advise on capturing motion and freezing the frame in one shot

[dellydel]

Hi guys,

I am going to take a few shots with a mate this weekend who wants to enter his work photogrpahy competition. The category is sport and he wants to take a few pics of me hitting a golf club to capture the energy and fluidity of the motion through the swing. He hasn't actually got any gear himself yet but I have 60d and flash, plus a wide angle, kit and telephoto.

What I'm thinking will work well is to get set up against a simple backdrop and get low with the 10-20mm siggy and shoot from there. My question however is how best to capture the motion...?

From what I understand, if I use a 2nd curtain flash and play about with the shutter speed hopefully we will be able to get the back and fore swing blurred and time it so the flash will go off around the time the club face hits the ball and freeze the action, am I right in thinking this will create the type of picture we're after?

Any thoughts or advice we be greatly welcomed!

Cheers,

Del

 

[chivers67]

Yes, 2nd curtain flash is the way to go


you might also want to try to "underexpose" the ambient light a tiny bit by using a smallish aperture and use the flash as a main light source that way the subject matter will stand out more with the background darker.

 

[HoppyUK]

Hi guys,

I am going to take a few shots with a mate this weekend who wants to enter his work photogrpahy competition. The category is sport and he wants to take a few pics of me hitting a golf club to capture the energy and fluidity of the motion through the swing. He hasn't actually got any gear himself yet but I have 60d and flash, plus a wide angle, kit and telephoto.

What I'm thinking will work well is to get set up against a simple backdrop and get low with the 10-20mm siggy and shoot from there. My question however is how best to capture the motion...?

From what I understand, if I use a 2nd curtain flash and play about with the shutter speed hopefully we will be able to get the back and fore swing blurred and time it so the flash will go off around the time the club face hits the ball and freeze the action, am I right in thinking this will create the type of picture we're after?
Any thoughts or advice we be greatly welcomed!

Cheers,

Del

Not really. You won't get anything of the swinging club to register much, if anything at all. It's too slender and moves too fast. Second curtain sync will do nothing except make it very difficult to time the moment of impact.

The way these things are usually done is with the flash in strobe mode, against a dark background, preferably black. Not many guns have a strobe mode though, mostly top end models only.

 

[Jayst84]

Strobe is the 'standard' golf swing shot, as Richard says. It will give you an image with several impressions of the club and his arms as they move through the swing. And, depending on the intervals of the strobe, a few of the ball leaving the tee.

If you want a blurred arc through the swing, then I would get the ambient light down, and use a very direct continuous spot light. Position it so it hits the club as it swings, but not his body (have fun with that). Then fire a flash at the end if you want to expose the chap and whatever position you want the club in.

Timing would be very tricky though, second curtain flash means you get none of the follow through, which you may or may not want. You could experiment with a cheap sound trigger and see if the noise of him striking the ball is enough to set it off. Or you could just take 600 shots and see how fast your finger is on a remote trigger.

 

[Forbiddenbiker]

...any pre-light can do though, just needs to be similar or lower in brightness to your flash otherwise the exposures going to be unbalanced, ie bright blurred shaft, dim frozen hit.

Timings going to be the hardest bit ....

When the conditions are right, like my subject is in dull light, I've used my cameras AF pre-light to softly light the movement, then the rear sync flash to freeze the end...it could be any pre-light though, a torch could be used.

Here is a twin layered shot, the lower bottle is dimmed in PS for effect but the upper shot is a full exposure (although its shorter it could be as long as the first if I had control of the ambient light, like in a studio) ...I'm using my cameras flash pre-light followed by the flash on curtain close.

.

Same for this one, again dim light ...exposures about half a second, similar to the bottle.

.

Your task is far harder than this though. ... maybe if you both used this metronome to match your timings.
.

 

[Alastair]

The way these things are usually done is with the flash in strobe mode, against a dark background, preferably black. Not many guns have a strobe mode though, mostly top end models only.

The Canon 430EZ has strobe mode and can be picked-up second-hand for around £40-£50. No TTL with a modern camera though, so you're on manual (probably best for strobe anyway).

Sample using a 430EZ in strobe mode and a 40D..

 

[PaulF]

mmmm Leffe.............

sorry no help I know but mmmmm

 

[me15]

mmmm Leffe.............

sorry no help I know but mmmmm

 

[dellydel]

Firstly, thanks for all the advise, really appreciated!

