Fuji 50-230 to shoot at the circus?

[Bobby T]

Has anyone tried shooting in a circus with the 50-230? We are going Saturday. I'm not sure how well the 50-230 will do in that lighting. But the 90 won't have enough reach.

 

[KillRamsey]

Closest I've done to that was an indoor speaking event. I planned on using mostly the 35 and 56, but brought the 50-230 as a lark. The room was DARK, but there was a bright screen behind the speaker, and he was lit well, so that's similar to what you'll probably get. I had to push ISO (obviously) up to 3200 and shoot at around 1/50, and I chose to go b&w with most of the pics, in part to hide some of the grain from that lofty ISO, but I was surprised by the results. It worked, in short.

KBRX9851 by gordopuggy, on Flickr

 

[Dave Jenkins]

Crank the ISO up to 6400, as I did at my granddaughter's dance performance recently and will do again this Sunday. The results are fine for family photos. Here's a file and a 100% crop from same. Certainly looks as good as ISO 800 color film.

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[Bobby T]

That's great to hear. I have pushed the Pro2 to iso10,000, even 12,800, for the zombie walk and some local music venues.

I can pre focus for AF, or just manual focus. The viewfinder in the X-T2 is huge.

 

[KillRamsey]

I didn't have much trouble with AF, aiming for the edges of the subjects seemed to work fine. But, as usual, if the subject's not going to be coming closer/farther, I tend to immediately lock that focus once I get it, and leave it there til the subject does shift distance-wise.

 

[Dave Jenkins]

Since the dancers were in constant motion, I relied on the X-T20's auto focus. It did fine, and any softness in the photo I posted should probably be attributed to the subject moving a little faster than the shutter speed could handle.

 

[Bobby T]

So far, the X-T2, with performance boost on, has the best AF of any Fuji body I've shot with. From what my dad has told me, the T2 is even faster to lock focus with the battery grip. So I should be totally fine then knowing the results you two have gotten.