Pro Tip: Shutter Speed
Have you ever wondered how photographers use shutter speed to capture motion in an image? For instance, with waterfalls, the silky effect is largely determined by the length of exposure and the volume of water flow. While many photographers enjoy this effect for aesthetic reasons, often times a longer exposure is used for more practical reasons such as compensating for using a larger depth of field or using a less sensitive ISO for decreased visible grain.
Shutter speed can simply be put as the length of time a single photographic frame (or digital censor) is exposed for. It can also be described as how fast a camera takes a picture or how fast a shutter on a camera can open and close. Shutter speed is measured in seconds and can vary anywhere from 4 seconds to 1/8000th of a second, however the extremes can be less or greater depending a camera’s capabilities.
Shutter speed is directly related to capturing motion in an image.
F/22 @ 1/40 of a second
If you desire your subject to be blurred, a slower shutter speed would be utilized.
Generally speaking, if your subject is moving quickly, your subject will be blurry unless you compensate by increasing your shutter speed. You may have to adjust your aperture setting to decrease your depth of field (a setting such as f/3.5 or f/5.6) or increase your camera’s sensitivity or ISO (400, 800) if your image is underexposed.
Also, if you do not have a tripod on hand when taking photos, it’s important to keep shutter speed in mind to avoid camera shake which also contributes to making blurry images.
If you don’t have something sturdy to brace you and your camera with, I have found that when using a 50mm lens, it’s difficult to keep an image sharp below 1/125th of a second. However, to be safe I usually select a shutter speed that is faster than the focal length of the lens when I don’t have a tripod.
F/5 @ 1/800 of a second
A faster shutter speed would be used to capture a fast moving object while maintaining sharpness of the subject in the frame.
It’s always a balance of aperture, shutter speed and ISO to expose an image properly. If you like to photograph at air shows or race tracks, you will likely need to use a higher speed in the range of 1/2000th of a second. However, if your subject is not expected to move too dramatically - such as a pet or child standing still, you can likely use a slower speed. (Above 1/250th of a second and higher). 1/250th of a second might seem a little fast, but I tend to lean on the side of increasing shutter speed when photographing kids and pets since they don’t always follow direction consistantly.
F/20 @ 1/30 of a second
Using a slower shutter speed while panning with a moving subject, can be used to show motion in a photograph while still keeping the main subject sharp. Panning can be very difficult to achieve, because you need to follow the subject at the exact momentum it is traveling to keep it tack sharp in the photograph. At the same time, the shutter needs to be slow enough so that the motion of your pan can be seen in the background of the moving subject. When done correctly creates a great feeling of motion in the image.
Do you have a great example for using shutter speed creatively? If so, post a link to your photo below!
