Some of my personal learnings….
Having spent about 18months out of four years love of photography trackside I have to say that if you want practice do get along to Oulton the press guy there is extremely friendly and is willing to sign on freelancers. Get your face known first though. The guys and gals in the pits there are good folk too and will chat with anyone......get them to recognise you and they'll probably give a nod if asked about you. During most club meetings there are usually about five or six snappers on the day (including me!) and usually only two of them are accredited ( autosport MSN ).
The only lesson I learnt very slowly was there isn't a program for motorsport that works on most cameras and even the quickest autofocus generally misses the moment. Use the camera with a separate light meter and a long lens, set up a "kill zone" with the right D-O-F to cover the piece of track you want, check the shutter speed is above your focal length and you should be OK. I always go for the landscape shot with as many cars in the way as I can, Oulton being as picturesque as it is you can't go far wrong - take a look at TOCA-tour.com's galleries of the Oulton Rounds.
Autosport and Tom Dooley are both wanting pictures of club sport racing showing packs of cars – not individuals. tom is the secretary for BRSCCNW I think - but he does the programs for oulton and is always on the lookout for shots for the cover and inside, you can get his details at
www.brsccnw.co.uk you won’t get paid – but you will get credited inside - something to show to teams \ autosport \ MSN and anybody else under the banner of published work. He and Alistair garret are always saying they want pictures to update the website – Alistair if your on this forum – please just update the website – anything, we have seen the pictures of the 2000 party long enough.
As for panning - there is no secret formula - practice, practice and practice some more - even without film in your camera for a while just to get the muscle memory, once you get it right - you'll keep on getting it right – it cost me a damn fortune – I am not a natural at it but now I get 15-20 useable pan shots out of a roll of 24 of which 5 – 10 are pin sharp – I shoot at least 1 roll of 24 panning shots every time I go out.
PS.Always make yourself known to the post observer - good manners, ask if you can take pictures at his \ her post - they will tell you where the pro's usually stand and why in most cases......
PPS.if your at knickerbrook and you see marshal’s running away - treat it as a race.
PPPS. Don’t forget to snap the marshal’s at work now and again and hand the pictures out. you may need one or two of them to save your life one day, but until then they won’t mind you asking the occasional favour…..
and one last thing
All the marshalls at every post know exactly where cars usually exit the black stuff should there be an incident, just smile and ask politley if those are the shots your after........