Advice, please. Photographing Motorsport Tomorrow

[ernieh]

Hi All, I've also posted this under Motorsport, but maybe this is more appropriate! Wonder if someone could offer some advice as to suitable camera settings for an Experience my family have gifted me at Knockhill, Fife driving Knockhill's E type. This is booked for tomorrow morning so is slightly urgent.

This is likely to be a one-off, so we need to use what we have. However, my grandson has gained a fair bit of landscape experience, but not a lot on motorsport but will be using my D90 to record the event and I was thinking the 70 - 300mm 4.5 - 5.6 would be OK if we upped the ISO a bit, say to 1600 and focus set to AFc (continuous) and shot at shutter priority at around 1/1000secs. I'm not expecting wonders and I think it would be too much to ask him to take slow shutter speed panning shots at this stage!

Although my grandson is good with a camera, neither of us has much motorsport experience, so if somebody could offer any advice before hand, it would be much appreciated!

Many thanks,


Ernie

 

[danski]

1/1000th of a second will freeze any motion, so will help to get sharp shots, but won't really give any sense of speed, if shot side on.

My advice would be to either shoot at a lower speed (say 1/125 or 1/160) and try panning (I doubt you will be going that quick that this shouldn't be achievable) or ask him to get into a position where he can shoot you head on, maybe coming into a corner, or just leaving the corner - you will be travelling slower, so easier with focus, and if driving directly towards the camera the motion effect is less important

 

[Tigger.ufo]

If the light is not too bad you won't need the ISO so high either.

When he tries panning, get him to continue to pan after he has pressed the shutter too.

He can use a higher shutter speed if he will be shooting you head on as well.(if this doesn't confuse him too much swapping between panning and not!)

Enjoy your day and any pics will be a bonus!


Heather

 

[ernieh]

Many thanks for the advice, folks. Not really expecting to hit any high notes photgraphically, but will stay for the day in any case and hopefully get some decent shots, if not necessarily up to the high standards published here!

Will let you know how it goes.


Ernie

 

[Nod]

Just my opinion (see sig below!)

If you'll be helmeted, in photos you could be anybody so if I were you, I would get a few shots of someone else driving the car you'll be driving for the action shot(s) and get a few decent shots of you stood beside the car and sat in it with no helmet and (if possible) the window down.

Most importantly, enjoy the day - any decent photos will be a bonus and an aide memoire for the real memories!

 

[ernieh]

Hi All,
Many thanks to all for the good wishes....the experience of driving an E Type was magic to say the least, made all the more 'interesting' on a slightly wet track, in driving rain, with a misted up windscreen and wipers that danced off the screen above about 65MPH.

Needless to say the conditions were not conducive to photography, at least for me, and by the time we had a bowl of soup, the rain was such that we gave up in disgust. One lesson we learned, though, was that the 70 - 300 on a crop is too long for panning shots from the pit lane viewpoint and a 50 might be more appropriate. However, there's always another day...........Knockhill is only 40 minutes from us!

Ernie