The second essential creative option is the shutter speed.
Depending on your camera make and model, you will have upwards of 56 shutter speed options, ranging from 1/8000th of a second to 30 full seconds (30″). You may also have a bulb setting (B or Bulb) which allows even greater exposure times.
The Shutter Speed
Your primary goal when choosing a shutter speed is to freeze or blur action. Overall illumination concerns (how bright or dark your photos appear) are secondary. You must not let the lure of a brighter image overpower the need for frozen action. A bright image with a subject that’s blurry, is still just a blurry picture.
Bear in mind, the term ‘shutter speed’ is a bit of a misnomer. It’s wise to think of this choice as the amount of light (in time) that hits your sensor, rather than the speed of your shutter mechanism. It will make things much easier further down the road.
Shutter Speed Control – No More Blur
Familiarization Assignment
- Switch your camera to manual control.
- Locate your shutter speed control dial (check your manual if necessary).
- Choose the fastest shutter speed your camera affords (usually 1/4000 or 1/8000th of a second).
- Choose the slowest shutter speed your camera affords (usually 30 full seconds/ 30″).
- Choose your Bulb setting — this is usually one setting (or click) slower than 30 seconds or should you own a more expensive Canon camera, it may be found on your main command dial near the Manual (M) setting.
- Choose 1/10th of a second
- Choose 3 full seconds (3″)
- Choose 1/1000th of a second
- Choose 1/250th of a second
It’s not important that you take a photo yet, just familiarize yourself with the shutter speed control.
The Perfect Shutter Speed
Choosing the perfect shutter speed requires real-world experience (there is no getting around it). You’ve got to get out there and practice shooting action if you ever hope to know what setting will freeze what. You need to fail and fail again until the correct settings become a part of you. This means really looking at your images while in the field, while you still have a chance to change the setting and try again.
This also means shooting a lot of different types of action, from moving cars, to splashing water, to runners, cyclists, skiers, and horse racing, to people jumping, birds flying and trees blowing in the wind. You’ve got to practice, practice, practice, learn from mistakes and practice some more. With enough experience, you’ll be able to pick the perfect shutter speed for any situation, quickly, confidently and easily.
In the meantime however (until you learn your settings) you can always use the classic Let-Your-Focal-Length-Be-Your-Guide rule. Think of this as a shutter-speed safety zone. It’s not a guarantee mind you, but it’ll get you close.
Finding Your Minimum Shutter Speed
Focal Length to the Rescue
Since the crop factor of your lens (how much your subject fills the frame) has a direct influence over motion blur, you can rely (partially) on the following insight:
When hand-holding your camera (and should you and your subject not be moving) then a shutter speed of at least equal to (or preferably double) your current focal length will suffice.
If there is any type of movement however, from either you or your subject, then you would double (or preferably triple) your focal length to find your minimum shutter speed setting. Remember, you can always choose faster ‘shutter speeds’ but try to avoid slower ones … as your chance of motion blur raises dramatically.
For really fast action always triple (or preferably quadruple) your focal length to find your minimum setting. This again, is not a guarantee — but at least it’s a start.
Slowing things down
Creating rhythm within an image is a one of the three goals of composition and the easiest way of doing that is introducing a bit of controlled blur. Simply slow your shutter speed past your ‘safety zone.’ If you were shooting with a 60mm lens for instance, just use a shutter speed slower than 1/60th of a second.
If you have any action in the scene it will appear blurry, anything holding still, will be frozen. Then just keep slowing the shutter speed (changing the aperture and ISO appropriately) until the desired rhythm is achieved … nothing to it.
Key elements:
- The shutter speed option in your camera gives you control over the amount of exposure your sensor receives.
- You adjust it by changing the shutter speed setting in your camera.
- Fast shutter speeds freeze action.
- Slow shutter speed allow action to blur.
- The primary goal of the shutter speed is to freeze or blur action, not to illuminate a scene.
Next: Essential Creative Option #3 – The ISO
This is post #4 of 16 of In Camera Magic: The 12 Essential Creative Options, a free online photography course for creating spectacular images right in the camera.