catalint Loc: oslo

I had the pleasure of spending a day at my friend's cabin and play with RC cars. Gee, I haven't had this fun in a while. Childish fun that is :D
After a couple of hours I remembered I wanted to shoot some fast moving RC cars.

And that how I started crawling and tried to keep up with the fast moving RC truck. This little baby does 40Km/h and accelerate so fast that I was having a little problem focusing.
My idea was to catch some motion, either wheels , dirt or leaves splashed around from the spinning wheels, so I did not went higher than 1/320s . Or maybe I could , but my main problem was getting the damn speedy monster it's self sharp. I was happy with the motion details.

So how do you guys control your camera for such? The biggest challenge was that this car was moving very fast, even from start point, and since I could not keep up with it I asked my friend to do drive-by's me, as close as possible. I wanted to use a wide aperture so I can keep as much of the background out of focus and get some nice bokeh. Since I wanted motion, I didn't go too fast and felt 1/320 was enough, which seems to be ok.
I am pretty happy with the results, but I feel I could have done better in focusing.



My setup was :
MY Nikon D750 with my Sigma 50mm 1.4
S 1/320s , A@F3.2, AF-C group focusing, ISO 100 (it was very bright), and fast-continuous shooting.

Pictures are pp in LR like I always do, from top to buttom, exposure, highlight, w&b, sharpening and I played a tad with dehaze since it gave that extra boost

So what you think ? I could have done better ?

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Howard5252 Loc: New York / Florida (now)

1- This is one of those situations where BBF (Back Button Focusing) might come in handy. If you lock the focus to a particular spot (area) and then have your friend drive through that area, all you have to do is follow the car in the viewfinder and snap the photo when the car passes through the prefocused area. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usSF41lo78I
2- This is also a great way to learn panning (tracking to subject in the viewfinder).
BTW - good for you ... getting down to where the cars were.

catalint Loc: oslo

Hi Howard, and thanx for commenting

Actually I did use the BBF button, as I started to see the benefit of it, but I did not focus on one spot and waited for the car. I was more trying to follow the car. So grate tip to try waiting for it. I shall try that next time.

And yes, I was stretched all the way on my belly "rolling in the dirt", as I really wanted a good perspective of the car and motion.

Rongnongno Loc: FL

A simple question... Why do you want to freeze something that is fast moving? Why not take it immobile in any scene?

Panning is usually the best option that way while the car is sharp (if you have the experience) the background becomes blurred. This would be introducing speed as well as keeping the object in focus. (Check panning in photography)

A flash can be used too, best being the rear curtain. The background is still, the car shows motion then the flash triggers freezing it. (Find rear curtain tutorial of explanation)

catalint Loc: oslo

Hi Ron,
I was not trying to freeze, but I can understand why you had the impression. My pictures shows the background as frozen, I only got the blur cause of the shallow aperture and the car passed just near me. Also the car was spinning a lot and often I got the shot while accelerating and spinning on the spot.

Anyway , I see the both you and Howard mentioned panning. So I searched for it and read a little and seen some youtube videos. It seems I was unknowingly using the technique , but I was all over the place instead of concentrating on the same spot/area. Also I see that shutter speed should been lower.
So i'll practice some more now that I've become familiar with the term panning.

Thanx for commenting and tips

Cheers and great weekend to you all

Reinaldokool Loc: San Rafael, CA

I don't know your D750. When I moved from Nikon to Sony, one of the factors was the speed of the continuous focus mode. Another was the Sony a6300's amazing focus-tracking. Adding those to the panning idea from Ron would have been amazing. I sometimes miss my Nikons, but the Sony focusing is so good I can't go back.