Cars, or Drivers ?

[SmartWombat]

Which would you prefer to see more of?

[livin4lax09]

cars in this case. Normally I would say drivers, but since the driver's face is completely covered and you can't really capture the emotion, I think shooting the car gives a better sense of the race.

[Photo-John]

I think I like to see more car. I like it when I can tell a car is really being pushed. For me, that's usually a combination of suspension, car position, and driver's head position.

You said you had trouble with your new camera's AF. What, specifically, were the problems? If you tell me more and show me some samples, maybe I can give you some technical pointers. Plus, we can get the other sports shooters and 20D owners involved.

[SunnySideUp]

Doesn't matter as long as it is interesting and different. I think cars would be hard to shoot. Out of your shots I like the last one best. Probablly because of the reflection.

Shane

[Ouvinen]

Ha! Nice shots from Valencia. I spent two days in Barcelona just a week ago. Check out the gallery at http://www.racingimages.cc/gallery.php?eid=113&page=1

[Ouvinen]

I think I like to see more car. I like it when I can tell a car is really being pushed. For me, that's usually a combination of suspension, car position, and driver's head position.

Have you witnessed F1 cars? They have no suspension movement, for god's sake! And all the little twitches and stuff are so quick, that they're damn hard to capture with a camera. And they still wouldn't look like anything spectacular. When they get sideways, so that you can see it with your bare eyes, then they're gonna spin or crash.. ;)

[SmartWombat]

I'm in Barcelona in two weeks.

Did you notice some teams are spoilsports?
They have an outer element over the brake disc so you get no glow under braking

Your panning results are far better than mine.
What distance were you from DC's car, what focal length, and exposure?

[Ouvinen]

It was pretty close, I was shooting at 135mm with 1,6x crop factor on camera. Exposure was 1/400s @ F8 or something like that. 1/400s anyway. Getting the crop and timing right was damn hard, they do come to the braking over at over 300k. ;)

No cropping afterwards on those except the one with Ralf talking to a Williams guy..

[SmartWombat]

Mine were about the same where I got close enough to the track.

So what's your success rate at 1/400 ?
Do you get every shot, 1 in 5, 1 in 10 - I'm wondeirng how good I am at it (1:10) success improves with higher shutter speed of course
I was talking to some NIkon users and they were shooting at 1/2000 - no wonder it was sharper than mine

I find panning in braking very difficult as the velocity change means it's not a simple pan.
Same on the entry to corners, as the angular velocity does weird things from my point of view.

[Ouvinen]

I'd say something like 1:5 sharp in that situation..

[SmartWombat]

Thank goodness !
I was thinking you were goign to set me a target of maybe 1:2

I had much more success using the monopod than hand held, so I'll see how good I can get it in Barcelona.

Thanks.

[Ouvinen]

I can't pan on a monopod. Maybe on a very long lens that would be nice. But I like to work with shorter lenses, being the poor son of a bitch that I am. ;)

I take it that a succesfull pan will be sharp on the computer screen in 100% size. Tack sharp. (At least after a light usm.) To me there is no 'relatively sharp'..

[SmartWombat]

To me there is no 'relatively sharp'..

Right, it's sharp or not.
Often when a driver takes a different line, it's not in focus !

[Ouvinen]

Me and a mountainbiking shooting colleague of mine just had a laugh about the fact that we both always look at shots of Trulli and think 'Hell, he's got a Foxracing sticker on his helmet..' and then notice it's not..