that most wonderful time of the year, some advice?

[Craig.]

Well its the auto show again tomorrow, and after disappointing results last year, I'd like some advice please.
First of all some people i've read posts by elsewhere state its better to go without flash and a wide open Appature. Others say its always good to go with flash.
What ISO setting would be worth going with? last year i went with 200 and an ap of 5.6 and i got a lot of blurred photos. We all remember those.
So any help would be appreciated for better results.
And dont worry fella's I plan on bringing back pleanty more picks of the ladies this year, less blurryness I promise.
Give me a few mins and i'll include some examples of what went wrong.

[flyboy 28]

And dont worry fella's I plan on bringing back pleanty more picks of the ladies this year, less blurryness I promise.

Good.

[C]

Wish I could go, but performing a mileage limitation exercise on the cars at the moment...

[Craig.]

fly in, cant you arrange it as a business expense? lol.
Its just across the road from Birmingham airport.

[C]

fly in, cant you arrange it as a business expense? lol.
Its just across the road from Birmingham airport.

On a Sunday. We're not overflowing with aeroplanes either. Have you not been reading the news.

[61_OTU]

Hi Craig,

the larger the aperture, the more light you'll get in through the lens onto the sensor. When you open the aperture wide the f number decreases. My Fuji Finepix goes from f8 (small aperture, so not much light through) to f3.2 (wide open aperture, maximum light to the sensor).

This means with a large aperture (f3.2 on mine) you get most light, and therefore can go for a faster shutter speed, which will reduce camera shake.

A problem with a large aperture, is that is reduces the depth of field. This means that if you focus on the nose of an F1 car from the front, with a large f3.2 aperture, then the car may be out of focus from half way back.

The reason you got blurry shots last year is that the aperture you selected (or the camera selected), would have been in the middle of your range to get a good proportion of the image in focus. This would have restricted the available light through the lens, and lowered the shutter speed. The lower shutter speed means that any camer shake would have been very visible. in the resulting image.

The good thing about cars in a show, is that they don't move. If you can get a tripod (even a video camer tripod is better than nothing if you have one), then you can lock the camera in place and get a nice crisp shot of the car. You may still find that people get blurred, as their movement will show up in the slow shutter speed, but this could look artistic if you play around with it.

I find that on-board flash just looks too obvious and just doesn't travel far enough when taking the sort of shots you're talking about.

Steve

[Craig.]

Hi 61, thanks mate, I dont use the standard onboard flash as i bought a new larger flash for it, the difficulty being, A: there are occasions where the reflections are really bad, and B: its rather bright and blinds anyone in the picture, not a good way to get the ladies to pose for you I'm not gonna be able to take my tri-pod, its too bulky for such a busy enviroment. What would you suggest as a good aperture then? my lense allows me to go from 4.0 at 17mm to goodness only knows but its quite high.

[C]

Nice to see you back around Steve. Happy new year to you!

[61_OTU]

Thanks Charlie, that was post 8k by the way, so congrats, never one wasted  ;)

I'll be honest Craig, I don't know. I'm not sure how much use you make of the manual features of your camera, but I'd put mine on aperture priority, and I'd see what sutter speeds it offered me for the available light. I'm no expert on photography, but make use of the display, zoom in on the images and try to see if you are managing to avoid camera shake on the settings you have, if not then tweak them.

If you're getting camera shake then the shutter speed is too slow. Play around with increasing the aperture and increasing the ISO speed. The ISO speed increases the sensitivity of the sensor, in the same way the ISO speeds on film reflects how much more sensitive the film is to light.

A high ISO film is good for freezing fast action photography, as it allows you to capture more light with a shorter exposure. in the same way it allows you to capture more light in low light situations, while still achieving a shutter speed that will 'freeze' action, and avoid camera shake.

Be warned however, the images will be more grainy.

Hopefully there are some actually skilled people who will be able to give you some proper advice, my approach is to have a go and play around with it.

[Craig.]

thanks again:)
The funny thing is, airshow photos i've had some but few problems with, and its taken 2 years and quite a few shows and trips to the airport to get the results.
Sadly car shows are not that common so its tough to find a good substitute for practice. I've found I cant really go above ISO 400 for acceptable photos, last year going with 200 was perhaps a little off and I might try 400, 800 and above is just too grainy for my tastes.
Its just this apeture thing thats getting me, I wouldn't mind so much if I could really get a good preview as I'm sure with yourself the worst thing is to get home and find those good looking previews turn out to be rather poor.

[C]

Thanks Charlie, that was post 8k by the way, so congrats, never one wasted  ;)

Lol, not one, probably several thousand!

[Anark]

Tell me how it was.
I went last year but my dad said it wasn't good this year, personally I think he was just being lazy....

[Craig.]

just back guys,
I'll post some photos asap. It wasn't as good this year, far more stalls aimed at the mechanics side of racing. Less cars sadly. But still a fair selection. The pictures came out much better as you'll see, but there arn't so many.
Far more models around aswell its nice when you can take photos of people who do this a lot, as they take directions/requests really easily.
The live action arena was a little dissapointing, but still really good, no real photos from it, the star was definitly the aston dbrs9