Framing the fast and the furious

The biggest challenge for the Formula One photographer is to capture motion and the excitement of the event effectively

Bahrain International Circuit is an ultramodern motorsports facility that is located in the heart of the Sakhir desert in the Kingdom of Bahrain. The 2016 Bahrain Grand Prix was held there on 3 April 2016. This was the second round of the 2016 season and marked the 12th time that the Bahrain Grand Prix had been run as a round of the Formula One World Championship. To cover a distance of just over 308km on the race track, the F1 cars have to cover 57 laps.

Photographing Formula One races requires a number of skills, and in order to plan the shots ahead, you need a sound knowledge of the sport and the circuit. The cars move at varying speeds along different parts of the track, and you can choose your position and angle depending on the frame you want. It’s very important that you become intimately acquainted with your camera in order to keep up with the pace, and learn the best lens and settings combinations to

The fact that the cars are moving so fast means there’s difficulty in focusing and keeping them in the frame

achieve a variety of shots. I do mostly panning shots as I feel this creates a sense of motion and gives the effect of speed.

The selection of the shutter speed to control the length of the exposure depends mainly on the speed at which a car is moving, the focal length of the lens and the distance from the subject and background. A stable hand helps a lot, too! As I have been shooting

F1 cars every year I have gathered enough experience to develop good stability. The risk is that the panning motion will be jerky at slow shutter speeds, and it is also harder to keep the subject in the same position of the frame for a longer period. So it’s very important to select the right shutter speed to get a balanced ‘sharp’ picture with the maximum panning.

The Bahrain night race track is lit profusely, which can prove tricky with exposures. At certain locations the lights bounce from the paint, washing the car out completely. In such cases I underexpose by 1/2 or

1 stop. The fact that the cars are moving so fast (200300kph, depending on the different stretches of the track) means that there’s a great deal of difficulty in continuously focusing and trying to keep them in the frame. The most challenging shots are the cars coming directly towards you or at a steep angle. I switch to AI Servo autofocus mode, which proves to be very effective.

Having become more involved in Formula One due to my photography, I’ve been drawn into the technology behind the whole sport.

It’s a combination of the talent of the driver, the technological advancement of the machine and teamwork all contributing to winning the race.