When Action is Called Get the Photo

When "Action!!" is called, you have to long be ready for "the shot" of the day.  You have to have the camera aimed, the setting set and focused on a point where all of the action will take place.  Yes, this was taken at Disney and I was ready. I had my Nikon D90, a 18 to 105 telephoto zoom lens, a shutter speed at 200th of second and an F-stop of F/8.  I choose the shutter speed to stop the action (actually I fired off 5 frames to capture the fireworks) and I wanted to catch the car in mid air as well. I also wanted the background to be sharp and the photo lit up by the fire and fireworks, hence the F-stop of F/8.  I was pretty lucky that the sun was behind me and this also contributed to lighting the entire scene, but as you can see it was the fire and fireworks that did most of the illumination in this photo. Remember, when you want to stop action, you want a fast shutter speed and a rather sharp F-stop (higher number) which in this case, gives the illusion of the car being lit by the fire and fireworks. So when you know someone is going to be yelling "action" be ready to get "the shot of the day!"