Cheap Beginner Sports Photography Equipment

[48Valves]

HI,

I'd like to be able to take some decent photos of my sons football matches and possibly some indoor gymnastics. So have been looking into buying a DSLR and appropriate lenses. If they would be of use for the F1 at Silverstone in July that would be great too.

To be honest, as a complete beginner I'm lost and can't make sense of the articles I've found.

I'm happy buying second hand equipment. I only have a budget of £400 and don't really want to stretch it that far at this time.

Any advice or pointers in the right direction would be great.


Thanks

[covboy]

No matter what equipment you get, depending on where you are located at Silverstone it will be very difficult to get decent "close up" shots of any cars on the track -(distance being the problem) Even with a very long (and expensive) lens there are limited locations - Lot's of atmosphere type shots to be had though.
For your budget have a look at mpd .com for a big range of second hand equipment. Consider a body and an average length zoom covering about 50mm to 200mm

Typical Canon Body for about £230 + 18-200mm lens about £160

Edited by covboy on Friday 23 June 10:20

[48Valves]

covboy said:

No matter what equipment you get, depending on where you are located at Silverstone it will be very difficult to get decent "close up" shots of any cars on the track -(distance being the problem) Even with a very long (and expensive) lens there are limited locations - Lot's of atmosphere type shots to be had though.
For your budget have a look at mpd .com for a big range of second hand equipment. Consider a body and an average length zoom covering about 50mm to 200mm

Thanks.

My main priority is the kids sports stuff and better general photography. I'm not that fussed about the F1. It will just be nice to experiment.

[Deltic]

I use mine mostly for the same (my kids football and family type stuff). I use Pentax and I'm sure that there will be people who swear by Canon, Nikon, Sony etc etc.
I would look to get a DSLR, but not a 'full frame' as this will let the long end of the zoom be even better for the kids sports), I don't really think any of the of the mainstream brands will let you down. If you can, get a 18-200ish zoom on it (the wider angle is useful for the family stuff, the longer is better for the kids sports) and get more than one memory card!
Most of all take photos whenever you can, camera phones are great for quick people pics but a DSLR is much more versatile.

Oh and by the way, once you start taking pictures of your kids sports, always offer the manager/team sec. copies. The other parents love seeing better pictures of their kids.

[48Valves]

covboy said:

No matter what equipment you get, depending on where you are located at Silverstone it will be very difficult to get decent "close up" shots of any cars on the track -(distance being the problem) Even with a very long (and expensive) lens there are limited locations - Lot's of atmosphere type shots to be had though.
For your budget have a look at mpd .com for a big range of second hand equipment. Consider a body and an average length zoom covering about 50mm to 200mm

Typical Canon Body for about £230 + 18-200mm lens about £160

Edited by covboy on Friday 23 June 10:20

Are these combinations appropriate?

Canon EOS 7D Body- £369

Then one of either of these lenses

Tamron AF 18-200mm f/3.5-6.3 XR Di ii LD Aspherical (IF) Macro, Canon EF-S Fit

or

Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 III

Thanks

[48Valves]

Deltic said:

I use mine mostly for the same (my kids football and family type stuff). I use Pentax and I'm sure that there will be people who swear by Canon, Nikon, Sony etc etc.
I would look to get a DSLR, but not a 'full frame' as this will let the long end of the zoom be even better for the kids sports), I don't really think any of the of the mainstream brands will let you down. If you can, get a 18-200ish zoom on it (the wider angle is useful for the family stuff, the longer is better for the kids sports) and get more than one memory card!
Most of all take photos whenever you can, camera phones are great for quick people pics but a DSLR is much more versatile.

Oh and by the way, once you start taking pictures of your kids sports, always offer the manager/team sec. copies. The other parents love seeing better pictures of their kids.

Thanks.

I am the manager of the team and we already share our photos and videos. Unfortunately non of the parents of my team are into photography. We held a festival at the weekend and one of the visiting teams parents took some great pics which he shared with me. He had some serious kit with him. I've fancied getting into photography for a while so this is a great excuse to buy some kit.

[covboy]

48Valves said:

Are these combinations appropriate?

Canon EOS 7D Body- £369

Then one of either of these lenses

Tamron AF 18-200mm f/3.5-6.3 XR Di ii LD Aspherical (IF) Macro, Canon EF-S Fit

or

Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 III

Thanks

7D great body (I'm biased!) Can't comment on the lenses, but go for the biggest focal length range you can

[Deltic]

48Valves said:

Thanks.

I am the manager of the team and we already share our photos and videos. Unfortunately non of the parents of my team are into photography. We held a festival at the weekend and one of the visiting teams parents took some great pics which he shared with me. He had some serious kit with him. I've fancied getting into photography for a while so this is a great excuse to buy some kit.

Don't get worried about 'serious kit'. For the first few seasons I used an 50-200 zoom and they were regularly used by the local paper. The best thing to do is crop the pictures so that the subject fills the frame. I'm at work at the moment, but when i get home tonight I'll put a couple of examples of before and after cropping to show you what I mean.

