PHOTO OF THE WEEK ‘Using the reach’

The hardest part of shooting baseball or softball is waiting for a shot, especially when it’s hot. Hoover High is one of the softball fields where I can find a little shade and get an angle that is a little different. There is a fence around the outside of the field that is low enough for me to shoot over and has some trees providing shade.

The trick to this spot is to have a lens that is long enough. We have a couple of pool 300mm 2.8 lenses that we share. This focal length is good enough for almost everything we shoot, but we do have teleconverters to provide a little more range. I find my spot, always in the shade, pop a 2X TC onto the 300mm, making it a 600mm, and I have a perfect view of all the bases. You need a little depth of field to pull this off, as a 2X TC can be slightly soft wide open. But the shade on a hot day is worth it, and you can grab shots like this one.

— Roger Wilson