Assignment 3 - Panning

[dkippen]

Okay - here is my try at panning, but not with cars.

[jerryph]

In the first one, you got the basics of it... in #2 and #3, it's backwards becuase the horses are blurred and not the backgrounds.

Still an awesome try. Panning is very hard to get right without a lot of practice.

[nikkirose]

I tried panning today and took heaps of shots but I could not master it -will have to keep trying so well done to you.
Nikkirose

[jerryph]

Here is a little trick... get a little closer to the horse (maybe like 20-30 feet) as it gallops by pan with the horse aiming at only it's body or head (which ever appears to be bouncing less, as it comes square with you snap the pic but do not stop panning, just kinda follow through.

Horses are VERY difficult to get using this technique. Moving cars are a lot easier as they do not bounce.

[jonrayner]

Great effort, especially the first one, I am still trying to get the opportunity to get out and practice mine!

[dkippen]

Jerry -

I think this was a one time shot and as long I was there, I wanted to give it a try. It was a challenge to find a good spot to try the panning as the horses were constantly changing direction and there were 10 other people trying to do the same thing. For the most part, I'm pleased with the results. It was a fun opportunity.

[janine]

here is my attempt - also not of cars - just my husband walking the baby hehehehe (my new favorite subject of course)now just to go out there and practice the ghost trail effect...

[LensBaby]

Good! I am glad that you are starting to join in now! I know how busy you must be with the little one though!

[sanzia]

Well, I am up to this assignment, but had to spend hours to even find out how to put my camera in the right mode. :rolleyes: Eventually I worked it out, but didn't feel confident enough to work with cars, so I chose water for an experiment, just to see if I could freeze it. I put a perfume bottle in the bathroom sink and put the tap on quite fast, and it does look almost like ice to me, and the unfrozen parts are blurred, although I had to crop a lot off. It's a start, but perhaps tomorrow or the weekend, I'll be chasing cars. :D

~Sanzia

[jerryph]

Panning is where you move the camera to follow an abject along its course and as you take the picture, the object that you are "following" is clear and the background is blurred.

This is not my work, but my friend (and business partner at times) who is a professional racing photographer (www.alainsurprenant.com), but it is a perfect example:

http://www.proudphotography.com/forum/gallery/files/1/0/0/0/aps_work.jpg

Note how the car is in focus and the background well blurred? This is the effect panning does. :)

Go to the corner of any street, and "follow" a car as it passes by, try snapping the picture as it is just in front of you but keep twisting your body to follow through.

I hope this helps.

[sanzia]

Thank you for the excellent example, and yes, I did know after the lesson what I am 'supposed' to do, but *cough* I had to work out how to get into "S" mode first, and then how to change shutter speeds, and then see if I could take "any shots".

From that, I am sure you can see that any help is appreciated. It is really not all that flattering to not even know how to get into "S" mode, but if I can 'pan' successfully, I will probably faint. :rolleyes:

Thank you!:)

~Sanzia

[sanzia]

At 65 MPH and 100+F degrees heat, this is the best I can do. I do understand the concept and now know if the cars were slower, it would have been easier, but I really enjoyed this exercise. Two are in focus as close as I could get, and 2 are with BG in focus. Thank you for the example that I can only aim for. :)

[dkippen]

Sanzia - I think the goal is to just understand panning and how it's done. I don't forsee myself perfecting this art for quite some time. There are other techniques I want to get better at first. It seems everything is easy when at slow speed or stopped. Nice try.

[sanzia]

Sanzia - I think the goal is to just understand panning and how it's done. I don't forsee myself perfecting this art for quite some time. There are other techniques I want to get better at first. It seems everything is easy when at slow speed or stopped. Nice try.

Hi Debbie,

I was not sure if we had to post that we tried here or not, and I sure didn't get it as I wanted. The light was extreme even though it was late afternoon; cars were too fast, and too crowded for this, and I lack the expertise, but understand the concept. For me, I will now be able to do what I want with birds on a lake in motion, which is far, far slower than this was. So, although I could not physically do this as the example shown, I learnt so much just trying. In honesty, this is not the type of photography I would ever take in my life; it just isn't me, but what we learn in trying, makes up for what we might do with it. I probably will try again for fun!

Thanks for looking. :)

Sanzia

[LensBaby]

I think you did a good job for your first tine trying this. This is one of the harder assignments for me. Hey can I borrow some of your heat to melt all of the snow that we have here? I would love to just see GREEN grass again.

[jerryph]

A hint: click the picture just as the car is in front of you as it is passing by. If your body movement matches the speed of the car passing by, it comes into focus, the background blurs. Basically, if you can see the hood or trunk, its not in the "correct" position.

[sanzia]

Ok, that's a good hint after the fact:D. But this was on a highway, and at that speed I was too close to do what you are saying. But I do get "it". The few I did get as you say were better, but the highway was crowded and another car would spoil the effect:confused:. One funny thing, I did snap a guy way off ....never mind, it's gross what he was doing with his nose. So I DO understand, this was just waaaaay too fast for me at this stage, and as I have more 100F+ degrees heat to face [about a week so they say] I will try this again later.

That's a good tip though. Thanks a lot!

[sanzia]

PS: Can you move your body at 100K's++? :D

[sanzia]

I think you did a good job for your first tine trying this. This is one of the harder assignments for me. Hey can I borrow some of your heat to melt all of the snow that we have here? I would love to just see GREEN grass again.

Thanks for telling me that. I had a friend pro photographer who said I was nuts doing the highway the first time.:confused: It's also a hard one for me because my heart is not really in taking pics of cars lol. Now as for the heat, you can come here, and I will trade places with you anyday!!! They are saying that the summer to come for your hemisphere is going to be very hot, humid and dry, so if I were you, I would enjoy that snow. We are getting night temps of up to 30C, and even with AC the body still feels it.

I want to roll in your snow!!!:eek:

Ha, your user name had me looking at the Lensbabies, and I just have to get one of those sometime!!! I love the look on somethings, and dislike it on others, but thanks for the ad with your name . :)

~Sanzi

[jerryph]

PS: Can you move your body at 100K's++? :D

No, but here is a little fun fact... did you ever as a kid swing or spin a ball on a string? How fast was the string close to your hand moving compared to the ball? The longer the string, the faster the ball was moving, even if you always spun it at the same speed.

If you are close to the car passing by (right on the sidewalk for example), you will have to twist pretty fast to keep up (now try standing close to a race track and do that with a car roaring by at 275kph. Not only will you throw out your back trying to keep up, its a little dangerous to be close to a car speeding by that fast.. lol).

To make it possible, stand back a little further and zoom in. All of a sudden you made the "string longer". The effect is that you twist slower, but still get the effect you want.

Try it out! :)