Morwell hill climb.

[goatydude]

Hi, a couple of shots from todays hill climb, went along with the intent of practicing panning, got lots of shots these are probably the best.

In the 4th shot the car is coming towards me what sort of shutter speed should I be using to get the wheels "moving"

Comments welcome share your thoughts/tips.

Cheers
1
http://http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj38/canno1_2008/silver-open-wheeler-6-april.jpg
2
http://http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj38/canno1_2008/rorange-holden-sharp.jpg
3
http://http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj38/canno1_2008/hillclimb6april08openwheele.jpg
4http://http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj38/canno1_2008/open-wheeler-tight-crop.jpg

[Cadwell]

I think you've pushed the saturation a little too far on these. The reds in particular are a bit eyeball searing. As to shutter speed for the car coming towards you it depends on how fast it is going but start at 1/320th and work your way down until you're happy with what you see. 1/320th is pretty much fast enough for anything.

[goatydude]

Thanks Cadwell, yeah the saturation is high.

Was going to re-process all the photos from today as I overdid the saturation and contrast when converting from raw.

What did you think of the overall sharpness of the pans?

What sort of post processing do you do for your motorsport pics? Do you do any sharpening? This is the first time I have been out to shoot cars so any tips would be appreciatied.

Thanks

[Cadwell]

They are a good effort for your first time. The sharpness on them looks fine.

Everyone has different ideas about how to post process their photos. I am not saying this is the only way to do it, but in general this is what works for me.

I always shoot in RAW so everything needs some post processing. I use Capture One Pro as my RAW converter as it is the only one that I have found where I am happy with the colours. I did flirt with various other converters but got fed up with the combination of them and the 1D Mark II producing pink Ferraris – Enzo would not have been amused.

How much and what processing I do depends on the intended use.

Stuff for my web site is batch processed in C1 Pro using a standard set of parameters which include a small amount of sharpening and a small saturation boost. My involvement is limited to selecting which ones to process. Photos I intend to share on here get some more detailed attention that will include, if required straightening, a levels and white balance adjustment before being resized and then some sharpening. Images sent to a magazine will be corrected for levels and white balance and then sent uncropped and unsharpened. Photos sent to the printers will get the most detailed treatment of all.

It will also depend on the lens used. For example, the Canon lenses tend to produce a cool image in low light with a distinct blue-ish tinge to the whites which needs to be corrected unless you want a blue race track. The Sigmas give a slightly warmer image in low light. In brighter light there’s not much to choose from them. Sharpening can depend on the lens too. The Sigma 120-300mm and the Canon 600mm often need to have the sharpening decreased from my “normal” settings as they are incredibly sharp to start off with and can look over-sharpened.

And finally the 1D Mark II needs slightly different treatment from the 1D Mark III to get consistent looking images if I am using them both.

[goatydude]

Thanks.

[goatydude]

Cadwell, got a couple more questions for you.

How come you dont bother sharpening and cropping your images that are for magazines? is this because magazines prefer to do this themselves?

Would you do anything different for a newspaper submission?

Thanks

[Cadwell]

Magazines/newspapers/book publishers it's the same approach for all of them.

Sharpening should really be the final stage of any processing done on a photo and it is very likely that the publications graphics department will want to do some further processing on anything you submit. For example they may want to adjust the white balance of your shot to match that submitted by other contributors or they might want to adjust the colours so that it suits their printing process better.

As for cropping, the last thing a magazine picture editor wants is a tightly cropped shot. They have to lay out text and photos to give a pleasing effect in the article and that usually doesn't mean every photo looks good in 3:2 aspect ratio. It is better to let the editor crop the image to the size and shape they want to best fit the article layout.

[goatydude]

Thanks