The Racer

I went to the Barry Sheene Festival of Speed classic motorcycle races at Sydney Motorsport Park yesterday.Unlike last year-see Barry Sheene FOS-the weather was heavily overcast and rain threatened most of the day.It was not good light for photography.Overcast is OK if it there is a little sunlight to add sparkle.Yesterday definitely lacked sparkle which was a pity as we have had weeks of great weather.

I did manage a few photos worth putting on the blog including this one.I am ambivalent about black and white but I think that it really works for this shot.The shot was not set up or posed.I took it on the run -street photography but not on a street.The Racer was working on his bike between races in a pit garage.It was very gloomy and the X Vario had to go to ISO 6400 to expose this so there was a fair bit of noise on the photo.The fact that you can now take passable photos at these very high ISOs is amazing.Not so many years ago ISO 400 was considered a fast film.
The photo really sums up the ambience of classic motorcycle racing for me.There is a very friendly,laid back atmosphere.It is totally amateur -everyone works on their bike-no support companies and poo faced technicians holding laptops -and many of the racers are well let's say "vintage".
I am going to give this photo a run in a couple of competitions.For those interested it was processed in Lightroom 5 and converted into black and white in Silver Efex Pro 2 using a customised preset I have created.