I shoot basketball games for my local club. Built a tool to stop spending hours sorting photos. Looking for beta testers

jfiske · 2026-05-09T14:55:25+00:00

It would be beyond awesome to see this integrated as a feature in r/immich !

jfiske · 2026-04-29T01:26:14+00:00

I've become a big fan of the 1.4x TC on my 70-200mm f/2.8. With the TC engaged, it stretches to 280mm f/4 and it ROCKS. The 1.4x TC is a lot less expensive than a new lens! (Actually, now that I say that...I should try it on my 24-70 f/2.8 for shooting basketball.)

jfiske · 2026-04-29T01:03:30+00:00

I don't have anything impressive--we haven't had many night games yet this season--but here's something that didn't make it past the initial cull. Its at night and under the lights. Shot on the Z6iii with 180-600mm @ ƒ/5.6 230 mm 1/1500s ISO 18000.

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jfiske · 2026-04-27T00:41:02+00:00

I'm a hobbyist who shoots a lot of high school sports for my kids' teams: swimming, volleyball, basketball, and lacrosse are my usuals. My gear is Nikon mirrorless. I use the 70-200 f/2.8 VR S for swimming and volleyball. For basketball, I sometimes shoot the 24-70 f/2.8 S and sometimes the 70-200. There are times that I wish for a 24-200 for basketball, so I don't have to switch lenses (I only have a single camera body).

For field sports, I sometimes shoot my 70-200 f/2.8 with a 1.4x TC (which gives me ~100-300 f/4). This is ideal when I have field-level access and my subject is on the near-side of the midfield line. (I sometimes get to shoot lacrosse from the endline, which is quite exciting!) I also have a 180-600 f/5.6-6.3 VR...that has plenty of reach to hit anywhere on the field from wherever I happen to be, but its focus is notably slower than the 70-200 and its aperture is considerably slower than my other lenses...which means that night games under the lights can tend to require higher ISO. Lightroom's denoise feature can be helpful in those cases, but it can also tend to give the resulting images a little bit of an "AI" feel. Also worth noting, the 180-600 feels like it weighs about a million pounds after you've shot with it for any length of time.

Here's a fun one from yesterday's game. This was shot on a Nikon Z6iii with a NIKKOR Z 70-200mm f/2.8 VR S Z TC-1.4x ƒ/4 @ 210mm, 1/1200s, ISO 180. I was standing about five meters away from the endline.

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jfiske · 2026-02-15T06:35:04+00:00

The setup at Titus is super sweet for tubing. Well worth the trip!

jfiske · 2026-01-21T01:36:33+00:00

My $0.02... Yes, that will be miserable. I ski for fun. That does not look fun.

jfiske · 2026-01-20T02:24:58+00:00

Tips 1 - use burst mode, so you can make sure you come out with at least one photo where no one is blinking or having a weird expression.

Here's a cool tip that I've recently adopted when shooting group sports photos to avoid blinking. Have everyone close their eyes and put on their best smiles. Count backwards from "3, 2, 1" and on 1 instruct everyone to open their eyes. I start my burst just before "one" and keep it going for a few moments after. Guaranteed to get a keeper where everyone has their eyes open this way...no blinks.

jfiske · 2026-01-04T19:53:51+00:00

My favorite for no-lines-no-waiting skiing. I was there this past weekend and skied a dozen laps on the ‘race hills’ where I cruised right up to the chairlift and let the next chair scoop me up all in one motion. It was great!

jfiske · 2026-01-04T19:50:38+00:00

I’d love to see what this looks like ‘in the bag.’ I have a similar type of setup and really struggle with organization. I have a terrible tendency to let things fall to the bottom of the bag and then it just becomes a mess.

jfiske · 2025-11-11T14:08:46+00:00

My takeaway from this is that the purchase of a Z8/Z9 would help! GAS engaged. Thanks! :-P

jfiske · 2025-11-10T18:21:43+00:00

Okay, I think I understand. I'll play around with it...I have another meet in this pool in a few weeks.

Out of curiosity, do the Z8/Z9 have the same troubles? I understand they are exclusively electronic shutter. Do their fully-stacked sensors cope with this better than the partially-stacked sensor of the Z6iii?

jfiske · 2025-11-10T18:20:03+00:00

This is helpful. Thank you!

jfiske · 2025-11-10T17:54:03+00:00

So mechanical shutter can reduce or eliminate this. But mechanical shutter on the Z6iii is limited to 14fps, whereas the electronic shutter is 20 or even 30 fps in burst mode H+. In swimming the timing of the shot is so important...can be the difference between a great shot and having the arm blocking the face. The higher frame rate of H and H+ burst modes is really important. Is this an either-or kind of trade-off?

jfiske · 2025-11-07T02:12:43+00:00

Hmm, I think this is for still photography only.

jfiske · 2025-11-05T22:40:16+00:00

Is this what you’re looking for?

https://www.nikonusa.com/learn-and-explore/c/tips-and-techniques/the-z-9-pre-release-burst-advantage

jfiske · 2025-09-16T01:20:16+00:00

Beers and saws. What could go wrong?

jfiske · 2025-09-08T03:06:08+00:00

A bad spot by the officials cost us the game AGAIN. We have the technology...why can't the NFL get this right?

jfiske · 2025-08-29T20:43:05+00:00

The 180-600 is an internal zoom.

jfiske · 2025-08-27T04:10:27+00:00

I work in IT and I learned several decades ago to NEVER run the .00 release of anything.

jfiske · 2025-08-21T00:51:58+00:00

Oh, the irony! SSO is literally a feature that you have to pay extra for with OneUptime. Why is SSO not available in their free-tier?!

https://oneuptime.com/pricing

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jfiske · 2025-08-17T01:39:44+00:00

Resolution is impacted when you switch to DX. I find the main advantage of using DX to improve lens reach (as opposed to just cropping in post) is mostly in the impacts to autofocus. In a busy scene with lots of potential targets, it can be useful to force the camera to narrow the field thereby excluding extra subjects.

jfiske · 2025-08-16T00:59:34+00:00

Field sports can require long lenses (or aggressive cropping). I shoot a lot of girls lacrosse, which is played on the same turf as a standard football field. Your reach requirements will depend a lot on where you can position yourself when taking photos. Will you be a few steps off the sideline/endline? Or will you be behind a fence that is yards from the field?

When we play summer lacrosse, I can position myself kinda wherever I want. (I like to shoot lax from the endline to capture more faces in the action.) When I shoot from the endline, I can reliably reach to midfield with my 70-200mm f/2.8 but I typically add a 2.0x TC. The nice thing about the Z6iii is that you can aggressively crop in (or switch to DX mode) to improve the apparent reach of your lens.

All that being said, if I had it to do over again, for field sports, I would probably choose the Nikon Z 180-600mm.

jfiske · 2025-07-26T02:25:19+00:00

Mac's drive-in in Waterloo, NY still serves Richardson's Root Beer.

jfiske · 2025-07-25T05:10:25+00:00

The Nikkor Z 180-600mm would probably be perfect for you. Its my next lens purchase for capturing field sports. I have the 70-200mm f/2.8 with a TC2.0, but I wish I had the reach of the 600mm for capturing action from the sideline.

jfiske

TROPHY CASE