Horse Races - Panning with a Slow Shutter Speed 4th try

[Brownbear]

And the last try until the season starts again next Spring or Summer!

First off thank you to everyone who helped me with trying this... I learned a lot and I believe these shots show an improvement.

This time around I used Shutter Priority and an iso of 320. I kept it simple so I could concentrate on trying to keep sharp focus somewhere. I also switched from single point auto focus to 51 point focus because it seemed to me that I would have a better chance of grabbing focus on more parts of the image.

While the shutter speed of 40 that I was using before produced the best blurry background, indeed it was too, slow to freeze the motion of the bobbing heads. Grahame's shutter speed suggestion of 60 was the best compromise... A SS of 80 was easier but the backgrounds were not blurred enough and neither were the horses hooves (for my taste)

Panning at a distance of about 5 meters away was easier than from the rail simply because I could hold the pan in my view finder for longer. Panning close up, I think needs a faster shutter speed (guessing from my flops) and I was also thinking that if I'm close up, I could just use my long lens and a large aperture and blur away the background, so being a distance away makes more sense to me for panning.

These I just quickly processed in LR (later on I will try blurring or healing the distracting bits in the backgrounds).

Composition is a continuing challenge... I just did my best to click that shutter button at the right moment, but its hard to do.

No critique needed (I know what needs work and that I have some clipping) but I would appreciate knowing which photos are preferred as this focus vs pretty blur thing is hard for me to look at objectively. I have a few more photos that I will share later this week when I have more time.

My favourites... Which I like despite the shadows of the poles that I couldn't blur away with a SS of 60

#1



#2



#3



Others

#3 (Cropped away the distracting background)



#4 (and also #5...headed for the bin because of the background but sharing because it shows you can freeze action at a low shutter speed)




#5


I also like these

#6



#7



Not sure about these

#8



#9


#10 (I like the left half but not the right half)

[Donald]

No critique needed (I know what needs work and that I have some clipping) but I would appreciate knowing which photos are preferred as this focus vs pretty blur thing is hard for me to look at objectively.

3, 6, 7 & 8. These are the ones that made me stop scrolling and look more closely.

Why?

In 3, 6 & 7, the horses heads are sharp; i.e. no movement blur. I'm learning through this series that you've been posting, that if the main feature in the image (in the case the heads of the horses) are sharp then everything else having an element of blur in it, including the heads of the jockeys, is fine. But when their is movement blur in the horses' heads as well, then it doesn't feel such a strong picture.

Just my thoughts.

No 8? I just like that close up action and in this one the heads of the jockeys are sharp whilst there is movement blur on the horses

[Clactonian]

Christina, I have been trying improve my success rate with pics of aircraft and have found the biggest improvement when I switched to using the 'auto-focus on' button to control focus rather than a half press of the shutter. By separating the two functions, which becomes quite natural after a while, you can operate the continuous focus as the subject approaches and then press the shutter at the opportune moment. My success rate has improved enormously. There are videos on YouTube that demonstrate the technique.
Forgive me if on coming late to this thread you are already aware of or are using this technique.

[Brownbear]

Hi Donald,

Thank you for your feedback. I guess I am having a hard time figuring out when I manage enough focus or not. It's easy to do with an image shot with a fast shutter speed but I'm finding it hard to evaluate here. And also how much movement blur is ok or not...

I did these very quickly yesterday and I was tired. I think I liked 1 & 2 mostly because of the horses hooves and because the horses seem prettiest in these two but now that I look at them again, I like #6 the best, sharpest and also the best background.

Thank you for helping me with my horses. Truly appreciated.

3, 6, 7 & 8. These are the ones that made me stop scrolling and look more closely.

Why?

In 3, 6 & 7, the horses heads are sharp; i.e. no movement blur. I'm learning through this series that you've been posting, that if the main feature in the image (in the case the heads of the horses) are sharp then everything else having an element of blur in it, including the heads of the jockeys, is fine. But when their is movement blur in the horses' heads as well, then it doesn't feel such a strong picture.

Just my thoughts.

No 8? I just like that close up action and in this one the heads of the jockeys are sharp whilst there is movement blur on the horses

[Brownbear]

Hi Mike,

Thank you for sharing. I have yet to try back-button focusing but it is something that I intend to try soon. The horse races are finished for the season but when they start up again next year I will try it with slow panning.

