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Watch out !!!! (no edit)

by willem

Many people questioned how I achieved my motion blur challenge entry. Well, here is the explanation. It shows the evolution through a series of shots. I took a total of 22 shots and picked the challenge entry at home, behind my PC.

First important thing is to find the right location. I used an empty parking space next to a school on a Friday afternoon. You don’t need much space, just enough to drive slow circles. The surrounding buildings were some 10 meters away and the sun was shining through an opening between the buildings.

Second important thing is to achieve a longer shutter speed during bright daylight. Although it was around five o’clock in the afternoon, it was a bright and sunny day. In this case a neutral density filter (ND8) was used to give me 3 extra stops. An alternative could be a polariser (2 stops). Combining the ND8 filter with F8 aperture allowed me a shutter speed of 1/10 of a second, which was sufficient in this case. Without the ND filter the shutter speed would have been 1/80 s, too short for a nice movement blur. Exposure was measured on a greycard and set manually.

Third of course is to mount the camera for the desired angle of view. I used a very cheap and light tripod (no, not my Manfrotto), extended the legs, but at first did not fold the legs open. I attached it to the front of the car with some strong straps. Because it was a cheap tripod the legs bend a bit which also creates some tension and keeps everything in place.

Then I started : manual exposure, auto focus and self timer. Set the self timer, jump into the car and drive a slow circle. Check the result and try again using different camera positions and different starting points versus the sun.

Here are some examples achieved with this setup. :



I liked the dynamic feel of the shot with the camera at an angle but really wanted some more distance to the car, to see more of the blur of the road and surroundings. So I took the tripod of, shortened on of the legs and folded it open. Then I attached it again to the car, like this :



Repeating the same process I got a number of different shots, some with the sun on the car, some in the shadow, some with some softer light (must have been a cloud). I also tried 1/20 of a second (image below) instead of 1/10, but this did not make a big difference.

Here are the results with this setup :




My final choice for the challenge was this image, which I especially like because of the contrast, with the shadow on the car but the sun on the tire. Also the reflection on the car and the clean but still blurred background made this the best one, in my opinion.

All I did to create the final image was crop away some of the sky and a very minor curves adjustment, for even more contrast.



Next time I would also try to drive the other way, so turning left instead of right, to make the shot even more scary. If you are not comfortable doing this on your car, why not try it on your children’s go-cart or your granny’s rocking chair ? This last idea I have seen once it the magazine Practical Photography and resulted in a great picture.

Have fun,
Willem

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