Red Kite Rally - Wales

[MattGayton]

Hi guys,

Just got back from the Red Kite Stages Rally in Wales. This was my 1st chance to give my new 20D a proper workout!
Because the weather was so grey and overcast, I had to shoot at iso 800 most of the time and was struggling to get a decent shutter speed, but the 20D handles high iso noise much better than my old D60 :)
Does anyone have any tips for getting a decent exposure of a white car against a dark background?

Heres a few pics.
http://images.fotopic.net/?iid=ysg3dr&outx=760&oq=0

http://images.fotopic.net/?iid=ysg3dt&outx=760&oq=0

http://images.fotopic.net/?iid=ysg3e2&outx=760&oq=0

[attu]

Nice shots matt, probably the quickest way to get the exposure right on a white car would be to use exposure lock, this way you can point your camera at a section of road or grass that looks to be the correct exposure (not in shade or direct sunlight) and lock the exposure.
Or you could just shoot in manual and set the exposure up before the car arrives.
I cant wait to get into the forests :) though Im not 100% sure what event Ill be covering next probably the Sunseeker though ive also been told a track day has got to be covered on the same day :(.

Andy

[Dandaman_24]

Hi

I was up there, are these shots from the 1st stage on the 90 right, where all the cars were overshooting the bend (am I right).

Good shots, have you put them through PS, wot u do ?

Daniel

[MattGayton]

Hi Daniel

Yup, thats that was the bend. Took a few shots from just round that corner too (where I thought I was safe), but had a couple of close encounters. :eek:

The only things I did in PS was to crop and a bit of USM

Matt

[Dandaman_24]

Was it you the sub or Evo nearly went into

I got a shot of that

[MattGayton]

It was this one. The guy in front of me was really close. Ive just spend most of the evening cleaning the mud out of the camera!
http://images.fotopic.net/?iid=ysg3e0&outx=760&oq=0

[Dandaman_24]

Hi

Here you go this shows it better

http://uploads.savefile.com/users/uploads/near_miss_2.jpg

Which ones you.

Daniel

[Dandaman_24]

Heres another one

http://uploads.savefile.com/users/uploads/miss_000.jpg

[MattGayton]

Im the scruffy looking one about half way across at the top. White lens(now covered in mud) :)
Seemed much closer than that at the time!

Matt

[Dandaman_24]

They all look scruffy to me. Yeah i saw you, you had a Lowepro shoulder bag.

I will post some pics when I've finished PS-ing them, only another 420 to go.

Daniel

[MattGayton]

Yeah, thats me, free lowepro bag with subscription to practical photography ;)
Look foreward to seeing the rest of your pics.
Matt

[Ian_H]

It's great fun standing in a wet cold forest in the middle of winter (at least that's what I keep telling myself:rolleyes: )

What sort of shutter speed were you using in the Robert Swann evo shots?

I think the guy in the white hat running out of the way was asking for trouble standing in the gully, bit silly if you ask me



Cheers
Ian

[MattGayton]

Ian
Yeah, the cold wet welsh forest was good fun, thought next time I think I might dress more appropriately for the occasion! I think Im getting a cold. Sniff!

The evo shots were taken at 1/320th at f4 and iso 400.

I was talking to the guy in the hat for a while, he was a N*kon user, so dont be too hard on him!

Matt

[iwatkins]

Nice shots !

The guy in the gully is certainly asking for trouble. Just look at the debris on the ground, fairly steep bank and I'm guessing wet with it, where his his escape route ? Sorry, but what an idiot. :(

Anyway, had to laugh at those shots: "Support your local Milkman". I could just imagine having your milk being delivered by a rally driver in an Evo. Probably end up with butter. :D

Cheers

Ian

[Huckaback Photo]

The guy in the gully is the sort of reason why stages get cancelled and we all got to walk home without a shot, this has happened to us only once many years ago where spectators were indeed injured. now its not only spectators and amateur photographers with cameras in these situations.
I actually have some other pics in the sports section WALES RALLY GB 2003, heres one further shot
of Colin McRae's car just after landing, this time its a pro photographer (sorry if its one of you guys) this is the special stage at Margam park.
Cheers Martin.

[NikonF4s]

there are always crazies that get too close. The biggest problem we have in new zealand has to be the harrassment the WRC drivers receive in between stages from Police and spectators.

We have a huge modified Jap car culture in nz, and there are always about 100 young guys in modded Subies and mitzies wanting to have bragging rights for overtaking Gronholm or Loeb. A couple of years ago I saw a bunch of cars deliberately block out McCrae, resulting in him having to overtake on a blind hill, on the wrong side to get back to service park on time.