Not really. You won't get anything of the swinging club to register much, if anything at all. It's too slender and moves too fast. Second curtain sync will do nothing except make it very difficult to time the moment of impact.

The way these things are usually done is with the flash in strobe mode, against a dark background, preferably black. Not many guns have a strobe mode though, mostly top end models only.

Ahh, I see what you are saying that makes sense. I have a ex430ii and from what I have read there is no strobe mode, apart from when using it wirelessly, even then the master flash has to have a strobe mode i.e. ex580ii. So based on that, I am not going to be able to really on the camera or flash to give me the effect I'm after!

Strobe is the 'standard' golf swing shot, as Richard says. It will give you an image with several impressions of the club and his arms as they move through the swing. And, depending on the intervals of the strobe, a few of the ball leaving the tee.

If you want a blurred arc through the swing, then I would get the ambient light down, and use a very direct continuous spot light. Position it so it hits the club as it swings, but not his body (have fun with that). Then fire a flash at the end if you want to expose the chap and whatever position you want the club in.

Timing would be very tricky though, second curtain flash means you get none of the follow through, which you may or may not want. You could experiment with a cheap sound trigger and see if the noise of him striking the ball is enough to set it off. Or you could just take 600 shots and see how fast your finger is on a remote trigger.

Thanks, that could be a realistic workaround to get the shot I'm after! I guess I could use a powerful torch to illuminate the club to try and capture the blur then hopefully get the flash timing right to freeze the action... I'll give it a try, thanks!

...any pre-light can do though, just needs to be similar or lower in brightness to your flash otherwise the exposures going to be unbalanced, ie bright blurred shaft, dim frozen hit.

Timings going to be the hardest bit ....

When the conditions are right, like my subject is in dull light, I've used my cameras AF pre-light to softly light the movement, then the rear sync flash to freeze the end...it could be any pre-light though, a torch could be used.

Here is a twin layered shot, the lower bottle is dimmed in PS for effect but the upper shot is a full exposure (although its shorter it could be as long as the first if I had control of the ambient light, like in a studio) ...I'm using my cameras AF pre-light followed by the flash on curtain close.

.

Same for this one, again dim light ...exposures about half a second, similar to the bottle.

.

Your task is far harder than this though. ... maybe if you both used this metronome to match your timings.
.

Two great shots there illustrating what I want to achieve albiet with a different subject. However, when you say pre-light are you refering to the first flash that is fired by the speedlite or another source of light?

The Canon 430EZ has strobe mode and can be picked-up second-hand for around £40-£50. No TTL with a modern camera though, so you're on manual (probably best for strobe anyway).

Sample using a 430EZ in strobe mode and a 40D..

Thanks, due to timescales and sourcing one I don't think it will be an option, good to know though! Can't believe they took the mode away from the ex430, I guess its a way of making you spend more and go for the 580 :|

Cheers,

Del

 

[Forbiddenbiker]

...

Two great shots there illustrating what I want to achieve albiet with a different subject. However, when you say pre-light are you refering to the first flash that is fired by the speedlite or another source of light?

Del

Yes thats it, the auto flash pre-light I call it. (but any light will do just like light painting) ..Most flash pre-lights are a bit longer burn and softer than the actual flash, on my camera somewhere around the 1/4 of a second mark it can fully fill the blur, any longer and Id guess a gap would appear in the blur just before the main flash hits. ..would still look just as cool with a gap i think.
(BTW I wrongly guess half a second, guessing again they're both probably nearer a quarter)

Another suggestion, if you can use a club with a bright or silver shaft you'll likely to catch more reflected light. Just like the pink chrome on this bicycle wheel...

.

 

[Forbiddenbiker]

You can actually see (possibly) the pre-flash lights intensity curve in the red blur ...starts burning, gets brighter, then dies off again.

maybe... not sure, just guessing again.

 

[Alastair]

Thanks, due to timescales and sourcing one I don't think it will be an option, good to know though! Can't believe they took the mode away from the ex430, I guess its a way of making you spend more and go for the 580 :|

Del.. where are you? and what's the timescale?

 

[kennysarmy]

My advice :

See a pro...

