Day 11 of the 12 days of photos comes from my two visits to Oxford Stadium to photograph speedway racing.
Speedway is a fast-paced sport with a fair share of spills that happens on loose surface shale tracks. In each meeting there were two teams the hosts and a visiting team. I went to two meetings at Oxford Speedway where the visiting teams were from Redcar and Plymouth.
I had some great advice about photographing speedway from a buddy Dave Beck, who is a long time speedway fan. His wise words were to choose corner three as the best spot to photograph from. With that advice in my brain I headed to the track, and found fast action, and not much light. It was an evening meeting at the end of April, and while there are lights around the track, they are not that bright from a photography point of view.
The speed of the riders as they slide in to turn three also meant that 1/1000s was the minimum shutter speed to get the riders sharp. Autofocus was set to vehicle tracking with spot enabled for helmet detection. I also opted to have an initial AF point so that I could choose a specific rider in the pack to focus on.
ISO speed ranged from ISO 3200 to ISO 25,600 to enable me to get the shots I wanted. I’d taken the fastest lens that I own with sufficient reach, an EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM with an Extender EF 1.4x fitted. I shot at 280mm and shot wide open for every frame. A 300mm f/2.8 or 400mm f/2.8 lens would be a better lens to take.
April 2022 – Oxford vs Redcar
- EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM + EF Extender 1.4x
- 1/1000s, f/4, ISO 4000
- EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM + EF Extender 1.4x
- 1/1000s, f/4, ISO 6400
- EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM + EF Extender 1.4x
- 1/1000s, f/4, ISO 10,000
- EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM + EF Extender 1.4x
- 1/1000s, f/4, ISO 10,000
- EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM + EF Extender 1.4x
- 1/1000s, f/4, ISO 20,000
July 2022 – Oxford vs Plymouth
For my second meeting I wanted to shoot a wider range of shots than in the previous meeting. Also panning would need slower shutter speeds and lower ISO settings.
- EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM + EF Extender 1.4x
- 1/1000s, f/4, ISO 8000
- EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM + EF Extender 1.4x
- 1/1250s, f/4, ISO 10,000
- EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM + EF Extender 1.4x
- 1/1250s, f/4, ISO 10,000
- EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM + EF Extender 1.4x
- 1/250s, f/4, ISO 3200
- EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM + EF Extender 1.4x
- 1/400s, f/4, ISO 5000
- EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM + EF Extender 1.4x
- 1/1250s, f/4, ISO 25,600
- EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM + EF Extender 1.4x
- 1/100s, f/4, ISO 20,000
Short of an EOS R3, the EOS R6 is the best low light camera in Canon’s line up. 20MP over a full-frame sensor makes big pixels, and that makes them sensitive to light which makes for less noise and better low light AF. The newer EOS R6 Mark II needs 1/2-EV more light for AF than the original EOS R6.
Speedway has definitely got my interest, and in 2023 i’ll got to some of the other tracks, as well as a few meetings in Oxford.
Day 11 of 12 done, see you tomorrow for some more photos.