Reds vs. Giants at Goodyear Ballpark

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Bob Buchanan

Bob Buchanan

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Joined
Mar 3, 2005
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Location
Philadelphia, PA
Had a great day for myself at the Goodyear Ballpark on Wednesday. I grew up in central Kentucky and have been a Reds fan most all my life - so this was a real treat. The Reds moved their spring training to Goodyear this spring.

I brought my Canon 50D plus a 28-135mm and my relatively new 100-400mm lens and that made for a pretty hefty bag to tote around. When I entered the ball park, they had me open my camera bag -- and were very interested in examining the content of the long tubular case inside in more detail.  :) All of the long shots are with the 100-400 from the deck area above the seating areas. That is an amazing lens! I actually didn't sit in my assigned seat at all during the game. The ushers allowed me to rest in any open seat unless the owner of the seat showed.

Have set up a Flickr slide show HERE to view a few of the images. Once it starts, you can control all of the settings with your mouse:

Lower right corner to toggle full screen, lower left to pause. Click the center of any pic to toggle captions. 
 
Bob

Wish we could have been home to go to the game with you. The stadium is in easy biking distance from our house. Unfortunately we haven't been home during spring training since the stadium opened for the Indians last year. :'(
 
BernieD said:
Wish we could have been home to go to the game with you. The stadium is in easy biking distance from our house. Unfortunately we haven't been home during spring training since the stadium opened for the Indians last year. :'(
Click to expand...

You had mentioned at QZ that you wouldn't be in the area -- it would have been fun to have you there!! I saw an Indians game last year (against the Cubs). This was the only time the Giants played the Reds in spring training so had set aside the 24th for some time now. Being from NCal, I have many family members and friends that are heavy duty Giants fans.

I'm also a devout Kentucky Basketball fan and was wearing some Kentucky blue. Amazing how many Cincinnati fans were there, and how many of those gave me high fives about Kentucky. Of course, today am wearing my new Reds Spring Training 2010 baseball cap!!

BTW, Kentucky beat Cornell last night and moved on to the Elite Eight in the NCAA. They play Saturday against WVa. Now "that's" a game I wish I could tote my new 100-400mm lens to. :)
 
geodrake said:
Hey Bob:
Nice photos.  What is the 100-400 mm lens that you are using?
Click to expand...

Thanks -- appreciate the feedback!

HERE is the Canon webpage on this lens. When extended to 400mm it is half again longer than the web pic. Some say the push/pull barrel to extend the lens is cumbersome, but I find it very easy to work with -- and for the amount of twisting otherwise to get to 400 would be less convenient for me.

The only other drawback I read about is that the IS is not the very latest, in that it only adjust for two stops vs. 4. I don't do "stuff in flight" photography that much, so that also is not a drawback for me. If you have reviewed TomS's BIF photo albums, you can see what can be done by a photographer with that type of experience with the same lens.

The good news is that it goes out there and gets sharp images. Notice in my images from Goodyear that the deck area is probably 25-30 yards from the diamond. All of the images I have posted were taken from that decking area. My 50D gives me the resolution to crop and still have all the texture I need for sharpness. The Autographing image of the Giants 3rd baseman is a good example. That image was cropped a bit on the sides -- otherwise it is as taken from the camera.

Tom S, Jim Dick, Ron Marabito, and other photographers on the forum also use this lens.

Unfortunately, it "is" a bit pricey. The best pricing I have found is around $1,200 USD. However, it holds it's value very well, as evidenced on eBay.
 
Bob:

Are you going to be around long enough to come up to Happy Trails and see us?
 
The Canon 100-400 L IS lens is the best all around lens for wildlife and sports photography without a tripod for a Canon DSLR. It is one of Canon's older lenses and the IS hasn't been updated in a few years, but the IS still works awesome. As Bob says, the push-pull zooming takes some getting used to but it does work very well and is much faster at zooming than the twist style. It is expensive unless you compare it to Canon's 500, 600 or 800 mm lenses. And it is built like a tank.
 
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