I went to Medieval Times last week and played around with panning as the knights rode on by. ; What did I discover? ; That I need more practice with this! ; These are the ones I liked the best. ; All of these were taken with my 50/1.4 and cropped some. ; That is the only lens I have that would work well in that light. ; Let me know what you think. [attachimg=1] [attachimg=2] [attachimg=3]
I think you did a good job for a first try! One of the tell-tale boo-boos are jiggly lines of lights in the background. Yours are straight - nice. I think you may be fighting two forces here - one is the speed of the animals and the other is the speeds of the legs. I've usually found that the subject is moving fastest relative to my camera when it is at its closest leading to longer streaks in the background. The horses legs are either planted in the ground (so they are too slow to be sharp in the pan) or heading in the direction of the pan so it's sharper. (Look at that one hoof in your first shot - almost tack sharp.) Not all the time since it does speed up, but as the leg is starting or ending it's step you'll see them get sharp. I have no idea how to deal with this, and I'm not sure you really want to. The tails/riders/horses are sharp. The rest shows motion and speed. Good job!
Not bad at all! ; Good tracking on the subjects - nice and horizontal. ; Personally, with a moving animal I like to see limbs in blur to give the feeling of motion, but sharp on the bodies or faces - you've got that a bit in some - the second shot in particular gives the feeling of fast movement.
blurring the backround and the hoofs and keeping the horse sharp is a lot to do. you did great for your first time
