first attempt at mtn bike race

[SrBiscuit]

hey everybody...
here is a set i put together of a down hill race i attended on sunday.
this was the first time i had ever tried any kind of sport with movement (usually it;s just my 5yo's baseball games...lol).
i know these are pretty bunk, but would like to improve future shoots like this.

i tried it on the sports setting at first, but everything came out rotten...everything was blurred.

so knowing what little i know about photography, i figured i would do trial and error with manual settings...so i played with ap and speed, and think i came up with decent combinations. it;s nice that the display gives you some idea of how to compensate for lighting...this was great cuz the sun was in and out of the clouds all afternoon, and we were in the woods.

anyone have any advice for shooting action in the woods?...i plan on attending more of these this summer.

shot with D40 with 18-55kit, manual settings (i can get exif if ya want), no flash.

i know some of the highlights are blown out...i had to play a bit in pshop, as the images were a bit dark.

thanks everybody!

-biscuit-


*edited to place a bigger version*

 

[LeSueur24]

Walk the course before the race starts and find better areas to shoot where they'll be going faster. IMO a good spot in that picture would be on the other side of the track near the boulder he's jumping off of. Also look into getting a flash, whether you'd use it on or off camera. For races, having a sync cable and just holding it in one hand would be the easiest to move around with.

 

[dslrchat]

Haaa
After a second look, I JUST noticed it was all of the same person.

Dooh, I was slow.

 

[Ripskip]

haha I did the same thing! I couldn't figure out why everyone had the same number and gear..

I guess that's tribute to a good sequence job!

 

[SrBiscuit]

thanks for the props on the sequence job...guess i shoulda mentioned that...lol.

LeSueur...what type of flash would you recommend?...just a regular speedlite type deal, or is there some different kind i would need for this application?
and i just connect it to my D40 with a cable, and let it pop where i need it to?

thanks!

 

[nicfargo]

I saw your topic and my first thought was that you were trying to be a smarty pants and put the picture of the car driving through the bike race thats on CNN right now. Great MT Bike pic though!

 

[nicfargo]

huh, I didn't notice it was the same person til seeing dslrchat's post. Very cool!

 

[Coldow91]

Good sequence very good for the first time

 

[JimmyO]

Walk the course before the race starts and find better areas to shoot where they'll be going faster. IMO a good spot in that picture would be on the other side of the track near the boulder he's jumping off of. Also look into getting a flash, whether you'd use it on or off camera. For races, having a sync cable and just holding it in one hand would be the easiest to move around with.

+1
This is the guy to liste to, he has done some great work in similar situations. Also check out sw1tchFX's shots.

Very nice sequence!

 

[LeSueur24]

thanks for the props on the sequence job...guess i shoulda mentioned that...lol.

LeSueur...what type of flash would you recommend?...just a regular speedlite type deal, or is there some different kind i would need for this application?
and i just connect it to my D40 with a cable, and let it pop where i need it to?

thanks!

Yeah speedlite is exactly what you'd need. I'm a Canon guy, but a friend of mine uses the Nikon SB600 and SB800. If you have the extra cash, the SB800 would be the better choice but both are relatively expensive. You could mount it on the hot shoe but that won't give you as much versatility. With the sync cord you can point the flash wherever you need it to go. You could also look into wireless flash and just place the flash on a tripod in the position you want it and then stand wherever you want.

 

[SrBiscuit]

thanks for the replies.
i went into ritz the other day, and the guy demo'd this for me with a D40, and it looked like it worked great. both flashes popped at the same time wirelessly.
would a flash like this suffice (they also have some cheaper quantarays that might work also)? the price point is much more reasonable for me....those nikons aint cheap. or do i hold out and hope to find a used SBxx? (out local pawn always has photo stuff in stock)

http://www.ritzcamera.com/product/531660991.htm

thanks again!

 

[LeSueur24]

If you're looking into cheaper "off brand" flashes Vivitar is definitely the way to go. I don't know much about models though, so you'd have to look into that. I don't know anything about the Quantaray's either, but I'm sure someone on this site can help you with those.

 

[Ptyler22]

Thats pretty nice. You just put it on a tripod and shot continous, right? how did you put the pictures on top of eachother and got the overlapping so smooth?

 

[SrBiscuit]

thanks ptyler...
no tripod....this was just shooting from the hip at ground level pointing up slightly in continuous mode, and panning the cam as the rider went by.
furthest pic back is layer 1 in a PS document and layers are added seuqentially and masked to show the rider...some of the backgrounds had to be cloned a bit so that trees lined up properly...i can send you the PSD if you wanna check out the raw file.

biscuit

 

[Ptyler22]

thanks ptyler...
no tripod....this was just shooting from the hip at ground level pointing up slightly in continuous mode, and panning the cam as the rider went by.
furthest pic back is layer 1 in a PS document and layers are added seuqentially and masked to show the rider...some of the backgrounds had to be cloned a bit so that trees lined up properly...i can send you the PSD if you wanna check out the raw file.

biscuit

Oh ya If you could that would be great. I want to try and do some of those too... when I finally decide on which slr to buy lol