securing a tripod in the back of a car

Matt Sayle

Matt Sayle

2017MSA Young Photographer of the Year(Motorsport)
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Matt Sayle
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How do you do it?? I am doing a long exposure shot for college and reckon that this would look rather good!!

Thanks
Matt
 
Blimey Matt you're not planning to race around Oulton Park racetrack are you?!!!
 
I'd set the tripod up best I could then get some bungee cords (those elastic thigs with hooks for roof racks) and fit tose to as many places as I could. Wayne
 
King of Groove said:
Blimey Matt you're not planning to race around Oulton Park racetrack are you?!!!
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LOL no I am not!

swanseamale47 said:
I'd set the tripod up best I could then get some bungee cords (those elastic thigs with hooks for roof racks) and fit tose to as many places as I could. Wayne
Click to expand...

Ah right, will have a go :D Thank you very much.
 
Matt, if you go on Flickr, search for a member called Andwhynot? He does loads of long exposure night time stuff, and somewhere in his photosteam or on his profile page is a link to a picture showing a tripod set up in a car. It's worth looking through his stream too, he's very very good at what he does. Just make sure your windscreen and side windows are spotless and take your tax disc holder out before you do any shots.
 
RichardC27 said:
Matt, if you go on Flickr, search for a member called Andwhynot? He does loads of long exposure night time stuff, and somewhere in his photosteam or on his profile page is a link to a picture showing a tripod set up in a car. It's worth looking through his stream too, he's very very good at what he does. Just make sure your windscreen and side windows are spotless and take your tax disc holder out before you do any shots.
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Do remember to put it back before you hit the roads though, easly overlooked.
 
RichardC27 said:
Matt, if you go on Flickr, search for a member called Andwhynot? He does loads of long exposure night time stuff, and somewhere in his photosteam or on his profile page is a link to a picture showing a tripod set up in a car. It's worth looking through his stream too, he's very very good at what he does. Just make sure your windscreen and side windows are spotless and take your tax disc holder out before you do any shots.
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http://www.flickr.com/photos/andwhynot/2744013473/
 
I did it using a big, heavy sturdy tripod, one or two legs on the car floor and the other one or two jammed down gaps in the seat cusions til they hit something sturdy to stand on. While shooting, I usually had both hands pushing legs down to help keep them sturdy. If you've got a lens with image stabilisation, turning it on will help keep the lens stable in relation to the car which will keep dashboard details nice & sharp but make things outside jerkier. The faster you go, the more things vibrate and the more fuzzy things get, so go slow if you can. Longer shutter speeds seem make the effects of vibration worse, so use the shortest you can for the effect you want.

This was taken with IS turned on, 6 seconds about 30mph: click me
This was taken with no IS, 0.5 seconds at 60 or 70 mph: click me
 
I just jammed 1 leg down the back of the rear seats and extended the front 2 legs onto the floor, I then fed the remote shutter release to the front and just kept pressing for different lengths all the way home :D
 
My mondeo has eyelets in the boot just behind the rear seats, so I used a ratchet strap:

cartripod1.jpg

cartripod2.jpg
 
Dan, that looks like an awesome setup in the boot.

What sort of shutter speed and aperture is best to use on a non IS lens?
 
It doesn't matter if it's IS or non-IS. IS won't really remove much of the road vibrations.

I just used seatbelts!
None of this faffing around with wedging it somewhere or ratchets or god knows what else!
 
Use some high density foam under each leg this may help with some of the vibration.
 
i done this one but didnt strap the tripod down, although i would get better results if i did.

Exposure 0.4 of a second.

3533963599_a953b1fef5.jpg
 
Some tripods have a hook under the central column to spread the weight and keep the tripod sturdy. I would wedge the tripod somewhere amoungst the back seat and make sure I had somthing heavy hooked on, such as a bag of king edward potatoes.

Philx1979 said:
i done this one but didnt strap the tripod down, although i would get better results if i did.

Exposure 0.4 of a second.

3533963599_a953b1fef5.jpg
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That looks effing awesome! Has it been tone mapped at all?
 
hi mate, if you can't get hold of straps or bunjees, I'd think that you couls wedge the two front feet in the pockets behind the front seats (one either side) and the single leg on the back with the seatbelt wrapped around it tightly!

Only a suggestion and not tried!

Dion!
 
Hello guys, thought I'd drop in having noticed an increase in stats to my tripod setup page. Thanks for the mention, Richard :)

Setting up the tripod is not too big an issue in the overall scheme of driving shots. As long as the tripod's rigid enough not to topple your gear into your lap whilst you're driving, it'll give you stable enough results.

The bigger issue IMO is that of focal length and DoF. I shoot almost entirely at 10mm (Sigma 10-20, on a crop sensor). Longer focal lengths massively amplify any vibrations that do arise from tripod movement or bumps in the road. Hyperfocal at 10mm is something like 4ft so pretty much everything is nice and sharp.

Most stable position I've found to date is with the two front seats symmetrically positioned then stick a tripod leg behind each one, spread as wide across the two rear footwells as possible. Third tripod leg extends into the backrest of the rear seats and braces the whole setup forwards against the backs of the front seats.

It's stable, but it's also fairly conventional. For a more dramatic vanishing point, find a way to position the tripod head appx where the front passenger's head would be and angle the camera slightly towards the driver.

You can position the mirror(s) so that they catch the driver's reflection and then pop a strobe inside the cab to add a bit of foreground detail. Don't forget to set your strobe to rear curtain. Triggering can be done shot-by-shot via remote, or set the camera to continuous fire mode and lock-out your cable release.

As Richard mentioned, I do loads of in-car long exposures. Check out my driving and car mount sets if you're stuck for inspiration or technique, there's often a bunch of technical info on the photo pages. For anything else, drop me a flickr mail.

And.

A few examples:

Demonstrating the focal length amplification issue - this was at 50mm and literally rolling along at less than walking pace:


Exact same lights at 10mm and c20mph (blurry driver with no strobe):


Quick test shot (for white balance) but note the vanishing point much stronger (imo) for being offset.


Hope that helps
 
I bought some bungee cords from ebay like this:
Firebird%20Images%20Oct%2007%20008.jpg


Really useful for quickly tying down stuff, attaching flashguns to lamposts etc
 
Hehe. tried explain what I was planning on doing to my dad and he was really against. Thought it was strange.

Then I said 'I am going to with seatbelts'. To which repleid 'Oooooh you menat INSIDE the car' :lol::lol::lol:

He thought I was going to secure my tripod to the OUTSIDE of the car with bungee cord :lol:

Anyhow, tonight is the night :D
 
my first attempt at setting up a rig (no bungee cords just 3 seats belts wedging two tripod legs into the footwells, one on the middle seat) and got it fairly stable:

3547169704_94ae690493.jpg
 
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