Motorsport photography tips

[TXWRX]

Had my first go at using a dslr to shoot some motorsport on the weekend at the Cheviot stages, would be great if some of you guys could have a look and give me some advice on whats good/ bad etc and how i can improve, camera is a canon 500d and i was using the 55-250 canon lens

Here is a couple of the shots, more on http://s808.photobucket.com/albums/zz9/TXWRX_photo...





Thanks!

[JohnS]

First one isn't too bad at all. It looks slightly soft around the number plate due to motion blur. You can get away with a higher shutter speed with cars coming straight towards you on tarmac which will help freeze the action and give sharper results. 1/400 or 1/500th should work fine.

The 2nd one looks a reasonable panning shot, but at an awful angle unless the car really was going down a hill at 45 degrees Lose the silly angle and the shot would be much better IMHO.

[TXWRX]

Thanks! yeah having compared the first one with some of my sharper ones they are at the 1/500 mark, i hadn't thought about that with regards to cars coming towards me but it makes sense, the second one i was trying to be a bit arty with the angle take your point though, i did one of gwyndaf evans on the jim clark with my old camera like that, rotated it in photoshop and it was better so yeah will try and be a bit more sensible with the angles!

[grumpy bear]

TXWRX said:

Thanks! yeah having compared the first one with some of my sharper ones they are at the 1/500 mark, i hadn't thought about that with regards to cars coming towards me but it makes sense, the second one i was trying to be a bit arty with the angle take your point though, i did one of gwyndaf evans on the jim clark with my old camera like that, rotated it in photoshop and it was better so yeah will try and be a bit more sensible with the angles!

I agree on the angles, I think there are only a few times when this comes off. If the viewer tilts their head to match what should be a level road youve got the angle wrong. The subconscious knows when stuff should be level. Art images with bits of cars and strong backgrounds are the only time I would try to change that.

For me the standard head on is 250th, it gives a good chance of a crisp image and also still gives some motion to the wheels if they are in shot. I go up to 500 for fast single seaters occasionally as the camera has less to grab focus on.