Lightpainting Meet Up On The Race Track - Part One

On October 4th I met with Hive account@gunnarheilmann , Hive account@lichtkunstfoto , Hive account@marlasinger Hive account@stepko , Hans , Geane and some members of the club at the Radrennbahn in Bielefeld. More than a year ago, the idea of a light painting of the cycling track planted itself in my head. A few hurdles had to be overcome to organize the event, as the property management and the city of Bielefeld had to be brought on board to allow access to the track at night. So I was all the happier when we finally got there for the light painting. I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone involved once again!

I had a year to think about this topic. As I'm a hobby cyclist myself and was able to take the tandem for a spin on the cycle track with my wife Geane on Open Monument Day, my head was full of ideas. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to realize them all in one night. But I wasn't alone and I hope that my dear lightpainting friends here on Hive will show a few more things from that night.

After we had fortified ourselves with pizza and beer after a first tour of the cycling track, I set my sights on the finish line. Even though I had set myself completely different goals for that evening. It just seemed like the right time, as all the light painting artists were looking for a place on the site where they would not disturb their colleagues. I positioned and adjusted the camera in daylight (picture above). The first camera rotations were done with a polarizing and an ND gradient filter (picture below). Then I waited for dusk.

At dusk, @Stepko had the idea of using the time to recreate the finish on a racing bike. It was a pretty energy-sapping affair, as the gearing of the track bikes requires pretty thick legs. It is correspondingly difficult to start.

Finally it dawned. The show could begin. On the cover picture you can see a camera rotation at the blue hour. The texture of the racetrack should be clearly visible in the picture. You can see the test shot in the following picture.

In the following picture you can see a camera rotation in 90° steps. The result was not contrasty enough for me, so I put an orange color filter in front of my NOCTIGON DM11. I was satisfied with the second attempt (cover picture).

Below I'll show you a few impressions of the velodrome. That's it for today. I'll present the second part of the light painting meeting at the Bielefeld velodrome to you next Sunday on HIVE. So stay tuned!