be at least as good as with the primes and you won’t miss anything.

So do you keep your ISO low and SS high anywasy, get your very underexposed RAW images, breathe to avoid panicking, and then fix everything in post-production?

My shutter speed is as low as possible while avoiding motion blur and my aperture is as wide as possible while maintaining the necessary depth of field and sharpness. The ISO setting (typically in Auto) will be as high as it needs to be to increase brightness but low enough to ensure that no important highlights are clipped in-camera. If the RAWs are initially a bit dark, that can easily (and selectively) corrected in post

Is Lightroom enough for this kind of job or do you also need other tools?

Topaz DeNoise can be very helpful for cleaning up excessive noise while retaining and enhancing detail in the process, but Lightroom is very capable on its own with well considered settings.

You will likely do best using AF-S with a head sized focus box (NOT the smallest). Move the focus box to where you want your target’s head to appear in the frame and full-press the shutter button (no half-press first), with a full press the exposure will occur at the moment focus lock occurs and your hit rate should be excellent even in poor light.

Thank you, will try!