Rockingham Part Two

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Baz007

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Chris
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Having a chat about the downforce issues
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One of my fav's I think
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Seeing as nobody could get near us, we added the 'BYE BYE!' plate
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Post grass cutting :thumbsdown:
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#2 and #4 a bit underexposed - nice shots
 
Yeah, thanks for comment. I think i need to understand exposure a little, actually, a lot better
 
what's Rockingham?
 
Trev Rich said:
an oval race circuit me thinks... :thinking:
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Ah, the sort where you get to tie up the steering wheel and read the paper on the way round :D ;)
 
You can't tie the steering wheel up on banks like that! We were on the infield too, quite challenging...
I haven't got a video sorted, i'll try and find time this weekend, i'll let you know when its done. It won't be anything spectacular mind...
 
Baz007 said:
You can't tie the steering wheel up on banks like that! We were on the infield too, quite challenging...
I haven't got a video sorted, i'll try and find time this weekend, i'll let you know when its done. It won't be anything spectacular mind...
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i'm just intrigued by the car as it looked good in the mag. bet it sounds nice.
 
It sounds awesome, yeah. It looks better in the flesh. We'll be at a fair few tracks this season, maybe you'll get chance to see it. Think we're off to Brands on 17+18th for a test.
 
Baz007 said:
Yeah, thanks for comment. I think i need to understand exposure a little, actually, a lot better
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Quite simple really...;)

Half and 1/3 f-stops/ EV complicated the hell out of the very simple original model we used when Pentax K-1000's and ME Supers were considered great technology...oh boy I'm sounding like a right old cantankerous coot here...:bonk::LOL:

Controlling exposure is done in any one (or a combination) of three ways.

Faster or longer shutters. (Time)
Bigger or smaller apertures inside the lens. (Amount of light)
Film (or sensor) "speed". (Sensitivity to light)

In the simple old days everything was double or half of the previous setting and whatever you wanted to take on the one side you had to give on another aspect.

If you wanted to freeze movement you needed a very quick shutter - 1/500 or 1/1000 second or faster. To do this you needed "fast film" i.e. film that needed little light - ISO 400, 800, 1600 or higher or "fast lenses" with a maximum f of f/2 or f/1.4 or so.

Chances are you needed a combination.

If you wanted landscape piccies with DOF from here to next week you needed to use a high f number such as 16, 22, 32 or higher, which is no problem with most lenses.

Thing is, you needed to give something to gain something and so you needed long shutters - 1/4, 1/8 or 1/2 sec typically. You often did not want fast film because of excessive grain in high ISO's


Traditionally, shutter speeds would be range of numbers containing the following:
1 ; ½ ; ¼ ; 1/8 ; 1/15 ; 1/30 ; 1/60 ; 1/125 ; 1/250 ; 1/500 and other higher fractions of seconds sometimes as high as 1/8000 of a second.

So because of this everything worked in double or half so it was possible to compensate correctly. Take 1 here, give 1 there...

Only thing was, f numbers never made sense until you did some advanced primary school maths.

Traditionally you would have had these options:
f/# 0.5 0.7 1.0 1.4 2 2.8 4 5.6 8 11 16 22 32 45 64 90 128

Like shutter speeds they are also half or double the next setting.

Along with modern technology came the 1/2 and 1/3 stops (which apply to shutters, f/stops and sometimes even ISO).

They do give improved levels of control over exposure but it is good to understand the basic numbers first(y)

With half stops you now have the following options:

f/# 1.0 1.2 1.4 1.7 2 2.4 2.8 3.4 4 4.8 5.6 6.7 8 9.5 11 13 16 19 22


With third-stops there are even more options:

f/# 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2 2.2 2.5 2.8 3.3 3.5 4 4.5 5.0 5.6 6.3 7 8 9 10 11 12.5 14 16 18 20 22


HTH!

(y)
 
dod said:
what's Rockingham?
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Rockingham is the only recently built race circuit in the UK. Its main feature is an American style Oval and the Indy Racing League (or whatever they called themselves that year) came once. They use the oval for some things like Ascar (poor UK Nascar ripoff) and pickup truck racing.

There is an infield circuit with umpteen different configurations. BTCC and lots of other races use this with part of the oval forming the start / finish.

Its got all the facilities but its not really a photographers circuit.
 
Anton, thanks for that, I've read it twice now and still have NO IDEA. I'll go get my camera and read it while looking at it, maybe that will help ( I am completely new to all this).

Great Thanks, Chris
 
Baz007 said:
Anton, thanks for that, I've read it twice now and still have NO IDEA. I'll go get my camera and read it while looking at it, maybe that will help ( I am completely new to all this).

Great Thanks, Chris
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Only a pleasure Chris(y)

But now let's see if I can help you to make some sense out of it.

BTW, it would help if you told me what camera and lens combination you use mostly.
 
I cannot see your kit in your profile, but here goes...

The following works great on a bright sunny day but it is the principle I want you to understand.

Set your camera's main dial to "M".

Set your shutter speed to 1/125.

set your camera ISO to 100 if you can (some Nikons only go as low as 200 so knowing what camera you use is rather handy.

Anyway let's say you are at 100 ISO.

Now set your lens aperture to f/11.

These settings are a basic rule of thumb to get a good exposure on a bright sunny day.

Right now, again, it would be good to know what camera you use because they all have custom function settings which have an influence on the options you can select.

So there we have it: bright sunny day = 1/125 shutter, ISO 100 and f/11.

Say now it becomes cloudy...

Less light = compensation

That means adjust from f/11 to f/8 - f/8 will give you double the amount of light entering the lens as f/11 would.

Because you adjusted the internal lens opening you do not need to adjust the shutter down from 1/125 or the sensor sensitivity upwards.

The result of opening up the lens a bit is that your DOF will decrease slightly.

Lets's stop there and let me know how you are doing - more to come.

HTH!

(y)(y)(y)
 
Haha, excellent. That made more sense. I'll make a list in my Sig of camera gear now that i have more than one item i'm not 'that' ashamed! I think my next outing will be 17/18th of this month..

Thanks again.
 
Cheers Chris!

We work with the same camera so that makes life a bit easier already.

When you play with your camera again, go into the menu and go to Custom functions. It sits in the yellow zone directly below Format.

Enter Custom functions ( C. Fn for short.) and go to option 06.

Within option 06 you will be able to select 0 or 1.

0 = 1/3 stop/EV increments and 1 = 1/2 stop/EV increments.

Select 1 and exit.

This will make the numbers less confusing until you understand them.

Also remember that those basic numbers I gave you are simply a rough guide as to where to start because the camera's built in light meter does not know what you are photographing.

It purely confirms that you can make a reasonable exposure under the current circumstances.

Example: Bright sunny day on the beach and you photograph a kid and his sand castle.

Chances are your photo will show a nearly silhouetted kid against well exposed sand background.

Unless you use spot metering (which we do not have on the 20) the camera's metering will basically think along the follwing lines:

Check settings, check light entering the lens... ooh lots so we can take this piccie

End result = not what you wanted.

When you understand the numbers all the rest will become a breeze!(y)

Good luck
 
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