Not only have I never taken a photography class or been paid for a photo, but I've pretty much only shot digital (at least when it comes to BMX). There's something romantic and real about shooting film, but I like a) being able to see my images right away, and b) being able to store 500-plus full-sized frames on one 2g SD card. I also don't carry much equipment. Three lenses, the camera body, and that's about it. I have a slave flash, but the (light activated) remote isn't very reliable. Not to mention I need AAs for it. The one thing I absolutely should invest in is a spare battery for my camera, because I'm forever forgetting to charge mine, then having it die at the most inopportune moments.
(You know, I actually did shoot 35mm news photos--and develop them--when I worked briefly for the Oxford (PA) Tribune right out of college. Not sure if that qualifies me as a pro, though.)
I'm also not one for a lot of setup time. I like to think part of it is because I approach BMX photography from more of a journalistic standpoint (record what's happening without influencing it), but part of it is because I'm kind of lazy. All too often do I realize too late that I should have been standing THERE instead of HERE. And that maybe I should have started using my 50-200 lens before last week. But my normal MO is just pulling the camera out of the bag when I see something interesting happening (or about to happen) and try and capture what I can.
Sometimes there's someone filming already, and I'm always conscious that my flash could mess up a line, either by distracting the rider or rendering the clip unwatchable. So, I improvise. In this case, Nigel was doing a 180 on the bank to barspin out (I think) and the slow shutter speed captured it in a different way. I really like the blur of the front wheel and bars. If I was a real photographer, I would have set up a tripod up top and stabilized the background but, yeah, I'm not.
I really like this next one, although it seems it could benefit from some further brightness/contrast adjustment. If I remember correctly, this was a session where we were messing with the "bulb" setting, where the shutter stays open as long as you keep the trigger pressed down. You can set it up so the flash fires twice, once when the shutter opens and again when it closes. The hope was, with the camera stationary, that it would pick up a double-exposure image of a feeble-to-smith. It didn't. But the ghost feeble is still kind of cool.
(This post was somewhat inspired by Keith Romanowski's latest update over at Ride LI. Keith IS a real photographer, and his stuff is super-rad. Check it out.)
6 comments:
What kind of equipment would you recommend to someone who is just getting into BMX photographpy?
If you can afford it, just a basic digital SLR body and a basic 18-55 wide-angle lens. Preferably Canon or Nikon (so you can build on it later). I use a Nikon D50 that I got used for $500 with two lenses.
You could get a film SLR for a LOT less, but a) film and developing costs add up quick and b) digital allows you to progress MUCH faster as a photographer, IMO. You can see right away what angles and settings work the best and adjust accordingly. Not to mention if you're primarily shooting for the web, digital is fine.
Sorry if that was a little long-winded.
That helps out a lot dude.
A film camera is definitely out of the question. I'm getting ready to go to Iraq again.
Any websites you can recommend on how to set up shutter speed, and all that crap?
Wow, good luck over there.
I haven't really done much reading on settings, I mostly just experiment and see what works. Most digital SLRs also have an automatic setting that shows you the aperture and shutter speed settings.
Hey thanks for the link Russ!
Love that Nigel shot!!
Post a Comment