Back at the beach volleyball venue to photo the action...and...

Last night the USA team of Sara Hughes and Kelly Cheng were playing beach volleyball against the Italian team with a starting time of 10pm. I thought that this would be perfect, because then I could capture the game, but get there early and get another crack at getting a even better sunset shot in the iconic venue. And that actually happened! 

I got to the venue about two hours before the start of the USA game. There was another game going on, but I just positioned myself at the highest point, dead center this time around! It was not nearly as crowded as the last time I was there, but we still had a group of 6 or 7 of us photographers up there hoping for a nice sunset. Honestly, it was really great just hanging out, enjoying this incredible view and sharing stories and laughs with the other photogs. I saw the sun just about to go below the horizon and took this photo at f/22 to create the starburst effect on the setting sun.

And just before Hughes and Cheng started their game, we had this perfect light. Remember a while back when I said that I got my dream shot, well this one is even better. Mother nature did her job for sure!

And then, once I felt that I had the shot I wanted from up above, I made my way down to the sand to shoot court side.

I will be honest with you, this sport is not easy to shoot. There are many times when I would hit the shutter button but miss the action. I was not happy with what I was getting with the Canon R5 MKII (using the RF70-200mm lens). Then I thought "well...this is the perfect time to try the pre-capture mode of the new camera" where the camera can go back and save images 1/2 second before I fully press the shutter button. And this made a huge difference to my images! 

I was able to wait for the action and then hit the shutter button and get peak of action. (Note: I have not been using this feature up until now because the other sports are easier to predict AND I did not want to add another 2000 images to my culling process for each event.)

After switching to this new mode I was getting what I wanted! 

I was typically focusing on whomever was closest to me at the time.

I was shooting at a burst rate of 20 images per second, but could have changed the camera to go as high as 30 images per second. 

Even at 20fps I was able to catch moments like this showing the actual impact on the ball. Pretty amazing.

I tried shooting in different positions around the court, from the back and from the side.

I liked the side shots better, especially when they dove for the ball.

They had a really long rally and Sara ended up making a great diving save to help them win a point.

Kelly turned right towards us with this funny smile on her face.

Then it was back to business and a big win!

So much of the Olympics is about the reaction, and the reaction in these two photos says it all.

It is so awesome (and a real honor) to be able to sit feet away from the action and capture these moments.

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* Thank you to Canon, Apple, ProGrade Digital, Crucial, Tiffen, DataColor, ThinkTank, Adobe, and CameraBits  for providing loaner product to me for the Olympic Games!

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