Photography Video Tutorial: Head-Spinning Cars
Last year at the LA Auto Show, I tried out a new photography technique. I placed a small tripod on the edge of a car’s rotating platform and took long exposure photos. The result was a static car with a blurred background. To the left is a Ford Edge (crossover SUV) from last year. The auto show’s anti-photo lighting (small, bright sources of light) actually helped add quite a bit of pop to the photo.
I have a photo set on Flickr called “Head-Spinning Autos” that currently contains nine photos using this technique, with a few more to come.
This year at the LA Auto Show, I decided to revisit the effect and show how it was done. To the right is the final photo from the video, a Mazda CX-9 (another crossover SUV). Below is the video showing how the effect was accomplished, including settings, tripod placement, and environment.
Camera: Canon Digital Rebel XT (350D)
Settings: 3.2 seconds, f/29, 28mm, ISO 100.
More from Brian Shaler
- Photography Video Tutorial – Daring LA Rooftop Photoshoot
- Video: Making of a ‘ShalerJump’
- Heat Maps in Flash
- Sofa Jumping
- Downtown LA ShalerJump
Brian Shaler Recommends
- Time Flies (Chris Conrey)
- The First and Only Rule of Social Media for Salesmen (Chris Conrey)
- The Death of Refresh Phoenix and Why this isn’t a Bad Thing (Chris Conrey)
Tags: cars, effect, Photography, tutorial, Video
November 18th, 2007 at 8:40 pm
Very nicely done! Great photos.
December 1st, 2007 at 1:01 am
Nice, the Mazda Nagare and GT-R emblem are my favorites!
September 11th, 2008 at 11:54 pm
Yet again, thank you for instilling another great photo idea to try first hand!
September 2nd, 2010 at 10:11 am
Doing some net browsing and found your website appears to be somewhat screwed up in my K-meleon browser. However fortunately barely anybody utilizes it any more however you might want to take a look into it.