I am always asked which type of camera to buy. I always recommend that you buy the most expensive camera that you can afford. Sports photography is very much like paintball it that it requires very durable fast equipment. If you were to start playing speed ball with a Tippman or a spider you would not really have much fun and you would likely have a poor experience and not want to play again. Photography is the same but about $1000 is the threshold of what you need to spend…

For sports photography I highly recommend going with a Canon camera and lens.

If you are shooting portraits or landscapes Nikon has the best optics, but if you are shooting sports or fast moving objects is it widely known the Canon lens will auto focus much faster than Nikon lenses. Next time you watch a sporting event on TV if you ever notice the professional photographers you will see an abundance of the big beige canon lenses.

Check out the prices on a Canon Digital Rebel XTi and a Canon EF 28-200mm f/3.5-5.6 USM Lens. This IMO is the absolute minimum you will need to buy to get good results.

Another thing to consider is some sort of protection for your brand new expensive camera. I always use a Kata rain cape on my cameras and this has saved my camera countless times (Kata-Bags.com) and a clear filter on the end of the lens for protection.

It really helps to have played paintball because you already know the game and you can predict what will happen so you can position your self to get that great splat shots.

It really helps to have played paintball because you already know the game and you can predict what will happen so you can position your self to get that great splat shots.