Sports photography is a style of photography where you intentionally take photos of sports or other people doing sports. The most common sports are football, baseball, basketball, tennis, and volleyball. Sports photography is a tricky beast. You need a fast lens to capture fast action, but you also need to cut down on motion blur since motion blur can make a shot look blurry, and blur causes motion to be harder to detect. So if you want to shoot well, you need a fast lens, but you also need to take enough care to avoid motion blur.
Sports photography. It’s a strange play on words, but I believe it’s one of the most important aspects of a photographer’s work. Sports photographers are often taken for granted, but their work is extremely valuable in the media world. Many people will never get a chance to see a great sports photo, and it can be a difficult task to get a good shot at a sports event. Sports photography is often an endurance test, and the photographer must find the best vantage point, capture the perfect light, and not get in the way of the action. It can be a frustrating task and also a very rewarding one.
The best lens for sports photography is the lens that is the best for the situation that you are shooting in. If you are shooting in a basketball game, the lens that works best in that situation is probably a 50mm. If you are shooting a landscape, a wide angle lens will work best. To give you more details, here is the best lens for sports photography.
Contemporary, Sigma 100-400mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM
The Sigma 100-400mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM Contemporary Lens for Canon EF is a feature-packed lens with plenty of benefits for landscape photography, astrophotography, and sports and wildlife photography. It has a focal range that is on par with Canon’s most expensive telephoto options. It is sensitive to low-light conditions and delivers maximum sharpness, even at telephoto range. The lens is also beautifully crafted and offers a solid overall performance.
Some cameras are so compact, and they are nearly invisible. The new Sigma 100-400mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM Contemporary Lens for Canon EF is one of those cameras. The lens is only 3.2” in length, yet it offers optical image stabilization, a vibration reduction mechanism, and a 100-400mm zoom with an f/5.6 maximum aperture.
Features:
- It has compact packaging with inflexible image quality
- It is a Splash and dustproof mount
- It has smooth bokeh and minimized flare
- An all-new optical stabilizer (OS) unit with a exclusive algorithm
- It is incorporated with a push and pull zoom mechanism
Pros
The Sigma 100-400mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM Contemporary Lens for Canon EF is a very amazing lens that I really like because of the zoom range and the quality of the lens. This lens has a very fast and quiet autofocus, and it is very lightweight and compact, making it a great choice for travel and outdoor photography. This lens is equipped with a high-precision Sigma Hyper Sonic Motor (HSM) and features a much faster and more accurate autofocus than the standard Sigma manual focus lenses. This lens is equipped with one aspherical lens to help control light dispersion, which helps images appear sharper and clearer at the edges of image.
Cons
The Sigma 100-400mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM Contemporary Lens for Canon EF is slightly less bright compared to its competition. This can be an issue when shooting in low light, particularly in the evening when the sun is low in the sky. It can also be an issue when shooting in bright conditions, making the image appear washed out.
While we call it a “contemporary” lens, it’s actually a couple of years old. That’s pretty old by today’s standards, but it’s still a good lens, and Sigma’s recent TURBO OS version is supposed to be better. The image quality isn’t quite as good as the newer Canon L lenses, but the Sigma is still fine for the price, and it’s a good general-purpose telephoto zoom.
- Full Frame Lens with APS-C compatibility
- Compact size meets strong image quality
- Ideal Use: Travel photography, wildlife photography, nature photography and bird photography
- 4 Year USA Warranty
- Filter Size: 67mm
Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS III USM Lens
The Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS III USM Lens is the perfect companion for nature photographers and sports/action photographers that demand sharp shots at all times. With this lens, it isn’t always necessary to miss the shot because of a blur since the image is optically stabilized, and it features a fast f/2.8 maximum aperture to help with low-light shooting.
Features
- The Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS III USM Lens has a fast f/2.8 maximum aperture
- an improved optical design with improved autofocus performance
- it has a high-quality metal build
- has a focal length of just over 200mm.
Pros
The EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS III USM is a large telephoto zoom lens featuring an f/2.8 maximum aperture and a variable maximum aperture ranging from f/4 in the 70-200mm zoom range and f/5 in the 100-400mm zoom range in accordance with zoom position. Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS III USM was launched nearly two years back, and it’s an impressive piece of kit. It’s priced pretty competitively, too. It has an impressive build quality, and the image stabilization feature is one of the best in its class. And if you’re looking for a lens that you can use for sports, travel, family photography, wildlife, and landscape photography, it’s got you covered.
For many photographers, the biggest draw of this high-end zoom lens is its impressive image stabilization. This lens’s optical image stabilization system is similar to the one in the Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L lens (released in 2007), but it’s not quite the same. The IS II’s IS system is more sophisticated, but it’s also slower to react, making it less useful for shooting video.
Cons
The Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS III USM Lens is a relatively basic lens. It’s a modest upgrade from the previous IS II version, which lacked image stabilization, and its focal range doesn’t get too wide. There are a few disappointments to note unless you’re already a Canon EF lens aficionado. The biggest problems are that there’s no image stabilization and that the zoom range is limited to 70mm.
The Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM lens is an incredibly versatile telephoto zoom lens, with a high-quality prime lens, an excellent zoom lens, and a fast, excellent prime lens. It is an amazing value for the money.
- Constant f 2.8 Maximum Aperture throughout Entire Zoom Range.
- Canon’s Air Sphere Coating (ASC) Minimizes Ghosting and Flare.
- Optical Image Stabilization at up to 3.5 Stops of Shake Correction.
- Fluorine Coating on Front and Rear Elements to Help Reduce Smears and Fingerprints.
