Thursday, February 7, 2013

Shutter Speed and You

In my last post I discuss the need to get away from using the Auto setting on your camera. Today I would like to take a quick look at shutter speed and some of the reasons you want to use it to control what your camera is doing for you. I do over 50% of my shooting in this mode.

As you know shutter speed controls the length of time that light can reach the sensor. The more time you allow light to enter the camera the greater your chance of blurring the photo. Granted, sometimes this is a good thing, but for this discussion we are going to look at eliminating that blur. The photo below is a good example of stop action photography.


This picture was shot at 1/500 of a second allowing the camera to capture the birds in flight. Had the camera been set on auto and allowed to fend for it's self it most likely would have picked a slower speed and all that would have been captured was a bunch of blurred wings.

Next time you go out with your camera set it on shutter priority. Yes you will need to think about what you are doing and maybe even have some pictures that don't come out like you were thinking. Don't worry because as they say practice makes perfect. Once you get comfortable with that you will be ready to move on to other priority settings.

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