Beginners Tips

As I am going to be visiting more race meeting this year. I thought it might be a good idea to get in photography as well. Now I have two camaras at present one is mine and one as my Dad's. I have a Nikon Nuvis 200 APS, which is great and has produce some good picture. But my Dad has recently got a digtial camara, a Fuji Finepix 3800. My question is this kit good enough and does anyone have any tip, not so much for the APS, but for the digtal as this is the one I am going to be using the most, when I can borrow it that is.

not much you can do with automatic cameras on the track i've found, unless you can get right next to the track, and i mean right next to it. atmospheric shots are good, you can do a lot of those, and definitely try some people shots. the off guard non-posed ones are the best i reckon, some of the expressions i've got have been priceless!

When using a digital, it costs nothing to keep shooting away, don't be afraid to experiment. When trackside, you may need to use the zoom more often, so keep the image size as fine as possible, so when you download it you can play with the image better.

Spend time in the Paddock, you never know what you will see, as Bella says, these can be the best pictures.

If you really know your camera (and mean REALLY know it) you'd be surprised what you can do with an all or mostly auto camera. Figure out how it reacts in panning shots, how the shutter speed and autofocus adjust, etc. It takes a lot of taking some pictures, looking at the results and adjusting your shooting style from that. Good thing you have digital...

But, yeah, the paddock can produce some very interesting shots. People doing things, car parts, other situations that pop-up...

I've come into this thread a bit late but a digital camera is my favourite camera to use in the paddock. I just find it so much easier to capture situations quickly without worrying about setting up the lenses. Just point-and-shoot and it really does the trick. It's the spontaneous aspect that I like best about that. It's also small, compact and can be whipped out suddenly with hardly any setting up needed. I use a (now-discontinued) Kodak DC3200 digital camera.

I've had some great digital shots taken as a spur-of-the-moment - one of my favourite being JPM immediately after he'd had his lunch (judging by the look on his face I don't think it was very tasty:)) and a few of Kimi. I also used the digi cam to take some shots of the insides of Villeneuve's engine cover last year after his Honda had grenaded inside of it - used it to photograph the scorch marks before BAR spotted me;)

I use the big Nikon or the APS for track shots but the digital is great for the paddock.

Rob, I've always sworn by my SLRs. I've had an EOS100 for nearly 13 years and I love it to death. It serves me well at our favourite place every June. (Although last year's offerings weren't the best ever.....).

Having said this, I've become increasingly impressed with some of the shots that can be taken with relatively modest auto digital cameras. Some of the pics our mate Fab produces at Le Mans each year would do justice to an SLR and lenses costing way more.

rob..i don't know the models you own, but as ayse says an slr will always be better as you can change lenses to suit different situations.

if your camera can't take different lenses then thats something i'd look into. maybe a good digital slr.

great thing about digital is you can shoot as much as you like then wipe and start again. bad thing about digital is it still doesn't compare in quality to a nicely exposed roll of fuji velvia!

Well I had my first outing with Digital today and here are some of the results. Over all I am quite pleased with efforts. What do the experts think?

Action shot

Another action shot

and finally

hmmm, try a longer lens and different vantage points so that fences etc. don't come into the frame

next time you are at Donington try the infield..you can get right on the inside of Redgate...the Craner Curves...the run up to Starkeys Bridge and Mcleans with no fencing in the way whatsoever..another good place is just the other side of the road tunnel to the infield on the exhibition centre side of the track you can get some good shots of cars just before and as they enter the esses