Goodwood vintage - all in focus or?

[ajm057]

Is it better for both cars in this photo to be in focus or just the lead car? See attached photo.




Shot taken with a Nikon D3 800mm lense F8 Iso 240 and shutter 1/640th. It was 9:52 am and the sun had finally sneaked out from under a bank of clouds to provide a nice sligthtly diagonal light and shadows. Consitently through the morning left the appature fairly wide open - I took nearly nearly 1000 shots, many as high frame rate bursts, and have kept about 250 (see 2009 Goodwood Revivial (Sunday 20th Morning) - a set on Flickr) - the majority were of this corner with the 300-800mm zoom - wide open and a reasonably fast shutter speed - the consequence of this is a relatively short depth of field and as a consequence focus questions.

What looks better - all in focus, lead car in focus, a slower speed - more movement or a fast speed and the cars look like they could be parked, rather than racing.

How tight - With the Sigma 300mm-800mm f5.6 (and with a teleconverter option) I was able to get tight upto the subject in full frame - but is this better than a wider angle?

How would a professional approach this?

[wmbtaylor]

Personally I like it just the way it is. I can't think of a thing I would do differently but I am no where near an expert

[ilookalot]

i like this photo and think it has a good composition it says to me that they are racing ,maybe the only suggestion i could make is that if you use a slightly slower shutter speed the tread on the tyres would blur this would give the feeling of motion .because the cars are coming towards you it should not cause to much of a problem in regards to the rest of the shot being sharp,regards kym

Waaaayyy slower shutter, tighter crop and lower f/stop