So I took this shot, shown below, with my 17-55 2.8 and later on, I tried doing it with the Sigma 35mm 1.4 and none of the shots came out to be this focused. Does anyone know if it's because there's no IS on the 35mm or is it because I just got unlucky with all of my photos? Is it possible to get this clean shot with the 35mm 1.4 or do I have to be on a smooth road to do this? I was trying it on 280N from Pacifica up to South SF trying to shoot a random drift car and all of them were too shaky. Thanks!
1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION
OK lets try to clear a few things up. The desired motion blur comes from the low shutter speed & a perfect pan. With both vehicles in motion the pan becomes more or less like shooting a still BUT as such the camera & photographer can't be in motion as in having road vibrations transfer to the photographer because he / she is leaning onto the side door or window.. Also lets be clear in that the Canon lenses with IS that go really wide DO NOT have a panning mode & for this kind of use IS may CREATE fuzzyness, but that's just a guess based on my own experiences with my 24-105 when shooting race cars with the IS on. IF you really want to do this kind of photography well you need to spend BIG money on a camera stabilizersuch as sold by Kenyon.
These are used by pros to shoot air to air & car to car etc. NOW re the AF idea that multiple points is a better choice that is not correct. The camera can ONLY focus to one distance at the moment the photo is taken, not 2 or 3 different distances which seems to be what you are thinking. DOF gives you that extra area in focus, not multiple focus points. You need to decide on what you need in DOF & use an F stop small enough to get that much DOF from your shooting distance. There are DOF calculators on line or you can get an Ap for it to use when needed.
Correct settings and technique are the difference between getting a photo of a car that looks to be parked or one at speed. Both cars in these photos are going VERY fast but one looks to be stopped because the shutter speed was too high (intentionally).
"I've tried using single point auto focus and when I did that, the portion of the car I was aiming at was perfectly in focus, while the rest of the vehicle was actually starting to be blurred as well."
This is not a cause of single point focus. It is impossible. When you use multi-point all you are telling the camera is to use the "single point" it can mostly focus on. This is usually the closest. Multi-point does not expand what will be in focus. It simply allows more choices.
Show below is now what I beieve you want. Yes, no?
Or maybe the car instead?
Either way both photos were sharp to begin with. The rest is all Photoshop! It is under Motion Blur. 
OK lets try to clear a few things up. The desired motion blur comes from the low shutter speed & a perfect pan. With both vehicles in motion the pan becomes more or less like shooting a still BUT as such the camera & photographer can't be in motion as in having road vibrations transfer to the photographer because he / she is leaning onto the side door or window.. Also lets be clear in that the Canon lenses with IS that go really wide DO NOT have a panning mode & for this kind of use IS may CREATE fuzzyness, but that's just a guess based on my own experiences with my 24-105 when shooting race cars with the IS on. IF you really want to do this kind of photography well you need to spend BIG money on a camera stabilizersuch as sold by Kenyon.
These are used by pros to shoot air to air & car to car etc. NOW re the AF idea that multiple points is a better choice that is not correct. The camera can ONLY focus to one distance at the moment the photo is taken, not 2 or 3 different distances which seems to be what you are thinking. DOF gives you that extra area in focus, not multiple focus points. You need to decide on what you need in DOF & use an F stop small enough to get that much DOF from your shooting distance. There are DOF calculators on line or you can get an Ap for it to use when needed.
Correct settings and technique are the difference between getting a photo of a car that looks to be parked or one at speed. Both cars in these photos are going VERY fast but one looks to be stopped because the shutter speed was too high (intentionally).