Truly appreciated.

Christina, I have been trying improve my success rate with pics of aircraft and have found the biggest improvement when I switched to using the 'auto-focus on' button to control focus rather than a half press of the shutter. By separating the two functions, which becomes quite natural after a while, you can operate the continuous focus as the subject approaches and then press the shutter at the opportune moment. My success rate has improved enormously. There are videos on YouTube that demonstrate the technique.
Forgive me if on coming late to this thread you are already aware of or are using this technique.

[Stagecoach]

Christina, I have been trying improve my success rate with pics of aircraft and have found the biggest improvement when I switched to using the 'auto-focus on' button to control focus rather than a half press of the shutter. By separating the two functions, which becomes quite natural after a while, you can operate the continuous focus as the subject approaches and then press the shutter at the opportune moment. My success rate has improved enormously. There are videos on YouTube that demonstrate the technique.
Forgive me if on coming late to this thread you are already aware of or are using this technique.

Hi Mike,

Having tried my hand at panning recently I'm interested in your suggestion to try the rear 'AF ON' button method. I have been using the half press on the shutter button to commence focusing (in AF-C mode) once I have commenced panning and am targeted on a point of focus on the subject. The shutter then remains half pressed until I 'click'.

I can not see the advantage of using the AF-ON button instead of the shutter half press in this situation so must be missing something here but would like to understand it if there's a chance I can get more keepers.

Cheers, Grahame

[rawill]

Hi Christina, pity the season has ended.

Maybe cars will have to suffice for practise in the "Off Season".

With racing cars, I am 25 or more meters away, often a safety fence in front of me.
So I use a 70-300 or 28-200.
I can imagine 1/80 being too fast for horses, but I have gone up from 1/80th to 1/100 or 1/125 for race cars.

I have played with multi point auto focus and continuous shooting in the past, this year so far, I have been using single shot, manual focus at a particular point on the track. I am not sure I get anymore keepers, but it is fun trying.

Not sure I will ever get to be where I want to be in terms of keepers that are really sharp, with the speedshot background.
I also haveto play with EC to stop getting blown out pics on bright days.

Your pole, don't worry about it if it is your best place for taking photos. Take it out, not with cropping pp, but in GIMP language, ehance healing. Not surewhat it called in Elements or Photoshop, but it is there.

Now to the photos.
8 is almost there, but also illustrates the difficulty, the noses are chopped, otherwise it would have a BIG tick from me.
A close up partial shot shows and tells the intensity story, brings us in, rather than being spectators.

With cars I am looking for a space in front for the car to run in to. I suspect it is the same for horses, however your challenge is greater as there is often a horse in front "blocking" the space.

Trying to get your prefered subject just in the frame with space in front and no horse in front is going to be a huge challenge.

So my choice, given my criteria, would be 9, they are shartp enough to me, I would crop a little off the left side so they have just entered the frame, and heal out the shadow on the bottom right.

Keep up the good work, not such easy stuff.

[Clactonian]

I can not see the advantage of using the AF-ON button instead of the shutter half press in this situation so must be missing something here but would like to understand it if there's a chance I can get more keepers.

Cheers, Grahame

Grahame, it is a means of isolating the two functions and is particularly useful if you have a VR lens as you can continuously focus without implementing the VR function. If your camera is set up for continuous focus and the shutter button for release priority (as opposed to focus priority), by keeping your thumb on the AF On button the auto focus will be operational until you decide to hit the shutter button. If on the other hand you hit the AF On button and release the focus will lock at that point allowing you to recompose and shoot.
I realise that by juggling the settings you can get the same result by half pressing the shutter button but I have found that it is all too easy when panning or tracking to release the shutter at the wrong moment. This cannot happen when using the AF On for focussing and you can safely track and hit the shutter release when the subject is in the right position.
There are many videos on YouTube that can explain it better than I, but I'm sure if you give it a try you'll quickly learn the virtues of this method.

[Brownbear]

Hi Robin,

Thank you for your very helpful and informative reply. Yes, I will practice on cars or something. I tried a couple of cars the other day in preparation for the horse race but I don't think the drivers felt comfortable being photographed by a stranger, perhaps I will look for another spot.