Nothing worse than a crap swing ruining a photo

 

[wavefront]

An interesting thread!

I too would have suggested going down the strobe route, as it can be used successfully and become much more than a gimmick, but you do need a 580ex to act as a master to setup the strobe effect. All the other canon flashes can fire strobe light but they need to take instructions from the 580ex.

Here a few images I've tried in the last and am also trying out different sports with this effect. I'm trying football, badminton, and basketball over the next couple of weeks.

The main problem is getting the balance of ambient to artificial light. When you use the strobe effect, the power is greatly reduced, so you need to add more flashes to compensate for any daylight, or get really close to the subject. On my cricket shot I was unhappy that it looks like it was shot on the moon, so either I limit the amount of light spill on the ground and accept a very dark background, or I'll take the shot when I have more ambient, and add more flashes. I think I can round up about 10 flashes through friends and have the cables to connect them all to the camera. That should allow me to take a strobe shot earlier in the evening, giving a more natural daylight look - which would help, after all when was the last time you saw cricket played at night!!

With the cricket shot, I used three flashes. Two doubled up to take the strobe effect, and another set to second curtain sync which gave a final 'burst' at a much higher power to highlight the final pose in the sequence just before the shutter closed.

I agree with the others, trying to capture the golf swing using a longer exposure may be very difficult. Perhaps you could try two flashes, one set to first curtain, the other set to second curtain, That way you'd get two poses, at the beginning and end of the golf swing which would be obvious, and a blurred effect through the middle part of the swing - sure a couple of 430ex's could do that?

If you're near Surrey, perhaps drop me a line.

Mark.

 

[dellydel]

Yes thats it, the auto flash pre-light I call it. (but any light will do just like light painting) ..Most flash pre-lights are a bit longer burn and softer than the actual flash, on my camera somewhere around the 1/4 of a second mark it can fully fill the blur, any longer and Id guess a gap would appear in the blur just before the main flash hits. ..would still look just as cool with a gap i think.
(BTW I wrongly guess half a second, guessing again they're both probably nearer a quarter)

Another suggestion, if you can use a club with a bright or silver shaft you'll likely to catch more reflected light. Just like the pink chrome on this bicycle wheel...

I see, thanks for clearing that up!

Del.. where are you? and what's the timescale?

Hi Alastair, I am in Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham and looking to meet up with my mate on Sunday, so not much time I should of pulled my finger out sooner!

An interesting thread!

I too would have suggested going down the strobe route, as it can be used successfully and become much more than a gimmick, but you do need a 580ex to act as a master to setup the strobe effect. All the other canon flashes can fire strobe light but they need to take instructions from the 580ex.

Here a few images I've tried in the last and am also trying out different sports with this effect. I'm trying football, badminton, and basketball over the next couple of weeks.

The main problem is getting the balance of ambient to artificial light. When you use the strobe effect, the power is greatly reduced, so you need to add more flashes to compensate for any daylight, or get really close to the subject. On my cricket shot I was unhappy that it looks like it was shot on the moon, so either I limit the amount of light spill on the ground and accept a very dark background, or I'll take the shot when I have more ambient, and add more flashes. I think I can round up about 10 flashes through friends and have the cables to connect them all to the camera. That should allow me to take a strobe shot earlier in the evening, giving a more natural daylight look - which would help, after all when was the last time you saw cricket played at night!!

With the cricket shot, I used three flashes. Two doubled up to take the strobe effect, and another set to second curtain sync which gave a final 'burst' at a much higher power to highlight the final pose in the sequence just before the shutter closed.

I agree with the others, trying to capture the golf swing using a longer exposure may be very difficult. Perhaps you could try two flashes, one set to first curtain, the other set to second curtain, That way you'd get two poses, at the beginning and end of the golf swing which would be obvious, and a blurred effect through the middle part of the swing - sure a couple of 430ex's could do that?

If you're near Surrey, perhaps drop me a line.

Mark.

Wow, fantastic shots in my opinion, the sense of movement is superb! I would love to see you do it with a golf swing too

I think the lack of strobe is what is really going to hold me back, however I do have access to another ex430ii and your suggestion will definitely be worth a go and I'm sure I will be able to get a shot from it, even though it may not quite be as dramatic as what I was hoping for. Thanks for you response, very helpful!

Cheers,

Del