Night Lacrosse in February… brrrr
I usually avoid wearing my winter coat to any sporting event — mainly because it makes switching between camera bodies cumbersome if not down right impossible. This is particularly true for lacrosse which is extremely fast paced. By the end of tonight’s NCAA Lacrosse game between #2 Virginia and Mount Saint Mary’s, the temperature dropped to a balmy 26 degrees — and dudes on both teams were running around in shorts. Even though UVA is ranked #2 in the nation, I quickly began to realize why I was the only (still) photographer there — it was a night game in middle of the week and it was downright cold. Virginia seems to always play Mt. St. Mary’s this time of year… in 2007, there was a night game against MSM and it was actually quite nice — “71 degrees, somewhat overcast, and breezy“… heck, 10 days earlier the official weather for the game was listed as “50 degrees, Sunny, Glorious“… yeah, umm, not tonight.
I actually had a great time covering this game — Virginia dominated with 60+ shots and won the game 10-2. Mt. Saint Mary’s goalie deserves a lot a praise — even though he let in 10 goals, he stopped a bunch of others and was under constant pressure. Virginia dominated the entire game and it looked as if they were headed towards a shutout, but in the 4th quarter MSM scored on a 2-man advantage… they then scored again at even strength a few minutes later.
This shot (above) is of Danny Glading (9) running past Ryan Shewell (14)… I’m particularly pleased with how my post-production is ending up — thanks to fellow photog Andrew Shurtleff and a lot of tweaking, the color is getting very close (I was having a bunch of issues with colors fading — particularly oranges and reds — in the conversion from CR2/RAW to JPEG) and with the help of a few tricks (aka Noise Ninja and a 1DM3) I’m able to shoot at much higher ISOs that I would have been able to in the past. Below is an example from the March 13, 2007 UVA/MSM game:
Hopefully, I’ve improved in the last two years 
Hi Justin,
I typically use a Canon 400mm f/2.8L with IS for lacrosse. I also typically have a Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L with IS around my neck and sometimes also bring with me a wide angle f/2.8L lens (24-70mm or 16-35mm) as well. My primary camera body is the Canon 1D Mark III, my secondary camera is the Canon 1Ds Mark III, and if I bring a third camera it’s the Canon 1D Mark IIN. For night games, I’ll push the ISO up to around 2500 or more depending on the lights, shoot in RAW, edit via Camera Raw + Photoshop and use Noise Ninja to remove excessive noise.
Best of Luck with your shooting.
Regards,
Jason
Jason,
I love your shots of UVA. How do you get so close to the action? Do you use one or several lenses to shoot lacrosse? I am looking to shoot some of my nephews games and was hoping for some helpful tidbits. I have not had much luck freezing the action, or getting close enough. I love your work, thanks for any help you can offer and best of luck in the future!
JM