Panning a moving subject
Just after I bought the new camera my mother-in-law wondered why I shot so many pictures of cars as we were driving from place to place. I tried to explain to her that I was practicing the technique of panning a moving subject, but she didn’t understand what the fuck I was talking about.
This is what I was talking about:
If you want to try this technique, experiment with the shutter speed on your camera. Set it somewhere between 1/15 sec or 1/30 sec (sometimes even faster or slower). These are shot from a moving car, which makes it more difficult: it’s easier if you’re standing still, while the object you’re shooting is moving.
I’ve done it too, but I’ve mostly shot objects out of a moving train. You need faster shutter speed when you are (or the object is) moving at speeds over 100 kms per hour. You’ve seen some of those shots
July 18, 2012 at 08:48
Yes, great shots from the Indian railways.
July 18, 2012 at 13:17
‘hahaha’ – try to ‘shot’ the mouth of your mother in law when she’ speaking – maybe it could be as fast as the cars… ‘joke joke’
July 18, 2012 at 09:05
Like your jokes Drake
July 18, 2012 at 12:11
Well, like Face says: “You need faster shutter speed when you are (or the object is) moving at speeds over 100 kms per hour.”
July 18, 2012 at 13:13
Hmmm, I have written another comment some minutes ago, why does not it show up?
July 18, 2012 at 12:12
It’s there
July 18, 2012 at 13:15
Good, I started being paranoic considering all the banning history here
July 18, 2012 at 13:17
Cardinal,
I haven’t done this in a while, but I do like the results.
July 18, 2012 at 12:45
Thanks. It’s fun to experiment with different techniques.
July 18, 2012 at 13:17
Thanks for the tips – sometimes when I try to shoot things that are moving it doesn’t turn out (obviously) so I will give these panning tricks a try!
July 20, 2012 at 03:40
It’s also a great way to capture running kids or animals like dogs & horses, but obviously it’s easiest to practice on cars (since there’s such an abundance of them).
July 20, 2012 at 05:35
Oh exactly – kids are mental, and you can’t get them to slow down for pictures but if you can get the camera to work with them it’s brilliant!
July 20, 2012 at 18:40
Oh exactly – kids are mental, and you can’t get them to slow down for pictures but if you can get the camera to work with them it’s brilliant!
July 20, 2012 at 18:40
I tried this on BMX bikes recently – got one good shot out of all the ones I tried. The bikes all disappeared before I caught them – back to the drawing board. Practice makes perfect. I’ll get the hang of it eventually. I think my challenge was focus lock. Do you set yours on manual focus?
July 20, 2012 at 23:07
BMX is awesome! I love “extreme” sports – all the other sports are pretty much boring.
Yes I have mine on manual focus, but I pre-focus to the general area where the object will be.
July 20, 2012 at 23:14
Thanks – will keep practicing – show jumping/x-country rally this weekend…
July 21, 2012 at 02:12
Lucky you! Wish I could come with you!!
July 21, 2012 at 05:39