Caption:
PoTM 2011 March: Falling…
Commentary:
As a general rule I don’t shoot climbing falls; not because of any ethical or empathetic reasons, more to do with the fact that they don’t (usually) make good photos. Every once in a while though a falling shot works a treat so it useful to have the knowledge.
The shot here I got during my recent trip to Margalef. The crag (Raco de la Finestra) is a photographer’s joy; it’s one big photo op. There a ramp system to work off from which you have a choice of up to five individual sectors to shoot – all from the comfort of an easily accessed, big ledge – a dream shooting locale!
One of the main sector, a massive overhanging sector rammed with a raft of total desperate routes is easy covered off this ledge with a 200-400mm lens. Another sector, the wall featured, is 90 degs right. This wall though is much closer, more like 20-40 metres rather than the 100-150 metres of the other wall. A shorter lens is needed therefore. The other difference was that the distant wall was in total shade and the other was in total sunlight – exposure switch hell. I sat tight all afternoon one day spinning between the two walls, changing lens and grabbing action when I could.
The image here, of a local on, or rather off (sic), Aeroplastica (F7c+/8a), was grabbed in a lull between the action on the other wall. Mr White had continued onto the F8a extension but soon looked like he was gonna take a decent whipper. I just about managed to change lens and rattle off a couple of frames has he fell off. There was no time to change setting or get technical about depth of field or otherwise – just squeeze the shutter and grab what I could.
Freezing action, if that’s what you want to do, needs a high shutter speed – just how high depends on the distance the camera is from the subject and direction the movement is relative to the camera. As I’d been shooting action on the shady distant wall I’d wound the ISO up to so when I grabbed the shots of the flying Mr White I had plenty of shutter speed courteously of the high ISO and the sunlight. The EXIF file in this case (one of the joys of digital photography!) recorded a shutter speed of 1/5000 for this shot, totally overkill in terms of freezing the falling climber in this case.
BTW, the best way to get a feel for shutter speeds required to freeze action is to try a range of speeds from 1/30 to 1/1000 with subjects moving into/out off the frame and/or across the frame. And then there’s panning to add into the mix – something for another day I reckon…
Capture Notes:
Nikon D300, 28 - 70 mm AFS VR f2.8 @ 65mm, 1/5000 secs @ f6.3, ISO 640, matrix metering in aperture priority.
Keywords:
Falling climber, Margalef
