Naas Races C&C

Ballyman

Heres a few from the races at Naas this evening. It's my first attempt at sport. I was sitting at the 4 furlong pole and they bombed past me pretty quickly so made a bags of the first race with wrong ISO, shutter speed all wrong etc!!

What do you think? Thanks for looking and any comments appreciated.

Borderfox

Lovely shots Ballyman. Looked like a great evening. If I was going to be picky I would prefer a different stride on the third picture. Still though excellent shots

AnCatDubh

I wonder if the first one is cropped every so slightly too tight? Its a great capture with them so tightly bunched together but it kind of compresses the pic - perhaps a little too much. If you cropped a little wider it might open up the composition just a little bit.

Second isn't bad but I'd think given the angle, that the second horse behind is actually distracting ( I appreciate that there's nothing that you could do about that! ).

Third is not bad either but I'd agree borderfox as to the stride. I've never tried it but i'd imagine that it would be really difficult to capture just right and with consistency every time you shoot. Part of the skill of this genre i guess.

The forth doesn't do much for me although i think the posts/rail would make for an interesting vista perhaps further from the right and keeping the depth of field reasonably shallow pushing what would be visible of the stadium in the bokeh range.

Nice takes anyhow. Cheers.

AnimalRights

Fantastic for your 1st attempt, looking at them I in no way would've known it was!

City-Exile

The first 3 are very good.
You have all the important elements.
They could do with a bit of improvement in the clarity & vibrance.

Keep at it.

duckysauce

good solid shots

Borderfox

Heres two of mine from Leopardstown (Canon 350d Sigma 70-200 f2.8) forgive the daily star and miller signs as I was thinking of sponsors even then!! I turned up the saturation when converting these. This is what I look for when shooting racing, even when using a slow fps camera. Its all in the timing

Mr Dave C

Nice shots Ballyman 1st is my fav...

Ricky91t

PIcs great from both side keep up the good work!

Ballyman

City-Exile wrote: »

They could do with a bit of improvement in the clarity & vibrance.

Keep at it.

Cheers for all the comments. Delighted that ye like them. It was a beautiful evening, if a little on the nippy side. It's a really nice place to shoot racing without having to go into the track and it's my first time ever at the races without having a bet!!

City-Exile - I was using a Sigma 70-300 APO handheld. I think the focus length was between the 200 to 250mm mark.

Which would improve clarity in the pics, reducing focus back to under 200mm and cropping tighter afterwards or using a monopod or something to improve stability. For the horse group shot I was going to use the tripod but then thought if I wanted to take another quickly I wouldn't have been able to get the camera off or moved quick enough on the tripod so I didnt' bother as I only got a second or two before they were gone past me.

Obviously an IS lens would help but unfortunately I ain't got the cash at the minute! Any advice appreciated.