Motorsports crop question

[GMosher]

So....To crop, or not to crop, that is the question.

Well more like HOW to crop.

Is it more preferable for a tight crop with just the car? Or a crop with some foreground/background. It seems like a little bit of foreground/background adds to the sensation of speed being conveyed in an image, but how much is too much?
Here are two examples:
uncropped:
http://www.pbase.com/garett/image/43899258.jpg

cropped:
http://www.pbase.com/garett/image/43899259.jpg

I suppose i should have used more of a pan shot for an example..but I'm just wondering how you guys prefer to crop.

[KennyG]

To be honest, I prefer not to crop at all and frame right for the shot. You loose refrences when you crop tight. Foreground is good to have to give a relationship between the track edge and the postion of the car. The tyre marks in the track are important to show this is a bend, kerbs are better, but the tracks will do. Body lean and tyre/wheel blur convey movement for three quarter corner shots, plus you would have been better off with 1/320 instead of the 1/500 you used.

You have also cropped to an non-standard ratio - not good. If you ever submit to magazines, don't crop at all, even if you think the image will benefit, that's their job and they prefer to have control.

[KennyG]

Further, did you shoot this in program or an auto mode? You should use Tv.

[GMosher]

PERFECT KENNY! Exactly the man's feedback I was looking for.
This was only the first time out shooting these guys and i was shooting TV mode basically all day long. That was a bad example, it just happened to be an image I had open in PS at the time i started wondering.

For pan shots i stick around 100-125-160...such as this one
http://www.pbase.com/garett/image/43772160.jpg

I've been asked for publishing rights for a few of the photos i shot this past weekend, and I've also been asked to go out and shoot a few images for an article one of the racers/organizers is writing up for publication in a motorsports magazine...and like i told them I don't know that my skill level is really up to that yet, but I'll give it the old try...I want a few more races under my belt preferably, but I have untill sunday.

Even without cropping in PS I was wondering how tight to try to shoot and how much foreground/bacground to leave in the frame while shooting.

[GMosher]

The thing i don't like about this is also that the subject is in the center
http://www.pbase.com/garett/image/43912323.jpg
...if you use the centre focus point...you're pretty limited to having the subject in the centre without cropping...or again, am i a TOTAL n00b and missing something completely here.
The second image of the red golf i posted here i feel i haven't gotten in tight enough at only 170mm(i was shooting that with the 75-300 on a 20d so crop factor of 1.6)

[KennyG]

That last shot does need cropping. Nothing wrong with the image being in the centre by the way. Loose some foreground and keep the ratio by cropping from the left. Keep the sweep of the grass on the right. The problem with cropping an image with that size of subject is, even starting at 8mp, you will not have the detail. That's where the lack of lens reach shows up.

Forget about sensor crop factors by the way. Simply think of everything in terms of the lens focal length, less taxing on the brain. Work on your framing at longer lengths so cropping isn't necessary. You should try to frame like the shot below. It also has - foreground, background and references to position the car on track. Taken at 300mm and 1/320, with apologies for posting one of my shots in your thread.

http://www.motorpix.co.uk/images60/cr-08.jpg

[KennyG]

Further again. Why limit yourself to just the centre point? You should only use one point, but if you have contrasty subjects and decent light, then the one either side of centre is fine. I often use an offset point if say I want to have focus on the car but also make sure I have the chequered flag in shot. Another time I would use the offset is in portrait mode where I wanted to have less foreground and some extra sky in the shot. Use the focus points creatively.

[GMosher]

KennyG without a doubt I'll be happy if one day my motorsports images ar 1/4 as great as yours. This post gave me the info I was looking for though. I have the access and from my vantage point the 300mm is long enough to pretty much fill the frame, but I was sitting there all day wondering just how much of the fram should i be filling with the car, and how much foreground background should I be leaving in...so what happened in the end is a lot of shots from farther away than they should have been and not using enough of my available reach. It seems most of my shots were at 100-150mm so only half way. So i'd benefit from using more reach it seems. Also...I'm always torn between going for a pan shot, or shooting around 1/320th-1/400 and almost stopping the action. This was at 1/400, now i wish i could go back and shoot it at 1/320.
http://www.pbase.com/garett/image/43840555.jpg

Thanks SOOO much so far for the help, I had an absolute blast, and can't wait to get back to the track. Also, no need to ever apologize for posting one of your images in a thread of mine. Ever.