Boy Racers at the Drag Strip

[Stagecoach]

For any car race enthusiasts here's a few of our wanabe drag stars competing over the 1/4 mile this past Sunday.

There's different category classes for engine size, road legal e.t.c. and of course the big boys with the loudest noise, magic.

Lighting was the worst you could wish for from brilliant sun just about overhead to perpendicular and shooting straight into it but as always Mr Auto performed well This is the first session of these I have done with the 28-75mm Tamron that has partially replaced my failed Nikon 18-200mm VR.

No 1 - Returning from the run but for some reason I love this shot.


No 2


No 3


No 4


No 5


For info, all were shot in JPEG and the only PP was to crop and run a sharpen action (new toy to speed batch work up) but now realise my sharpening figures were based on working with my normal RAW files so I need to tone down slightly.

For anyone interested the full set can be seen here http://fijitime.smugmug.com/Fiji-Eve...g-Race-25th-J/

Grahame

[Shadowman]

Nice series especially number 3 with the sun flare.

[IzzieK]

I like that one too, John but I like the first one for the colour of the car...I just loooovvve orange. Not the orange jail suit, mind you...

Grahame...all great shots. Love the orange car too. And #3 is attractive with the sun flare like John said...

[Stagecoach]

Nice series especially number 3 with the sun flare.

Thank you John, had quite a few of the sun flares that add a bit of sparkle.

[Stagecoach]

I like that one too, John but I like the first one for the colour of the car...I just loooovvve orange. Not the orange jail suit, mind you...

Grahame...all great shots. Love the orange car too. And #3 is attractive with the sun flare like John said...

Hi Izzie, thanks and pleased you like them. That orange car seems to appeal to my camera for some reason and I don't seem to be able to take a bad pic of it, why, absolutely no idea.

As you looooovvve orange here's a bonus for you, competing on this run



PS. The watermark was added to this bunch I put on the website as I was having a grump after finding that the two TV companies here had each used one of my previous car images in their articles promoting these races without even asking.

Grahame

[FootLoose]

Grahame, it looks like you have the panning technique under control now. I just wonder if the shots might be improved if the cars showed a little bit of motion blur? I see the wheel spokes are blurred, indicating speed, but the cars still seem to be frozen to me. If that is the look you are going for, then great - ignore my comments. But in some of these shots, the car appears to be going backwards to me - probably because of the blur in the background. And that may just be because of my own peculiar vision problems.

[IzzieK]

I am so sorry, Grahame...I do not trust them either from previous experience. I'd have a go at them if I were you...they will offer an apology and a correction if it is their magazine section and none if they are on the news.

[Stagecoach]

Grahame, it looks like you have the panning technique under control now. I just wonder if the shots might be improved if the cars showed a little bit of motion blur? I see the wheel spokes are blurred, indicating speed, but the cars still seem to be frozen to me. If that is the look you are going for, then great - ignore my comments. But in some of these shots, the car appears to be going backwards to me - probably because of the blur in the background. And that may just be because of my own peculiar vision problems.

Greg,

I did a few things different this time and note more that I'll explain;

a) Using the new 28-75mm 2.8 without any VR (18-200VR previously) I was a bit concerned about my panning/shake abilities so tended to keep with higher shutter speeds 1/125 or 1/160 (faster cars) although looking at previous seems I was at 1/125 predominately. From the sharpness (where things are sharp) I do not think the lack of VR has hindered me at all.

b) Using this lens for the first time shooting shiny cars in horrendous sun I consciously decided not to use an ND (as previously in these conditions) so that I could confirm how it handled glare etc. The downside to this was that where I used to also control to get around f/5 to f/7 to limit DoF these are all around f/11 to f/14 so there is greater DoF.

c) This session I was farther up the track hence a faster car speed which has certainly diminished the "shakes" when they are accelerating harder which tends to smooth the car.

d) There's a lack of tyre detail on some of which reduces the amount of visible wheel rotation not helping.


On my next attempt I'm going to have a go with the 70-300mm although I can only move just over one car length further back from the track, push down to 1/60, maintain around f/5 and accept less keepers for one of the three runs to see the results.

Grahame

[Stagecoach]

I am so sorry, Grahame...I do not trust them either from previous experience. I'd have a go at them if I were you...they will offer an apology and a correction if it is their magazine section and none if they are on the news.

Izzie, they had used the pics in their websites.

I'm happy to have my pics used but perhaps I just had the grumps because a couple of months ago I was contacted by a publisher who wished to use some of my marathon images in a magazine that circulates the Pacific Islands. All was done correctly. Shortly after the same publisher requested if he could use some of the images for our airways in-flight magazine, again all done correctly and most importantly courteously.

One would have thought a TV station would be aware of such things.

Grahame

[IzzieK]

Then contact them and ask for payment or credit for using your images. If they do not comply, ask them to take it down from their website. I know I would...You are already well known for your images, why cater to them? I am just surprised that you are selling yourself too short.

[Nicks Pics]

These are cool! Now I'm not particularly a race car fanatic, but I still like these photos where the car is sharp but the BG is blurred. I was actually trying that yesterday, and was wondering if there is any formula for how to do it, (such as car speed =certain SS settings) or if you just experiment and see what works best. Also I was curious to know what kind of tripod you used. Thanks for posting these!

[Stagecoach]

These are cool! Now I'm not particularly a race car fanatic, but I still like these photos where the car is sharp but the BG is blurred. I was actually trying that yesterday, and was wondering if there is any formula for how to do it, (such as car speed =certain SS settings) or if you just experiment and see what works best. Also I was curious to know what kind of tripod you used. Thanks for posting these!

Nick, there is no magic formula but the slower the shutter speed with respect to the vehicle the greater the background motion blur. It very much comes down to how well you can steadily pan the vehicle and maintain focus, unless pre-focusing.

As an example the speed of this car would have been near on 150 mph and it was shot at 1/160s, 1/125 or 1/60 would have been better.



For road vehicles travelling at speeds around 50 mph start with a speed around 1/125s, practice your panning with the aim to reducing shutter speeds to a stage where you are happy with the number of keepers. I tend to play a bit on the conservative side as I want to achieve keepers for each car competing.

As for tripod use I have never attempted it, I suspect it may be possible if using long focal lengths which makes things easier.

[Nicks Pics]

Nick, there is no magic formula but the slower the shutter speed with respect to the vehicle the greater the background motion blur. It very much comes down to how well you can steadily pan the vehicle and maintain focus, unless pre-focusing.

As an example the speed of this car would have been near on 150 mph and it was shot at 1/160s, 1/125 or 1/60 would have been better.



For road vehicles travelling at speeds around 50 mph start with a speed around 1/125s, practice your panning with the aim to reducing shutter speeds to a stage where you are happy with the number of keepers. I tend to play a bit on the conservative side as I want to achieve keepers for each car competing.

As for tripod use I have never attempted it, I suspect it may be possible if using long focal lengths which makes things easier.

Thanks for the explanation Grahame. I guess using a tripod was on my mind, but that may not be the way to do it.