Various and sundry

[MotorToad]

Tricycle racing at Willow Springs.


I'm really happy with the way this turned out. I'm not a fan of drifting, but it does make for nice photos if they're doing it right.


I used to always try to eliminate motion blur in my action pics but my smelly brother (wfooshee on the fora) has put the idea of proper blur into my head. I think this is a decent example of it.


And here's an example of why I like to get the blur out.


No real post processing, I'm not really a fan of it, but if anything I might hit "I feel lucky" in picasa.

[SmartWombat]

I like that 3rd one!
It is the only one of the set that looks really sharp though. It may be from the resizing to fit the forum limit?

I can't be sure in the 1st one, I'd have to see full size, but it looks like the depth of field is very narrow and it's focussed a little too close. There is aliasing on the alpinestars logo but I think the focus is right on the sidecar rider's back and not on the side of the car, the "for sale" text doesn't look sharp.

In the drifting photo I can see from the front wheel that the top spoke is sharpest, that usually means panning too fast (left to right in this case) but the rear wheel and the tyre smoke is blurred too. I think the critical focus here is on the drilled A pillar seen through the window, not on the rear wheel.
Were you using centre focus point?
For this I'd use the lower right focus point and pan with that on the back wheel.

Last shot I love the mud splash! Good fast shutter speed.
Again I think it may be lost in the conversion to the forum size, because the mud spray doesn't grab me as being the sharpest part of the image.

Anyone learning to pan will want to know how you did that 3rd image
Could you leave in the EXIF information, instead of stripping it out, so other people can see the shutter speed, focal length, ISO etc from the image?
I use the "EXIF Viewer" plugin in Firefox that means I can right-click and get data straight from the image.

[MotorToad]

That first one wasn't the sharpest I had of that day, even of that bike, but I really liked the colors and background so it was the one that got my attention while I was thumbing through them. I'd put the out of focus on that or lack of perfect panning. As for the EXIF, all I've done is host them in picasa and link to the image with a change in the size (picasa defaults to a tiny image that isn't worth viewing). I can't use picasa behind the firewall I'm on right now, but my user name is sjfooshee if you want to look, I'm pretty sure all the pics are public.

I almost always use the center for focus, that's where I'm usually trying to put the subject if it's going race speeds.

[wfooshee]

Keep in mind on the drift pic that comparing the front wheel to the rear for motion blur is not even close to relevant, since the rear wheel is spinning maybe 10 to 1 in comparison to the front. What I really like about that pic is the texture of the smoke clinging to the bodywork as it blows past, then the tailpipe sticking out.

Picasaweb doesn't seem to include EXIF info in displayed images, although if you're on the site and browsing someone's album you can get it in the photo details link. Also, if you "download full size" from the options menu while looking at an image, the downloaded JPG has EXIF data. For example, the sidecar image in pic1 was shot with a 30D at 1/400, f:9, 250mm, ISO 100.

So Picasa is doing the EXIF stripping in its display, even though it retains the information. One wonders if it can be made to include that info in shared images in web display.....


And: "smelly." Really?

[SmartWombat]

I think I said "usually" ... that means you're panning at the speed of the top of the wheel, not the speed of the car body.
Yes the rear wheel will be more blurred, and if the rear is overtaking the front (he's setting up the drift, not stable) then you'd see that apparent over-pan.
Still AFAICS the focus appears to be not on the rear wheel /arch area but further forward.

I'd like to see a faster shutter speed to get more detail in the smoke - but that's personal preference.
This gives a good appearance of motion, at the expense of nothing appearing really sharp.

That's the problem with slow shutter speed even if you nail the pan; body roll, suspension travel, driver's head movement - all that kind of thing can leave an otherwise good image unsharp. I have plenty of those in my bin ;)

[SmartWombat]

I almost always use the center for focus, that's where I'm usually trying to put the subject if it's going race speeds.

Ah, eventually you'll get creative. Once you're comfortable putting a focus point on a part of the subject and holding it there as you pan.

For example this one with a focus point on the right gives plenty of space for the sponsors to use for text and their own logo.

[MotorToad]

Thanks for your critique. One of my problems is that I like to shoot but hate to sort. Any time I find a shot that's half worth posting I throw it on the web and let the folder sit for a couple weeks before I'm bored enough to look again.

As I said, most of my time in photography I've been trying to take pictures sharp enough you can read the manufacturer's name on wheel bolts (not that I ever have). This blur thing is new, and I've never even thought about adjusting the focus point off center unless I had the entire subject off center. I've only been shooting DSLR since January so almost all of this is new to me. I understand a lot of the numbers mathematically but few of them creatively.

[Mayday]

It's amzing. How do you feel when you took these photos? Exciting?

[MotorToad]

Haven't been foruming much lately, but here's a thing I took.

[scarletbrown]

I really enjoyed this sports photograph because it required lots of concentration to capture while the object is moving. Keep it up.