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Racing Photography

Get started in racing photography

Depending on where you live the chances are that you're close to some kind of race course. Every day, people gather to race; from motorcycles to stock cars, horses to dogs, Formula 1 to Daytona, Power Boats to sailing boats. Racing is everywhere and presents a fantastic opportunity to capture the adrenaline and excitement of the event, whether for your stock photo portfolio, for pleasure or just for the practice.

Here in the UK you're never that far from anything! On the sunny South Coast (Trying my best to make it sound like Malibu or Waikiki here!) there are obviously a lot of water sports. However, for the four wheeled enthusiast Goodwood Motor Circuit has seen a fantastic revival over past years and has seen heavy investment in its track and facilities. Better still they run track days there where you can turn up and watch proceedings. For the purpose of this tutorial that's where we were.

Track Safety

Okay, first the health and safety bit! Motor circuits, irrespective of what is travelling on them, are dangerous places. Don't take any risks, cross any barriers or generally get in the way. You are a visitor and there are places allocated for you. There may well be photography areas but this doesn't mean they're safe. Never turn your back to cars on the track, enter anywhere you're not supposed to and even if your in the safety of the public area always check out where your going to dive to if it all goes wrong!

Preparation

As with any photographic location preparation is everything. You need to pick your shots before you've even picked up your camera. Walk the public area and look down the track. Are there any specific locations for photography? Sometimes the most obvious locations are not the best. At Goodwood for example, there is a raised overhead viewing area with fantastic spectator views straight down the track as the cars approach the line. However it can be too close to get effect 'speed' shots as the car goes by. The grassy public area over the track however is nearly as high, not nearly as populated, gives great opportunity for speed effects with a reasonable 200mm lens and puts the blurred spectators and trackside signage right in the background.

Equipment

Racing is going to present you with many photographic opportunities, not just the race itself. For the race images you'll need a 200mm but a 300mm or more is going to give the best results. An image stabilised lens would be beneficial too (Although none were used for these photos) If you've got pit access your standard lens or wide angle will cover most requirements. Forget tripods too. They're too cumbersome and awkward for most racing conditions. A monopod however can be invaluable. I find that for this and nature photography some kind of knee padding is invaluable. Repeated kneeling on concrete and debris is only going to hurt and they are always a good idea on shoots where you need to take kneeling shots and don't have time to consider what you're about to kneel on! Also be aware that if you are allowed into the pits you are probably going to need a high visibility vest and some ear defenders, depending on the event and the vehicles.

Practice and set up

You're going to be shooting a lot of images, very quickly. Some will be good, some bad but the more practice you get the higher the ratio of good to bad! Shooting digital gives you the chance to review and delete so don't be afraid of taking loads of photos. Setting the camera to continuous shooting can be beneficial.

It's important that the subject car fills the image view finder and it's sharp. The chances are there will be a lot of advertising hoardings around so we need to put some blur into the background to give the feel of speed (Also unrecognisable adverts mean your images are 'stock ready').

Set the camera to Aperture Priority and set the aperture to the smallest f-stop you can get away with. The built in light meter on your camera makes it easy to set up shutter speed from here but not to low or everything is going to blur. There is no hard and fast rule here. Different light conditions are going to alter settings.

Using autofocus is difficult in race conditions and may not be able to keep up. So I generally set the camera up to be focused on a particular part of the track and note any landmarks I can see. With the speed of the vehicle and lenses used, the depth of field is tight here so it's practice, practice and more practice. That includes your panning too. Move your hips, upper body and camera in a fluid motion to track a car as it comes by. When setting up you can just practice the motion to get the feel for it (Onlookers generally wonder what they're missing as you take photos of an invisible cars!)

Then there's the monopod. Well, this is a personal thing. Where the cars are slower and there's a chance the whizz-bang ultrasonic motor in your lens can keep up, the monopod is only going to make those images sharper. However it is restrictive when trying to achieve speed blur by panning. In this instance I find hand held and well braced wins.

In the pits you're going to get chance to take more artistic and story telling photos. Mouse eye view and close crop always work well. The first time I undertook race photography there was a lot to take in. As it was practice there was no pressure and I could experiment and learn. With time and repetition it certainly gets easier!

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September 8

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