Scirocco Central

I'm getting reasonably good at it now. When you know the right settings you can get a 50% hit rate ok. If you can do 1 in 10 you're doing all right. But it depends a bit on the shutter speed. 1/300th of a second will make it look like it's actually moving and you can get those right most of the time. To get loads of blur, like the guy hanging out the side, that's only a 1/60th I think (or maybe 1/40th) and they're a bit harder. Maybe one in 3 or 4 is good. But it depends how fast the car is, how far away you are and the angle the car is coming across your field of view.

It's all good practice for the 28th at the first day of the F1s at Silverstone. But they'll be at least 1/160th shots I think.

The little blades are for cutting the timing beam. The cars are lined up with the blade right by the starter beam and then it's used as a standard solid point to cut the beam at half way and the end so there's no arguments about whether the nose of the car was below or above the timing beam and so disputing what part of the car crossed the line first.

A couple from the Isle of Wight.

Went with a friend to have another go at the milky way but it was too cloudy so we shot the sunset and tried light writing

I visited my friend in Swansea at the weekend and had another go at the Milky Way. Still a lot of light pollution down there but I did much better.

Cotswold Wildlife Park
Full gallery here
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Great shots again Kev, which lens did you use this time?

ps. I did buy a 300mm lens in the end, very pleased with the results so far, expensive though being a M4/3 mount.

100-400mm but I wasn't hugely happy with those shots. That lens is a bit trickier than you might think and definitely has a sweet spot for settings.

A few pics from my recent holiday to South Africa.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/jwqtorq55sfk64y/e2mdjbmAJy" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Nice shots Kev as usual!

I recently purchased a Canon 700D with the standard 18-75mm lense, and a 75-200mm lense. I am still very much beginning to learn the setting etc, but here are a few random photo's I've taken so far...

Practise with different focal point at a Trabant meet:





Random cats:







A bit of wildlife:





Lake view:



And finally, the moon:

skippy wrote:A few pics from my recent holiday to South Africa.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/jwqtorq55sfk64y/e2mdjbmAJy" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Fantastic.
Looks like you had a great time and saw a good variety of wildlife.

Ozmosis wrote:I recently purchased a Canon 700D with the standard 18-75mm lense, and a 75-200mm lense. I am still very much beginning to learn the setting etc, but here are a few random photo's I've taken so far...

You're off to a great start! Some cracking pictures there. Really nice and sharp.

Kev wrote: You're off to a great start! Some cracking pictures there. Really nice and sharp.

Thanks Kev! I'll keep practising, looking forward to the winter to get some nice contrasting shots...

Looks like you had a great time and saw a good variety of wildlife.

Thanks Kev, it was an amazing holiday, just 10 of my 2000 odd pics!

Milky way in Llangollen last weekend.
Bit too cloudy but wasn't bad.
30 secs, ISO 3200, F2.8




And a good moon tonight. Clear sky. Bloody freezing!!!
1/320th, F11, ISO500, 400mm + 1.4x extender = 560mm and lots of post-cropping!

Kev wrote: And a good moon tonight. Clear sky. Bloody freezing!!!
1/320th, F11, ISO500, 400mm + 1.4x extender = 560mm and lots of post-cropping!

thats a really good pic of the moon. Out of curiosity how much would it set you back regarding cameras etc to be able to take that sort of pics.

I used a canon 100-400mm (£1100ish) and a 1.4x extender (£300ish) but the picture below was also taken tonight by a friend of mine using a 75-300mm which is only a couple of hundred quid. It's more about focus and settings. Obviously more reach gets you a little bit closer (you can see I have a bit more detail in the craters at the bottom) but if it's not in focus or properly exposed you don't get anywhere.

Only just seen these moon shots Kev, amazing. Again - we always talk about it, in this country getting away from light pollution is difficult, so glad you did find a spot not to spoil your shots.

I would imagine these did require a lot of patience!

The moon was done in the car park at my flat
Just a case of staying warm!!

For the moon there's a rough rule of thumb to get you started called Loony 11.

Stick it on F11 and the ISO and shutter at the same values (eg ISO 400 and 1/400th or ISO 800 and 1/800th) and you should be pretty close to a decent exposure, give or take.

I have enjoyed just playing about with a Canon 550D but want to get much better - does anyone have any good sources of information or is it just practise and experience?