I was using a SS of 40, and single point focus before but it was too low as evidenced by motion blur in the other horses heads, hence trying a SS of 60-80, and I thought these were improved but perhaps not.

I try and pick the best spot but the poles are everywhere and not quite blurred out with the faster shutter speeds. I did try healing out a little shadow of a pole in #7 but I can't seem to do it very well, ie; I can tell that I did it because the blur lines do not match. Nevertheless it is something I am working on so perhaps by next season I will be better at this to. And the exposure compensation is challenging because it is only needed when the jockeys are close up and wearing white, and you never know which horse one is going to focus on.

I still have a few shots to go through and if I find anymore close in with room to move etc, I will post these later this week.

Thank you for your help and advice. Truly appreciated.

Hi Christina, pity the season has ended.

Maybe cars will have to suffice for practise in the "Off Season".

With racing cars, I am 25 or more meters away, often a safety fence in front of me.
So I use a 70-300 or 28-200.
I can imagine 1/80 being too fast for horses, but I have gone up from 1/80th to 1/100 or 1/125 for race cars.

I have played with multi point auto focus and continuous shooting in the past, this year so far, I have been using single shot, manual focus at a particular point on the track. I am not sure I get anymore keepers, but it is fun trying.

Not sure I will ever get to be where I want to be in terms of keepers that are really sharp, with the speedshot background.
I also haveto play with EC to stop getting blown out pics on bright days.

Your pole, don't worry about it if it is your best place for taking photos. Take it out, not with cropping pp, but in GIMP language, ehance healing. Not surewhat it called in Elements or Photoshop, but it is there.

Now to the photos.
8 is almost there, but also illustrates the difficulty, the noses are chopped, otherwise it would have a BIG tick from me.
A close up partial shot shows and tells the intensity story, brings us in, rather than being spectators.

With cars I am looking for a space in front for the car to run in to. I suspect it is the same for horses, however your challenge is greater as there is often a horse in front "blocking" the space.

Trying to get your prefered subject just in the frame with space in front and no horse in front is going to be a huge challenge.

So my choice, given my criteria, would be 9, they are shartp enough to me, I would crop a little off the left side so they have just entered the frame, and heal out the shadow on the bottom right.

Keep up the good work, not such easy stuff.

[Stagecoach]

Hi Mike,

Thanks for the further explanation.

As it's a great sunny day here I now have an excellent excuse to sit on the seawall and try this method rather than tackle gardening

My lens is VR and I wonder what the affect of only switching VR on at the moment you want to click the shot will be as I was under the impression that the VR required a short time to settle?

Grahame

[rawill]

Christina, I think you are right to up the SS. Horses are going slower than cars BUT, everything is going in different directions as we comment on another thread, so trying to freeze some of the action, and having the hooves and bacground burred seems a good goal. Not that I know anything at all about trying to take horse racing photos.

[Brownbear]

Thank you Robin,

Helpful to hear because I'm not sure either. I'm going through my second set and trying to be objective and pick out the everything everyone has shared, and hoping to find one that fits which also has a nice background.

Christina, I think you are right to up the SS. Horses are going slower than cars BUT, everything is going in different directions as we comment on another thread, so trying to freeze some of the action, and having the hooves and bacground burred seems a good goal. Not that I know anything at all about trying to take horse racing photos.

[Stagecoach]

Hi Christina,

I have been giving these some thought hence the delay in commenting, but here goes.

Firstly, my favourites in order are; 8, 10, 9, 3 with a crop.

Secondly, now some of those thoughts ........................

I think you may be getting too concerned with 'focus' and my reasoning here is that in every image there are parts of the riders or horses which are acceptably sharp. This would not happen if your panning was not good and it is not because some parts are within the DoF and others not at the distances and apertures I suspect you are using.

One of the things I found out when doing the cars was that when viewed in Nikon ViewNX I could see the focus point and although my camera was in AF-C (continuous focus) and my shutter set to release even if the camera had not registered 'in focus' the focus point indicator in ViewNX does not show if focus has not been registered by the camera. If you have ViewNX check this out. I actually found that the camera registered 'in focus' in 95% of my car shots.

As for motion blur, this is best in your shots when the subject is parallel to your sensor as would be expected.

