So originally I was going to do a piece just on going out to the track and show photos and talk a little bit about it.  But one thing I’ve learned on this fancy internet thing is that people looking at photography stuff seem to much prefer learning about technique and how they can do something themselves.  So with that said I recalibrated my head and instead decided to talk about the actual doing of the photos and show off a little of what I did, although to be honest, I’m definitely no pro at this and really just did it for fun and had to learn as I went along.  I’d assume a lot of what I learned would apply to racecar photography too.

Real close up! 1/250s @ f/7.1, ISO 400, 125mm

So, first things first.  My buddy and I went out to the High Plains Raceway and worked the the MRA here in Colorado and got some media passes.  It wasn’t too hard to do, lots of paperwork, waivers, agreements, and all that jazz to go through (including who you’re insured by, ouch!).  If you are interested I’d suggest starting there, contact your local raceways and clubs that race and see what ones will allow you to get a pass, without one getting the really fun photos will be a lot harder.

Second, be safe, seriously and follow all the rules of the track.  You don’t want to end up getting hurt or getting someone else hurt or having your day cut short by getting kicked out.

This guy laid it down easy, with speed it really could hurt

Now, I’m going to break this blog post here, otherwise it may fill my whole homepage, click on through for more!

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So one thing that a lot of photographers know about but I feel a lot of people outside photography don’t is color accuracy.  I don’t know how many people have really sat down and worked on a photo, get the white balance right, get the saturation looking great, oh bump up those yellows a little, ah, finally it looks good.  Then you print it or put it online somewhere.

Oh man, those prints can look absolutely awful, way over saturated, bright fake looking reds, but how, it looked so great on your monitor, you can even hold them side by side.  This is not the photo you edited.

Well, I’ve seen this from time to time, more on the online side, since a lot of the work I do is online (websites, uploads to clients, emails) I’ve found that this problem extends well beyond printing.  Monitor calibration can play a huge role in what the client and prospective clients see.  Just this week I uploaded some photos from a Ron Zacapa event, I spent (more…)