[48Valves]

Deltic said:

48Valves said:

Thanks.

I am the manager of the team and we already share our photos and videos. Unfortunately non of the parents of my team are into photography. We held a festival at the weekend and one of the visiting teams parents took some great pics which he shared with me. He had some serious kit with him. I've fancied getting into photography for a while so this is a great excuse to buy some kit.

Don't get worried about 'serious kit'. For the first few seasons I used an 50-200 zoom and they were regularly used by the local paper. The best thing to do is crop the pictures so that the subject fills the frame. I'm at work at the moment, but when i get home tonight I'll put a couple of examples of before and after cropping to show you what I mean.

Thanks. I'm not worried too much about the kit. If I can get a decent body I will get a couple of basic lenses and upgrade later if needed.

[48Valves]

I've take a bit of a punt on the kit below.

Canon EOS 7D
Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS
Canon EF-S 55-250mm f/4-5.6 IS

Budget was stretched to £500 with this kit and a suitable Compact Flash card. Looking forward to it arriving and being even more confused

I feel this is the start of a slippery slope to spending a fortune.

[covboy]

48Valves said:

I've take a bit of a punt on the kit below.

Canon EOS 7D
Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS
Canon EF-S 55-250mm f/4-5.6 IS

Budget was stretched to £500 with this kit and a suitable Compact Flash card. Looking forward to it arriving and being even more confused

I feel this is the start of a slippery slope to spending a fortune.

Welcome to the club

[LordHaveMurci]

I took many hundreds of rugby photos when my lad played, now take hundreds of kayaking & cadets!

Used a Nikon D80 with Nikon 18-200 VR lens for 8yrs, upgraded the body to a D7200 earlier this year.

My daughter still uses the D80 & it still takes a great pic, sell for less than £100 I think.

[SimboRS]

https://www.parkcameras.com/p/3010248B/digital-slr...

Iv just bought that, although I'm completely new to photography it has taken some good pics, £45 cash back offer on it aswell, I chipped in another £40 or so and got a longer lens with it.
I have a thread on here about it, have a look for it.
If you're not bothered about the camera having wifi connectivity you can get the Nikon d3300 which does almost the exact same but without the wifi for just over £300. Google it, it got great reports from tech radar as best entry level DSLR.

[SimboRS]

https://www.parkcameras.com/p/3010248B/digital-slr...

Iv just bought that, although I'm completely new to photography it has taken some good pics, £45 cash back offer on it aswell, I chipped in another £40 or so and got a longer lens with it.
I have a thread on here about it, have a look for it.
If you're not bothered about the camera having wifi connectivity you can get the Nikon d3300 which does almost the exact same but without the wifi for just over £300. Google it, it got great reports from tech radar as best entry level DSLR.

[minky monkey]

I do a fair bit of football photography using a Canon 7D.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/minky_monkey/albums/...
https://www.flickr.com/photos/minky_monkey/albums/

Great bit of kit, a used example is easily within the reach of most now. I use a 70-200 lens, albeit a rather more expensive 2.8, however the focal length is ok for what you'd need initially. It's more about technique and practice to be honest, even I notice that I'm out of practice at the start of the season. Kids games won't be under floodlit conditions, so that makes life easier.

[Craikeybaby]

48Valves said:

I've take a bit of a punt on the kit below.

Canon EOS 7D
Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS
Canon EF-S 55-250mm f/4-5.6 IS

Budget was stretched to £500 with this kit and a suitable Compact Flash card. Looking forward to it arriving and being even more confused

I feel this is the start of a slippery slope to spending a fortune.

That is decent enough kit, I was going to recommend the 55-250mm over the 75-00mm you mentioned in previous post, but you beat me to it.

[48Valves]

Thanks all.

Hopefully the kit should be here tomorrow. Can't wait

[RobDickinson]

48Valves said:

I've take a bit of a punt on the kit below.

Canon EOS 7D
Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS
Canon EF-S 55-250mm f/4-5.6 IS

Budget was stretched to £500 with this kit and a suitable Compact Flash card. Looking forward to it arriving and being even more confused

I feel this is the start of a slippery slope to spending a fortune.

55-250 is much better than the 75-300 you were looking at.

7D is a pretty decent body and the 55-250 is ok.

rent a 100-400 mk2 one day see how it compares!

[Golaboots]

Nikon d300 offers better bang for your buck than a canon 7d imho.
Also avoid 18 to 200 super zooms, especially third party ones, most lenses are better.

A £200 d300 has great autofocus, good frame rate and leaves a chunk of cash for a nice lens. Might even get a 80-200 f2.8 for just over two hundred if you're lucky which is a pro lens.

[Golaboots]

Sorry. Didn't see you had already purchased OP. You'll be well served by your gear. The photographer takes the picture, not the Camera.