Panning, what settings?

AnimalRights

I tried to pan a Car for the 1st time and couldn't get it right.
When I tried a long exposure too much light was getting in and if I increased the shutter speed I was getting no motion blur behind the Car.
Basically I needed less light getting in!

stcstc

her is quite a good tutorial

http://digital-photography-school.com/mastering-panning-to-photograph-moving-subjects

KarmaGarda

Was this during the day/evening/night time?

DaireQuinlan

Use shutter priority and get the slowest shutter speed you can manage while not letting the aperture get smaller than f/11 or at a push f/16 if you're shooting a crop body, or f/16 f/22 if you're shooting fullframe. Lower your iso as much as you can. If you still can't get slow enough shutter speeds (which certainly might be the case during even a moderately sunny day) then you'll have to start thinking about ND filters.

Paddy@CIRL

Using shutter priority mode, start at 1/125th and work your way down.

Varies depending on light available, the trajectory and speed of the car. Your body stance is very important too, best to stand with your feet a shoulders width apart and pivot using your upper torso but thats down to personal preference.

PCPhoto

panning a car is mainly about moving camera at the same speed as the car (while you photo) ...... it ALWAYS takes time to get it right....of course if its dusk/dark .... a flash adds extra kick to the photo

or what the two lads mentioned above me .... they know more about it than me.

Ps. have you seen Paddy@CIrl's work - fantastic car shots - definately knows his stuff

AnimalRights

Daytime, was nothing serious, in the Phoenix Park.

KarmaGarda

Guys seem to have given good advice. I reckon you should be able to easily get a shutter speed of between 1/30 and 1/60 with an aperture above f11 (ISO at about 100/200). Depends on the day obviously. I'd ignore flash for now. And make sure VR/IS is turned off. Sometimes it can act a bit odd. Then just do the biz.

1 tip though, I find keeping your other eye open helps a hell of a lot if you can get used to it.

melekalikimaka

if ya wanna reduce the light... increase the ap no.

AnimalRights

Hah! My mistake appears to be I kept the F number low, F4, I assumed for background blur I needed it low.
and I had IS on, was the 24-105L

KarmaGarda

The panning will take care of the blur

Danbo!

AnimalRights wrote: »

Hah! My mistake appears to be I kept the F number low, F4, I assumed for background blur I needed it low.
and I had IS on, was the 24-105L

Would I be right in thinking that DOF decreases with longer shutter speeds??

And as said above, the blur is all motion, no dof needed.

melekalikimaka

Stee wrote: »

Would I be right in thinking that DOF decreases with longer shutter speeds??

.

shutter speed does not influende dof

Trizo

As others have said start at around 1/100 and work your way down youll be able to tell how far you can push it as the car/bike/animal wont be sharp or as sharp. best thing is just to go out and do it over and over youll get bad ones and good ones to start with.

DaireQuinlan

Stee wrote: »

Would I be right in thinking that DOF decreases with longer shutter speeds?

Nope, DOF decreases as you open up the aperture. IE going from f/5.6 -> f/1.4 (say) will cut your DOF quite significantly. Now, all thing else remaining equal, to keep your exposure the same you have to compensate, by -reducing- your shutter speed in this instance by the equivalent 5 stops.

Danbo!

DaireQuinlan wrote: »

Nope, DOF decreases as you open up the aperture. IE going from f/5.6 -> f/1.4 (say) will cut your DOF quite significantly. Now, all thing else remaining equal, to keep your exposure the same you have to compensate, by -reducing- your shutter speed in this instance by the equivalent 5 stops.

I rarely shoot macro/portrait, but for some reason I was under the impression that shutter speed had some influence. I knew it was all about the aperature, but I'm almost sure I read somewhere online that faster shutter speeds makes for shallower Dof. Time to dust off the 50 1.8 and actually try taking some pics with it rather than read dodgy info about taking pics.