The police aren't much better, hanging around on rural roads, waiting to pull over a rally car and hassle them about the 'dangers of loose body panels' or 'you were speeding' and 'here's a ticket for the missing headlight'.

Poor old Sohlberg almost ended up in cuffs, in 2003 for dangerous driving, because he barrelled into the service park, with seconds to spare, and some careless parent had let their kids get in the way. The RalliArt boss only just got him off!!

[Huckaback Photo]

We do get similar probs regards police they seem go overboard with targeting rally spectators and
drivers. speed cameras are everywhere, and of course as you said pulling in rally drivers for loose bits on cars etc between stages. but my understanding of this problem is there is no servicing at anywhere but scheduled service stops so drivers leave stage back on to main roads thats it.
I enjoy my rallying especially classic, i actually run a 1966 mk 1 lotus cortina owned it since 1972 i know theres a few in your part of the world.
Cheers Martin.

[iwatkins]

Getting back to service or the next stage is always dificult at events where all the stages are very close together, e.g. the current Rally GB (or small part of South Wales).

I remember a couple of years ago, we came off the Radnor stage in a convoy of three cars and we got stuck behind a line of press cars. Well, I say stuck, they were motoring but not fast enough for us (we planned to visit four stages that day). So we start the overtakes. :)

We are coming along a flat (ish) bit of moorland overtaking as much as we can. I get a headlight flash from my mate behind so we pull in. McRae comes past us like we are standing still :)

We start overtaking again, still about 15 press cars to get past. Next thing I see out of the corner of my eye is a blue Subaru drawing alongside me. Thing was I'm already overtaking at the time and it is Richard Burns, on the moorland about 20 feet away doing a bit of cross country :D :D

He overtakes the whole line of traffic on the grass and we hear later he made it to the stage start on time.

Reason for them not being miles ahead of us by the time we got back to the main road ? Some idiot had parked their car up a narrw side road for easy access. Turned out to be the stage exit route. :(

Cheers

Ian

[PeterTaylor]

This is one of the problems now with the Rally being held in such a small area. I remember the first RAC rally I covered as a Press photographer, way way back now. We had stages in Egland (Stately homes on Sunday, Yorkshire and Lake district) Wales most of the major forests and Scotland (Twiggles Castle ore! Etc) and don’t forget Killer Kilder. It stated on Sunday and finished on Thursday night, oh those were the days.

One of the problems is how to handle all the spectators in such a small area, it does cause the Police a nightmare, ok they target the boy racer in his modified what ever. But they also target the Drivers teams and us Press guys as well.

Whilst talking about bad driving and parking a couple of years back I got blocked in by some bad diving/parking form a series of spectators. What happened was I dove up to the stage turned the car around drove back down a line of parked cars and fond a parking place on the left hand side for the track between other cars. Nothing wrong with the parking or location of the car. Grabbed the cameras and when up to the stage, to shoot the first 30 cars. Stage was due to start in about 30 mins, so was in good time. Although I only needed the 30 at this point I did stay for another 10 cars.
When I walked back to my car, I found total mayhem, not only had we got cars on both sides of the road, but we also had a line of cars parked in the middle of the road. Which totally stopped everything from moving until the drivers returned. When we challenged one of the guilty drivers, their response was **** ***. The problem was that this was also an emergency exit, as most of the routes are. Oh and we had to wait for about 90 to 120 cars to go through. So we missed one service and two more stages that day.

This is one of the reasons I move to Europe and Circuit racing as a posed to rallying.

Anyway good shots, you should be able to hold down to 1/125 at F4 or at least 1/250 at F4, with rally cars it is also possible to use some small fill flash, although do be careful when using this.

[Huckaback Photo]

Hi Peter
We were totally trapped in Haffren (sweet lamb) the year all main roads became totally grid locked with spectators etc it prevented the second run of that stage after only approx 20 cars came through. Drove into car parks early hrs of morning took 15 min driving in and over 2 1/2 hrs to get out. Like yourself it put me off this type of venue for photos for a while. when nation wide it was never like this, we do have some good stages here in Wales I totally agree with you its far to concentrated in such a small area.
The pictures i have posted (re Rally Wales GB 2003) taken in Margam park do not really tell the story about how that special stage seemed to be designed for the television companys ..water spash, jumps, scaffold towers for cameras etc. we only actually saw about 30 - 40 cars on the day ,not good i thought.
Now Goodwood Revival last september thats another story , if you use a camera just be there .
Cheers
Martin (Huckaback Photo)

[Mills]

Risky if you have a camera in your hands, and people worry about me on the Fireground. Believe me, it is a lot more safe than this looks. Great Shots All. Love the "Support Your Local Milkman" ad.