top of page
Search
Writer's picturePhilip J

Rolling With The Punches

For a while now I have been wanting to try my hand at “rollers” or a rolling shot. For those who may not be familiar with rollers, it is when you are taking pictures of a moving subject with the subject being the car or truck you are shooting. I have not had the chance to try my hand at rollers however, I do plan to do them soon. Rollers typically involve three-plus man care to pull off. You have to have one person driving the pilot car with the photographer. The pilot car drives ahead of the subject vehicle while the photographer reaches halfway out of the car hoping to get some great shots of the subject car or truck. I know what you are saying right now probably, “but isn’t this extremely dangerous and somewhat illegal?” Why yes it is Karen. All jokes aside if they’re done in a safe manner where the photographer is strapped in with the proper equipment, then the risk of something terrible happening is greatly reduced.

Although I do not have experience in taking rollers, I have watched a lot of YouTube videos of people who have done them and they give great tips on what to do and how to take these specific types of pictures so I thought that I would share some of these tips with you. As I had mentioned before safety is very key to doing these types of shots. For camera settings, it is best to set the shutter speed to match the speed of the pilot car. For example, if the pilot car is going 40 mph the shutter speed should be roughly around 1/40 matching the speed at which you are going. For aperture settings, it is best to have the aperture as low as it can go. Other than that, it comes down to how well you can keep the camera steady if you do not already have something to stabilize the camera.

Speaking of stabilizers, something that I just bought recently was a moon grip that allows for better stabilization without paying high prices to have a good stabilizer. Moon grips are simple to use but do require some getting used to. I do have many plans to use it in the future when I get the opportunity to do some rolling video and photo shots which is something that I am very excited to get to do. If you are someone that is looking into some very inexpensive video products, I would highly recommend a stabilizer like the one I mentioned.


Click the link below to learn more about stabilizers like the one I mentioned above!


https://tinyurl.com/5bm4pfcr




10 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All

Comments


bottom of page