Four days at TT Circuit Assen with Sabina Ducatista, from panning on track to a garage in the dark.
From 28 April to 1 May, I worked at TT Circuit Assen with Sabina Ducatista, around her Ducati Panigale V4R in Bracket Racing colours.
Assen is one of those circuits where the light does half the work. Long days in late April, low sun at both ends of them, and a layout with enough camber and paint that the track itself gives you something to compose with.
The track work started with panning. Slow shutter, long lens, following the bike through the corner so the background dissolves and the machine stays sharp. It is the least forgiving technique in motorsport photography, and the hit rate is low even when everything goes right. What makes it worth the failures is that it is the only way to put speed into a still image without a single motion blur cliche.
Alongside the Panigale V4R there was a BMW M1000RR wearing number 38 in Champion Lubricants colours. Having a second machine on track changed what I could do: two different silhouettes, two liveries, and the chance to shoot the same corner twice with completely different colour in the frame.
Between sessions I worked the garage. Doors half closed, the bikes in shadow, one shaft of daylight across the floor. The dark garage frames are the ones I like most from these four days, because they are the opposite of the track work: no speed, no colour, just shape and light. A race bike parked in the dark looks heavier and more serious than the same bike at 200 kilometres an hour.
The other thing I shot as a series rather than a single image was the rider sequence: helmet coming on, gloves, visor down, the last few seconds before going out. It works as a sequence in a way no single frame does, and it is the part riders and teams use most on social.
On track I kept working the kerbs. Assen paints them hard, and a bike running right to the outside of one gives you a frame where the geometry does the talking instead of the speed.
The objective was a set that covers a trackday properly rather than just its fastest moments: action for social, garage atmosphere for storytelling, and rider sequences that give a feed something to build on. Four days at one circuit is enough time to stop shooting the obvious and start shooting the rest.