- Highly Resistant to Dust and Water, and Improved Durability Even in Harsh Conditions. Inner Focusing System with Ring Ultrasonic Motor. Full-time Manual Focus. One Fluorite Element and Five UD Elements for High Image Quality. Minimum Focusing Distance of 3.9 feet, 1.2 meter. Diagonal Angle of View: 34° - 12°
Nikon AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-300mm f/3.5-6.3G ED VR
To get the most out of your wide-angle zoom lens, you’ll need to get used to working with fisheye, panorama, and telephoto lenses. With the new 18-300mm, you can get the most out of your wide-angle (18mm) lens while enjoying the convenience of the 300mm zoom range. At a glance, the Nikon 18-300mm f/3.5-6.3G ED VR doesn’t look much different from its predecessor, but a closer inspection reveals a couple of important changes. The most obvious change is the inclusion of a Silent Wave Motor, which ensures fast and quiet autofocus, and a new high-magnification optical image stabilization system that helps the lens maintain sharp image quality in low-light conditions.
The Nikon AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-300mm f/3.5-6.3G ED VR is the latest addition to the DX-format lineup of Nikkor lenses, and it’s a popular choice for those who love to travel and shoot family portraits.
Features
- it can be mounted on nearly any camera
- Its second-generation VR (Vibration Reduction) system and Silent Wave Motor (SWM) make it a great performer for video and low-light photography.
- The 18-300mm is ideal for travel and landscape work.
- The Nikon AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-300mm f/3.5-6.3G ED VR Lens is an ultra-versatile 28-300mm lens in FX format.
- Lightweight design, geared towards ease of handheld use in all situations,
- is complemented by its silent-wave autofocus system, which uses special ultra-silent motors to make autofocus extremely quiet.
Pros
The Nikon 18-300mm is a value-oriented model that is ideal for most photographers who don’t need a huge zoom range and prefer a lightweight and compact design. The lens is equipped with a bright f/3.5-6.3 maximum aperture that enables some great images in low-light conditions. The optical stabilization system is designed to keep images blur-free even when shooting handheld at slower shutter speeds.
The new Nikkor 18-300mm f/3.5-6.3G ED VR is a versatile zoom lens designed for Nikon FX-format DSLRs. It offers a constant maximum aperture of f/3.5-6.3 throughout the zoom range. The new VR (Vibration Reduction) system enables the lens to compensate for the camera’s inability to compensate for camera shake during long telephoto shots. The new VR system also helps compensate for the lens’s inability to compensate for camera-shake during macro shots.
Cons
The Nikon 18-300mm – a lens that was released less than a year ago – is a pretty versatile kit lens, but it has some flaws. Its optical performance is a bit on the soft side, and sharpness isn’t the best at the telephoto end. The distortion is also well above average for a kit lens, worsened by the fact that you need to manually switch between “normal” and “vignette” to get rid of it. As for image quality, the 18-300mm is also quite disappointing when compared to its competition. It is well-built, but the Sigma 18-300mm DG OS HSM is lighter, has the superior image quality, and costs less when released last year.
There are many options in the market when it comes to buying a DSLR lens. Lots of people choose to buy Canon or Nikon, both having their advantages and disadvantages. There are also third-party lenses that are available in the market. Sometimes, they are cheaper but are not as good as the ones supplied by the brands. The Nikon AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-300mm f/3.5-6.3G ED VR is a lens that is both a recommended lens for beginner photographers and a staple lens for professionals. Since it is an affordable lens, many people are interested in buying it, but not everyone knows how to choose the right lens for their needs.
How To Choose The Best Lens For Sports Photography
As a sports photographer, you will want to make sure your camera picks up the action in the air, the action on the ground, and the action in the stands. The right lens can make all the difference. The best lens for sports photography is the one that will deliver the best possible shot to your camera, without causing any image artifacts, by staying focused on your subject. That may seem like a difficult task. But, with the help of some simple rules, you can get the shot that you are looking for.
Compatibility
The first thing you should do if you are thinking of upgrading your camera is to check if it is compatible with your existing lenses. You should make sure that the new camera, the lenses you plan to use, and the camera mount will all work together without any hassles.
Aperture
Many photographers these days shoot with their smartphones, which has gotten a lot of people curious about the proper way to shoot with a smartphone. Aperture, the opening of the lens (usually measured in f-stops), controls the depth of field in a photo and helps determine what is in focus in a photo. The aperture is very important when taking a photo of a person, especially in indoor sports such as tennis, baseball, and soccer.
Size and Weight
The size of a lens has a big impact on the quality of the photo you get. If you have a small mirrorless camera with a small sensor, a huge zoom lens with a wide aperture will be a must-have. But, a fast prime with a short focal length and a f/1.8-2.8 aperture will also produce stunning effects.
Focal Length
Focal length affects the amount of light that reaches the sensor on the back of the camera, which is why it is often referred to as “aperture.” The lens focal length equates to an equivalent angle of view (i.e., how much of the image captured by the lens is in focus). Focal length is also an important element when it comes to the picture’s perspective; for example, when you put your camera to your eye and look through the viewfinder, the image in the center is in focus, and everything in the periphery is in out of focus: this determines the image’s perspective.
Choosing the best lens for sports photography can be a daunting task. You have to be able to capture awesome images quickly, but you also have to be able to stop the action at the right moment to get the perfect shot. If you choose an awesome lens, but it is not fast enough, then you are just wasting your time. If you are anxious to get that awesome image of that awesome race or awesome surfing spot, then you are not going to have enough time to set up the shot. Choosing a lens for a particular event can be a tricky business.
You don’t want a lens that is too heavy, too expensive, or too bulky, but you also want a lens that can handle the conditions of the event. Most of the time, the photographer should be the one to choose the lens, as he or she knows best what kind of event is going on and what kind of lens is needed for the job.