Any autoshow photography advice Oppo?

"BATC42" (BATC42) 10/02/2014 at 13:11 • Filed to: None

0

43

Hey Oppo, I need your wisdom! Next week I'm planning to stop by the Paris Motorshow, and I'd like to take a few pictures, would you have any advice? (More after the jump)

Here is my gear : Fujifilm X-A1, 16-50mm 3.5/5.6 and 50-230 4.5/6.7 Fuji lenses, and an old Canon FD 50mm f/1.4. I'm planning on getting a PL filter as well as a second battery.
I never shot an auto show and I'd like some advice if you have any, whatever they might be :) (gear, technique, settings, ....)
I almost always use my camera in full manual so I know how it works, and how parameters work with each others. The two Fuji lenses I have are stabilized.

And have a 300hp, 2100lbs, 7-speed (!!! in 1996), fwd, French rally car. A car that, despite being FWD, could beat the mighty WRC cars.

Arch Duke Maxyenko, Shit Talk Extraordinaire > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 13:12

2

It sucks trying to take good pictures of cars in auto shows.

OPPOsaurus WRX > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 13:18

3

don't be that a-hole that takes 10 minutes to set up a shot and gives shitty looks at people who are there to see the cars too. Some dude did that do me. i wanted to shut the door on the pricks head. also dont forget to post them for us!!

KirkyV > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 13:31

1

I've no advice at all. But, you posted a picture of a 306, so I and my 106 - my specific car not pictured, because slidey awesomeness beats my driveway - wish you the very best of luck.

Victorious Secret > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 13:39

3

Take your widest lens possible. Don't crank ISO too high, but you might need to cause apart from the main display, lighting sucks balls.

You'll have to work hard to get good shots, people don't often care as they are walking buy and too busy to care.

Make nice with some of the vendors, if there are barriers, ask if you can come back later when its less busy to get some better shots. They appreciate this.

Xyl0c41n3 > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 13:43

1

Depends on what you're going for. As much detail as possible? Or highlighting specific parts of the frame? If you're going for very specific detail, you need to narrow your depth of field by shooting as wide open as you can. With your gear, that means leaving your wide angle zoom closer to it's 16mm limit so you can take advantage of its max aperture of f /3.5. But that means you'll have to get in close to compose your shots in most situations since that's such a wide angle of view. Unless you're going for a "take in the entire scene" type of shot.

That 50mm f /1.4 is probably going to be your best friend. It's prime, fast glass, and that means super tack optics. Forget the tele-zoom unless you really can't get up close and personal with the cars. The longer focal length and smaller apertures means you'll have to sacrifice ISO speed to compensate, which will up your noise factor. And speaking of ISO, try to shoot as low as you can (ISO 400 if you can manage it). Higher speed means reduced image quality. But I'm guessing such a big show will have pretty good lighting, so hopefully you won't have to worry about that affecting your ISO decision much. If you're shooting static objects, try not to shoot slower than 1/30th of a second. Any slower and camera shake becomes noticeable, even with a stabilizer. If you're shooting something in motion, your minimum shutter speed shouldn't drop below 1/250th if you don't want to have motion blur.

Forget the polarizer. The polarizer will force you to compensate for up to two stops of exposure, and it's not worth the trade off. Unless you're trying to shoot through windshields or windows to get shots of the interior, you don't need the polarizer. Other than cutting through glare shining off transparent objects, it won't serve you well indoors.

Hmm. I just realized I've been assuming all this will be taking place indoors... Ok... If you're shooting outdoors:

The polarizer still is too much of a nuisance to bother with. My other advice to shoot wide open and with as low an ISO still applies. If it's bright daylight outside, compensate with a faster shutter speed before you touch your aperture.

