Shooting with a 400mm zoom lens

I've been taking photographs off and on since high school. My focus has been mostly on landscape. Taking pictures of people always proved to be very difficult. They tend to move around a lot more than mountains and buildings.

I recently took on the job of yearbook adviser and thought I better improve my skills of capturing candids.

I took the schools 400mm zoom lens out to the OHS vs. Centennial baseball game. I only got to shoot for about an inning and a half. It was a great experience and I look forward to trying it again and trying other sports and events. Here are some of my favorites.

This was my favorite. I like the way the jersey and sunglasses have a sunset look to them. Not that me taking the photo had anything to do with it, but thought the shot turned out nice.

I did not edit any of these photos. I probably should have cropped out the catcher and made this a vertical photo. I like the umpire's action and facial expression.

I really like the back-lighting in this shot. The action and player reaction are solid too. You don't see the ball in this shot, but I was surprised at how often I was able to capture the ball crossing the plate or making contact.

Here are the best of the rest.

 Overall it was a great experience, think I need to continue to practice and probably put more time into the post-production aspect of the process. *Disclaimer- I did not identify people in this post because I was focused more on the act of shooting photos, rather than the journalistic practice of telling a story. I did get rosters and thought about writing cutlines for each photo, but decided against it because my goal was not for the game to be the focus. In the future I will identify people when I feel it's necessary.*