[hambone]

Which Pentax camera will allow me to shoot images at my daughter soccer games at games.

The lighting isn't great and I'm shooting with a 70-200 2.8 lens.

Which camera do you recomend?

[jatrax]

Well fortunately, unlike some brands there is not a huge number of choices.

New:
If you have the budget then get the K-5. No question it is the flagship of the line at this time. Good ISO and FPS

The other option is the k-r. Also very good but without some of the bells & whistles

Used:
K-7 is still available on used market and so is the K20D
K-x is the older model that was replaced by K-r. So less expensive, but less features.

With 70-200 f/2.8 I think you would be fine with any of them.

I would recommend the K-5 though since you did not mention a budget

[JinDesu]

Is it indoors or outdoors soccer?

[hambone]

It is outdoors.

[hambone]

How about if we want to go under $1,000?

[JinDesu]

If it's outdoors and it's during the daytime, I doubt you'd need anything more than a k-x/k-r. Bump the ISO up to 1000 and you should be able to get enough shutter speed to freeze action at F2.8. Outdoors and evening or indoors would be a good case for the k-5, where you could bump the ISO even higher and get better results.

[Adam]

How about if we want to go under $1,000?

Get a used K-5 from the marketplace.

Click here to get a notification when one becomes available (you'll see a blank page; the full interface is available in the marketplace).

Adam
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[hambone]

Most of the games are at night.

[hambone]

Will my lens (I bought it from a Pentax K10D) work on a K5?

[jatrax]

Yes. The beauty of the Pentax system is that any lens (well almost) ever made for Pentax will (within the limitations of the lens) work on the newest DSLR.

I have a Takumar made in 1957 that works just fine on my kx

[hcc]

While the camera body may be important, I believe that the lens selection is even more important for sport shooting IMHO. You need a reasonably fast and sharp lens.

Some relevant threads include:
Fast Sports Zoom Lenses for Pentax - 70-200mm Sigma & Tamron
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/pentax-slr-lens-discussion/163574-loving-...ml#post1694236

Hope that the comment may help,...

[Chaos_Realm]

I think you will need to get something with clean high ISO performance as top priority then worry about max frames per second especially in the low light fast action... you'll need all the shutter speed you can get. the k-7 has a high fps count (5 to 6fps or so) but it lacks in high ISO performance, so first choice would be K-5 both higher fps and incredible high ISO performance, then K-R in second place as it has good ISO performance but sacrifices fps (and a few other features) to save some $$ and third the k-x for even cheaper but then loosing more features.

I have the K-7 and have shot indoor basketball, I found had to pull out my FA 77 f/1.8 to ALMOST freeze the action using my highest tolerable ISO of 1600. The Sigma 70-200 f/2.8 wasn't quite fast enough. But given you are shooting soccer you'll need the reach and as a result higher ISO performance.

If the soccer were in daylight you could get away with the k-7 over the k-r / k-x to take advantage of the higher fps but alas 'tis not the case.

[AOShep]

I use the K5 with DA* 50-135mm f/2.8 at ISO 10,000 at night. Your Sigma would give you an even better focal range. If the field lights are good enough, which our field lights are not, you might get by with a lower ISO or even faster shutter speeds.

[dosdan]

Go for the K-5. For 3 years I've shoot junior soccer (U7-U9) with a K20D & DA 55-300/F4-F5.8 and for the final 2 months of this session, a DA* 60-250/F4. I've now bought a K-5, but this year's session is over so I've not used it with soccer yet. But I can see from other shooting that its ability to boost shadows will be very helpful, because it isn't always possible to get the sun behind you when you shoot. Also its 6+ fps rate will come in very handy when someone is nearing the goal. And it's AF looks superior to the K20D.

Shooting at night will be tough, even at f/2.8. I think the K-5 will be decent at about ISO4000-ISO4800. This compares to the K20D that was in trouble above ISO1600.

It is usually recommended that you stick down one end of the field near the goal and shoot from there. The idea being that you get a good sweep of the width of the field from there, the players will often be coming your way and relatively close and that any distracting stuff down the other end will be further away and thus more OOF & blurred. The obvious disadvantage will be that often the play will be in the other half of the field, further away and facing away from you.

That's why I prefer to shoot from the midpoint of the sideline. It helps if the spectators aren't on the other side of the field and if parts of the field are not in shadow.

A big problem with the K20D is action focus, with AF-C, when you're following two players, it would often focus between the two players at the background so the two players were OOF.

I've seen some great soccer shots taken by others at 200mm FL, but you'll probably have to move a bit around the field to compensate for the wider AOV of the lens.

Here is a diagram of relative heights of a player in the frame on the field at different distances & FLs:

https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/photography-articles/143778-subject-heigh...-position.html

Here are my shots. Please keep in mind that Brisbane is hotter & often doesn't get the level of rain of many European places, so the grass is sparse and not very green.

Photos Posted By dosdan - Pentax User Photo Gallery

https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/post-your-photos/156897-sports-u9-soccer-20110827-a.html
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/post-your-photos/156262-sports-4-kneeling-soccer-shots.html
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/post-your-photos/154635-sports-u9-soccer-20110806-a.html
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/post-your-photos/152911-sports-u9-soccer-2010723-a.html
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/post-your-photos/152114-sports-u9-soccer-20110716-a.html
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/post-your-photos/113220-sports-actionmen-u8-soccer.html
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/post-your-photos/105927-sports-more-u8-soccer-action.html
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/post-your-photos/108661-sports-u8-soccer-action.html
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/post-your-photos/105376-sports-demo-squee...eg-assist.html

I like to shot all players in both teams (through it can be hard to get an interesting shot of every player sometimes) and as many presentations as possible (it can be very difficult when both teams are presenting their "Player of the Week" awards at the same time.)

https://picasaweb.google.com/110304554160411023759

Dan.

[DaveHolmes]

The lighting isn't great and I'm shooting with a 70-200 2.8 lens

I'm not sure about the high-ISO performance of the K10... But, I regularly shoot my university's ice hockey teams games using my K-x and the 50-200(which is not as good as your lens) and get good results despite the bad lighting conditions...
I assume the K-r and K5 have even better high-ISO performance than the K-x... So either of those 3 (K-x, K-r, K5) combined with that lens you have should be a winner!!

Best
Dave