Do you have any strobes? (Flashes?) If you have one, take the money you would have spent on the polarizer and use it to get a second that has customizable slave capabilities and can talk to your first flash. Or even just an old school one that has an IR sensor. One of those will trigger off any strobe flash, though, so you'll have less control over when it fires. If you've got strobes you can play around with lighting your shots with off-camera lighting. Use one mounted on your camera to trigger the one off camera. Be sure to set both flashes to below full power. It's a good technique for portraits, but considering how big this show is, might not be that advisable since there will likely be tons of people waiting to get shots, too. But it's definitely something you can play with at smaller shows.

Anyway, I know I've rambled. If you have any questions, let me know. Happy shooting!

Stephen the Canuck > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 13:43

2

I would recommend you use the 16-50mm lens. Try and get the white balance right. Don't be afraid to get pictures where people are interacting with the vehicle. I'm guessing the PL filter is a polarizing filter, which is good to have.

Crouch down so you're more at the car's level. It gives a different view than normal eye level which is more interesting.

Find different/interesting angles.

You can use the environment around the vehicles to help frame shots, or add interesting visual objects.

You'll have to be patient and wait for the gaps in the people around the vehicles. It helps if you can go at non-peak visiting times.

PS9 > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 13:47

2

step one: Don't do what idiot me did last year and bring a Nexus 7 to take your photos with. iThingys and droids (as good as they presently are) CANNOT replace a genuine Mirror less or DSLR.

step two: forget about taking good pictures of the miata. Its not going to work. Even if you make a bee line for it when the door s first open, you have approximately .35 seconds before it becomes completely surrounded by drift kiddies and old dudes who want to talk to each other about how it compares to their vette (because I used to have both, and the vette has more power but the miata has better steering feel and...)

Stephen the Canuck > Xyl0c41n3 10/02/2014 at 13:53

1

I agree with you on the 50mm f/1.4 being very useful. I wish I'd had my 50mm f1.8 for the Toronto Auto Show this spring.

I think the polarizing filter would be useful. When I shot an indoor auto show, I found there were a lot of light reflections on the cars from the over head lights. I would think that a polarizing filter would help cut those out. Plus, there should be enough light that there won't be any trouble compensating for any exposure loss.

One thing I found was the lighting was inconsistent in colour. There were flourescent lights, and regular lights throughout. It pretty much depended on the exhibit to what they're lighting was.

Xyl0c41n3 > Stephen the Canuck 10/02/2014 at 14:01

1

That's why I like using strobes. You make and control your own light and you know it's all daylight balanced. The polarizer really is a subjective thing, though. I mean, it's definitely useful to cutting out the glare, but I personally kinda like the shine. But, especially for someone who hasn't used one before, it can be a bit cumbersome to be taking it off and putting it on to see what you like better. If you know you've got all the time in the world, then yeah, play around, experiment, and have fun. It's definitely something BATC can feel out when he's there. He might try it and decide he gets sick of it. Or he might find he likes it.

I also forgot to mention that if he wants to shoot shots that are pretty close to the "focal length" of the human eye, he should shoot at around 35mm. If it was a film camera, that'd be closer to a 50mm lens.

But in the absence of making your own light via strobes, you can fix most ambient light color temperature imbalances in post. Or, you can exaggerate them, or whatever. Basically, I hope BATC just has a helluva lot of fun out there! And I can't wait to see his shots.

BATC42 > Xyl0c41n3 10/02/2014 at 14:23

1

Wow, thanks for the comment, and all of the tips!

I wanted to get a polarizing filter because I'd like to cut off the reflections on the cars, and I can get a hoya pro filter for 40€ courtesy of Amazon. Though if I use the 50mm I won't be able to use the PL filter since the screw mount has a bump...
I don't have a flash (yet), but a decent setup will probably cost me a lot more than I'm willing (and can spend) right now. And I have absolutely no experience using flashes and strobe setup, so I'd like to have some practice fist ^^

I think I'm going to go for a variety of shots, I jsut really want to learn and try my hand at various stuff. Next step is to do some action shots, but that will wait the end of the month, when I'll go to a rally.

