Need pointers for shooting outdoor sports please

what time of day were you shooting? as for the filters, and this is only my preference, i wouldn't use them for sports photography.

 

Maybe post some examples Matt ?

My only thought would be to take off the filters.

 

Agreed on both counts.

 

If you show us some of the photos, we might have a better idea what caused the haze look. Things to consider doing to minimize this:

• Clean front element (no dust, no fingerprints)
• No filters
• Sun at your back (no sunlight on the front element and subject front-lit)
• A good lens hood
• Proper exposure w/o too much contrast setting

 

With out photos as others have said this an stab in the dark
I use a sigma with out filter with no problems

 

Yup, pix will help. FWIW I shoot this combo, just posted some from today, and the past month have made several posts if you search on my username...

 

For those interested in a larger version, I found it here:

This image just has very low contrast. The likely reason is that you were shooting into the sun, perhaps even with sun on the front element which causes scattered light in the lens to reduce the overall contrast.

This image can be improved a lot with simple post processing. In the future, you either have to avoid shooting into the sun or you have to get the exposure right while keeping the sun off the front element. In these conditions, I would definitely avoid a filter on the lens as that's just an additional sun-lit surface to cause scattered light.

I did a black point adjustment and a white point adjustment and an s-curve for additional contrast.

That turned this:


Into this:

 

Nice work on this John, I agree with what you have said

The secret of shooting into the sun is using +EV comp (+.3 or even +.7) and get as much of the player in frame as possible to minimise the blown backgrounds. You can get some VERY nice results.

Mike Mac is the master of this imho.