I watched a tutorial video from Adorama today on panning and the guy was using 1/30s for a cyclist but emphasised the use of burst mode at the point when you commence shooting and I suspect this will give more chances of getting the bits of your subject you want acceptably free of motion blur. The other thing he mentioned was getting in tight but not too tight for better effect.

Look forward to seeing the others once you have sorted them.

Grahame

[Brownbear]

Thank you Grahame... very informative and helpful... truly appreciated.


I have View NX although I have not used it yet, but will do as it sounds helpful, and I will also check out the video.

Hi Christina,

I have been giving these some thought hence the delay in commenting, but here goes.

Firstly, my favourites in order are; 8, 10, 9, 3 with a crop.

Secondly, now some of those thoughts ........................

I think you may be getting too concerned with 'focus' and my reasoning here is that in every image there are parts of the riders or horses which are acceptably sharp. This would not happen if your panning was not good and it is not because some parts are within the DoF and others not at the distances and apertures I suspect you are using.

One of the things I found out when doing the cars was that when viewed in Nikon ViewNX I could see the focus point and although my camera was in AF-C (continuous focus) and my shutter set to release even if the camera had not registered 'in focus' the focus point indicator in ViewNX does not show if focus has not been registered by the camera. If you have ViewNX check this out. I actually found that the camera registered 'in focus' in 95% of my car shots.

As for motion blur, this is best in your shots when the subject is parallel to your sensor as would be expected.

I watched a tutorial video from Adorama today on panning and the guy was using 1/30s for a cyclist but emphasised the use of burst mode at the point when you commence shooting and I suspect this will give more chances of getting the bits of your subject you want acceptably free of motion blur. The other thing he mentioned was getting in tight but not too tight for better effect.

Look forward to seeing the others once you have sorted them.

Grahame

[Stagecoach]

Hi Christina,

Have a look at this video which is of a racehorse in very slow motion and gives a good idea of which parts stay the most stable with respect to movement in the forward direction. As the crew were tracking it as opposed to panning they mention that the speed was 45 mph as measured from the truck.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scZbaTTAbCM

And another very useful tutorial from a racing photographer in PDF format.

http://www.neilmurrayphotos.com/asse...ev1-photos.pdf

I bet you have found these already

Grahame

[rawill]

Those slow mo shots are amazing, no wonder it is so hard to get a panning "speedshot".

[Stagecoach]

Robin, that certainly is a great example of the movement and gives a great clue as to the best spot to focus on which is also supported in the Neil Murray document.

[Dusty]

Panning when you get the hang of it is like taking a ordinary image and the subject is static, honest.

Here the Red Arrows from the UK, I started to my right and captured the subject and then followed through to my left.

[Brownbear]

Hi Grahame,

Thank you for sharing. That horse is a beauty! I am just going to have to try harder to get into the race track during practice and be on the inside ring.

Yes, I have that article printed out and I have Neil Murray's race horse photos posted all over my walls, just kidding. It is a great article that I have read several times and used as a source. I tried focusing on the cloth over the horse but my instinct keeps taking over and I end up focusing on the head of the horse. Next season I will try again.

Hi Christina,

Have a look at this video which is of a racehorse in very slow motion and gives a good idea of which parts stay the most stable with respect to movement in the forward direction. As the crew were tracking it as opposed to panning they mention that the speed was 45 mph as measured from the truck.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scZbaTTAbCM

And another very useful tutorial from a racing photographer in PDF format.

http://www.neilmurrayphotos.com/asse...ev1-photos.pdf

I bet you have found these already

Grahame

[Brownbear]

Thank you for sharing, a truly stunning photo Dave. Gorgeous and perfect sharp, focus.

Honestly, from my attempts so far race horses are very different because there is tons of up and down movement, and horses all over the place, ie; one pulling in front of the horse you are focusing on, and poles, geese, signs, garish race track dummies all over the place in the background which means I need to use a super slow shutter speed to blur out the background... I wish they could race through a beautiful blue sky.

Anyway, gorgeous image. Thank you for sharing. Truly appreciated.

Panning when you get the hang of it is like taking a ordinary image and the subject is static, honest.

Here the Red Arrows from the UK, I started to my right and captured the subject and then followed through to my left.