And again, thanks for the advice !

BATC42 > Victorious Secret 10/02/2014 at 14:24

0

And I'm going there on a weekend, so it's going to be even busier... My goal is to be at the gates for 9:30am to get in at 10am, when the show opens.

BATC42 > Stephen the Canuck 10/02/2014 at 14:27

0

I'm going to shoot in RAW, so I'll be able to play with the white balance afterwards.

The most difficult thing for me is going to try and find interesting angles, I'm new to all this, so it's going to be quite a challenge I believe.

And I'm going to try to be there before 10am so I can enter the show as soon as the doors open.

BATC42 > PS9 10/02/2014 at 14:29

0

To be fair, the Miata isn't really a common sight in France, and we don't have Corvettes so... drift kiddies are probably going to go drool at the GTR anyway.

Xyl0c41n3 > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 14:34

2

No problem. If you ever have questions, feel free to ask. I'm a photographer by trade. And what Stephen said elsewhere is spot on, too. Try to get shots from anywhere that isn't at eye level. Squat, kneel, tiptoe, stand on a step. Eye level is easy, and incredibly boring. His advice to use parts of the environment in framing your compositions is also solid advice.

As for rally, you can experiment there with how you want to shoot motion. Do you want to stop everything in a freeze frame where everything is visible? Then use a fast shutter speed to do so. Do you want to make it feel as if the motion was just too fast, and to impart the excitement you felt at the rush of it all? Then slow down your shutter speed to something like 1/50 or 1/100 and track your target (usually laterally). That'll end up keeping your subject (the car) in focus while motion blurring everything else in the frame. It all depends on what kind of image you're trying to create, what kind of emotion you want to evoke. And the best advice? Go out there and have a shit ton of fun. ^_^

Stephen the Canuck > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 14:38

0

RAW will help. Make sure you have enough memory card space.

Since you're new at it, just do whatever catches your eye or looks cool to you.

That's good. Will it be a weekday? That should also help.

BATC42 > Xyl0c41n3 10/02/2014 at 14:42

1

My camera has a tilting screen, so I really like shooting the same way one would shoot using a Rolleiflex camera :)
I'm going to try to get a faster tele-photo lens before the end of next week, like a 135mm f/2.8. Might be fun to use.

As for rally, I want to try my hand at panning. And I just saw a panning shot of a Porsche 919 on the straight at the Paul Ricard track, awesome shot!

Stephen the Canuck > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 14:44

0

The Yongnuo YN-560 III Speedlite Flash would work, and isn't crazily expensive.

Stephen the Canuck > Xyl0c41n3 10/02/2014 at 14:47

1

The best advice you've got is perfect. I really enjoyed the way you phrased it too. It's good to have another pro photographer around here.

You can read all the tips and tricks in the world, but you gotta get out there and practice. Try out different things, experiment, try, fail, learn, succeed.

Photography is an art. There's no real wrong way to do it. There's just ways to learn and improve.

BATC42 > Stephen the Canuck 10/02/2014 at 14:50

0

I currently have a 32gb SD card, I can get my on hand on a 2 8gb cards I think.

Unfortunately it will be on a saturday (and maybe sunday), but I'll try to get there before the gates open.

Xyl0c41n3 > Stephen the Canuck 10/02/2014 at 14:54

1

Thanks, Stephen! It's nice to make your acquaintance, too. And yup, I've always got a camera at hand because there's always something I want to try shooting. Photography is my favorite science turned art. ^_^

Stephen the Canuck > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 14:56

2

Panning is good. And it's not that hard. Try using the centre focus point, and place it on the front of the car, then use it to follow the car. Shutter speed anywhere from 1/50th of a second up to 1/200th for really fast cars. Try to make sure the entire car is crisp (may take a slightly higher shutter speed).

A telephoto lens like that won't be much good at an auto show, except for small detail shots. There's usually not enough space to back up to get the whole car in frame.

