Mini Cooper S

[Reschsmooth]

I had the chance to do a shoot with a couple of Mini Cooper S'. My light painting technique wasn't as proficient as that displayed by many members here, but I gave it a shot.

C&C welcome.

[gstark]

PAtrick,

This looks a little soft to me. Perhaps too much flare and light?

Of course, I'm refraining from making the point that just because these Beamers have badges that says they're Coopers doesn't make it so.

[biggerry]

lol, nice work - next time use real cars then I will be impressed

no excuse for not light painting these they are so tiny ya could do it in a 5 secs

They do look a bit soft from my end also.

[surenj]

Nice composition but the softness erks me a bit. Is it just a JPEG artifact or something?

[Reschsmooth]

Thanks chaps.

The softness maybe due to slight camera movement during the shot. Aperture was set at f/8 but depth of field is still too small.

Gary you would be happy or indifferent to know that one of the boys' current favorite movies is the car chase in the Italian Job...and I mean the original.

[gstark]

The softness maybe due to slight camera movement during the shot.

I was wondering about that possibility, but given the photographer, discounted that. What tripod were you using? The new JellyLegs?

f/8 should be fine, but that would depend upon your angle of approach.

Gary you would be happy or indifferent to know that one of the boys' current favorite movies is the car chase in the Italian Job...and I mean the original.

Excellent. That's the second best car chase scene ever filmed, IMHO, the best being in a little known Jean Paul Belmondo movie, Burglars.

Have you seen the deleted scene from TIJ's chase scene, with the cars dancing to the orchestra in the convention center in Torino? totally awesome.

[Reschsmooth]

No tripod used. The camera was rested on the ground. The red car was about 20cm from the front of the lens.

That car waltz was fantastic.

[surenj]

didn't realise these were toy cars (literally)

[Wink]

Either did I. The gloss bench top should've been a give away.

[Reschsmooth]

:lol:
Either did I. The gloss bench top should've been a give away.

That's a polished concrete floor

[surenj]

I did wonder about the glossy floor and assumed it was at the dealer!!

In that case, you can easily reshoot (Which I suggest ).

no excuse for not light painting these they are so tiny ya could do it in a 5 secs

Not sure actually. You would need a very small (soft) source of light without too much spill. Will need to improvise a bit I reckon.

[Reschsmooth]

Hopefully this version addresses the sharpness issue in the first one.



Suren is correct regarding the light source. It needs to be quite small to avoid too much spill. In this case, I used a torch app on the iphone. I was going to use my head torch with diffusing material but chose instead to use the red light feature as part of the background.

I have other ideas including using water.

[surenj]

Thanks for demystifying the light on these.

Hopefully this version addresses the sharpness issue in the first one.

It is an improvement. Hmm. Not sure whether it is sharp enough though.

[Reschsmooth]

It is an improvement. Hmm. Not sure whether it is sharp enough though.

Perhaps that is the narrow depth of field?

[surenj]

Perhaps. The blue car does look bokehy...

[gstark]

Patrick,

This is so much better. And yes, the blue car is now merely feeling the effects of the limited DoF given the subject to camera distance and aperture settings.

The next issue that you'll face is that if you go much beyond f/11, you'll move out of the lens's sweet spot, and while DoF will increase, that actual acuity might not. it will still be an improvement, but perhaps not quite as you expect.

A couple of other thoughts for you to play with here.

First of all, keep in mind that your lens's DoF represents a range over a given distance ... if you, for instance, set your focus point on the front most point of the red car - or maybe its license plate - the range of the available DoF - the parts if image apparently in sharp focus - will actually extend from a point closer to the camera than the nominated focus point to a point further from the camera than that nominated focus point.

This is a feature that you can use: you can set the focus point further from the camera, so that the point of sharp focus that is nearest to the camera is actually a little further away, and perhaps level with the closest point on the red car to the camera. That will, in turn, extend the range of the apparently in-focus part of your image to some point further away.

Second, this is prime territory for a PC lens. Use the scheimpflug theory to bring both cars into sharp focus.

[Reschsmooth]

Gary, spot on. I focused on the nearest part of the red car. At f8 and a subject to camera distance of c20 cm, DOF is about 3cm. However, about 40% of this is lost in front of the red car. Changing to f/11, moving the camera back 10cm would have given me DOF of about 9-10cm. Such changes and correct focus point positioning would have given me sufficientg DOF to cover more or all of the cars.

Cheers