Since you have a tilting screen, you can place your camera on the floor, and get shots like this.

It's a neat perspective, particularly for showing off how low cars are to the floor.

Stephen the Canuck > Xyl0c41n3 10/02/2014 at 14:59

1

Looking at my post, I didn't mean to imply that I'm a pro. I'm not even close. But there are a few around here. Photography is awesome. I've never been artistic, but photography just works for me. I usually try to take my camera with me wherever I can. And I read a lot of info about it. It's just fun.

Nice to make your acquaintance too.

craig-oesterling > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 15:01

1

I'd recommend sticking your 50mm on there and shooting close to wide-open. If your camera has an Auto-ISO feature with a top-end limit, set that for something reasonable that will allow you decent shutter speeds and controllable noise levels. Then you can leave it on Auto-ISO and either shoot manual or shutter-priority.

I'd try to avoid too-wide angles especially if you're using your 16-50. Keep it toward the long end. Personally, I really don't like close-up wide-angle distortion on cars. You end up with a massive amount of the bumper or something and hardly anything of the rest of the car. Of course, I'm not sure how a 50mm looks on that body. That might be too tight. But the low-light capabilities of that 1.4 will really help you keep your shutter speeds up. Also, shoot details.

The shows I've gone to haven't been big-time like Paris. So for a lot of the feature cars you should be able to get some pretty decent stuff since they'll be up on pedestals and well-lit.

Focus on what you like, and take a few more shots than you need, especially on those super-rare cars you may never see again. Have fun!

https://www.flickr.com/photos/coester…

MonkeePuzzle > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 15:03

0

if you have such skills, take a tripod (or unipod to save space) and take 2 or three pics. you can then splice them to get a pic without people

Stephen the Canuck > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 15:08

1

32gb should be plenty. It's a 16.3mp camera, my T3i is 18mp, and I can fit around 800 RAW pictures on a 16gb card. So you should be alright there.

Weekend mornings aren't bad. I would think a lot of people would show up after lunch and stay later rather than show up early. Most people don't want to rush in the morning.

Go, and have fun. Play around. If you can't get a particular shot, don't worry about it. You'll have more opportunities.

Also, FlowerGirl is right. We'd better get to see your pictures.

BATC42 > craig-oesterling 10/02/2014 at 15:09

1

I shuffled through your Flickr, I really like your shots !. And thnaks for the tips :)

BATC42 > Stephen the Canuck 10/02/2014 at 15:13

0

I have to clean my card though, I have around 2000 pictures on it (since I got the camera in early July). Right now it tells me I can shoot around 500 RAWs, so I assume it could be closer to 800/900, maybe even more if I shoot RAW only and not RAW+jpeg.

I hope you'll see them too, I haven't bought the train ticket yet, I'll do it this weekend, I have to go a SNCF store to have the 25% discount on the ticket. So it's not a done deal yet :)

Stephen the Canuck > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 15:39

0

How have you still left them on the card? My mother and brother have done that too so far, and I don't get it. When I get home from shooting, I cut all the pictures from my card and then paste them into my folder system. Then usually back them up to two different external hard drives. So my memory cards always get cleared and then formatted when put back into my cameras.

I just checked, and it's around 600 RAW photos I can fit on a 16gb card. So you should be good to fit at least a thousand on a 32gb card. Maybe even 1200.

Well hopefully you can make it happen. The train should be fun. That would be a good chance to experiment with freezing action, shoot out the window and try to have freeze what's going by.

I'm not sure what you use to host images, but Flickr and imgur and maybe photobucket can do slideshows, which make for nice posts on here for people to see.

Make sure to fully charge your camera battery(ies), and take your charger. If you take a break for lunch, try and charge the battery so you can make sure to have enough power.

Stephen the Canuck > MonkeePuzzle 10/02/2014 at 15:44

0

I think most shows don't allow tripods. Maybe small ones though.

MonkeePuzzle > Stephen the Canuck 10/02/2014 at 15:48

0

take crutches?

Stephen the Canuck > MonkeePuzzle 10/02/2014 at 15:52

1

Maybe. Take a backpack with a bean bag, Place the bean bag on the backpack on the floor, and place camera on top.

BATC42 > Stephen the Canuck 10/02/2014 at 15:53

0

Haven't had time to get around to sort all of them (the most recent ones, so around 500 I guess), and since I don't have a way to backup yet (I will get my external hard drive this week end) I keep them on the card just in case.

Taking picture outside the train might prove to be a bit hard, especially at 300km/h. I have a flickr account so they are going to go there.

Stephen the Canuck > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 15:58

0

Fair enough. External hard drives are brilliant. Less than $100CAD for a 1TB drive that will hold almost 200,000 pictures. They're worth it. Someone I know just fills up his SD cards, then buys a new one. He uses the filled one as his photo backups, just puts them away after labeling them.

Right, I forgot y'all overseas get the fast trains. Whoops. Still, it's practice for getting out to racetracks when there's fast cars racing. Haha. Flickr is good.

BATC42 > Stephen the Canuck 10/02/2014 at 16:01

0

I've got a 1TB drive but it's almost full, this weekend I will also get my 2TB network hard drive, perfect for what I want.

Stephen the Canuck > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 16:03

0

That should work perfectly then.

iforgotmyburnerkeyonce > BATC42 10/02/2014 at 17:36

0

http://photography.kinja.com/my-experience-…

Go to the section labeled "tips and hints".

It's a post I made earlier this year and I can't be held responsible for any less-than-the-quality-I'm-at-now info because I'm always learning and I feel like even back to February I've upped my game, but if I remember right, there's some decent information in there.

BATC42 > iforgotmyburnerkeyonce 10/02/2014 at 18:04

1

That was the post I was looking for earlier today, I knew i saw pictures from an autoshow on Photography, couldn't find them. So thanks, a lot!
Would you happen to have these pictures somewhere online? (Iabsolutely love the shot of the salesman btw)

After reading your post I think I'll probably mostly shoot using the 50mm, giving a focal length close to your 85. It's almost the only lens I use. I think I'm going to live the 50-230 at home.
What bothers me with this lens though, is that some of my pictures aren't in focus where I want them (and not by much), I don't know if it's because i'm an idiot who can't focus right, or if Fuji's focus peaking isn't accurate.

BiTurbo228 - Dr Frankenstein of Spitfires > BATC42 10/03/2014 at 05:55

1

Detail shots are your friends at car shows. It's difficult to get a whole car framed nicely, but you should be able to get nice shots of cool little details without anything else cluttering up the picture :)

iforgotmyburnerkeyonce > BATC42 10/03/2014 at 15:37

1

A further distance between you and your subject will give you deeper DoF, but if you're too close at a wide aperture, you can end up swaying just enough to change the focus. I did this so much when I got the 85/1.2. That, and have you tried zooming to double check the focus on the Fuji? I don't fully trust fujis focus peaking yet.

most of those pictures have been taken down, but there's two I think on my Flickr... Http://Www.flickr.com/photos/waldent

iforgotmyburnerkeyonce > iforgotmyburnerkeyonce 10/03/2014 at 15:39

1

I'd write more right now, but I'm in the midst of setting up for a wedding TheGirlfriend and I are shooting. I'll dig deeper later!

ttyymmnn > Xyl0c41n3 10/03/2014 at 15:42

1

I've been preaching about changing the vantage point forever. Everybody sees from approx. 6 ft off the floor, so anything you can do to mix that up makes for more interesting shots.

I haven't had a chance to read your posts at length, but I will. Cheers.

Xyl0c41n3 > ttyymmnn 10/03/2014 at 19:17

0

Thanks, man! I'll keep an eye out for your stuff, as well! Have a great weekend!

ttyymmnn > Xyl0c41n3 10/03/2014 at 19:26

1

Likewise.