NTP Challenge: Shutter Speed

[ricktas]

Well, you have had the chance to learn what the Aperture(A/Av) mode on your camera does.

So now we are going to look at shutter speed. For this Challenge you will need either a tripod or a stable surface to rest your camera on.

For this Challenge, set your ISO to 100 (or the lowest available), and your camera to S(Tv) mode. This mode allows you to change the shutter speed and therefore get creative with the effects that differing shutter speeds can offer Read the Learning Centre : Experimenting with Shutter speeds (http://www.ausphotography.net.au/forum/showthread.php?t=24051), to get more of an understanding of this mode.

I want you to go to a local street, and take 3 shots of cars going by. Each shot is to be taken at the following shutter speeds. If you cannot get shots of cars, find another subject that moves, and use that.

1/15th Second
1/100th Second
1/500th Second

Present your photos in this thread, and tell us your findings and what you have learnt. Remember to either use a tripod, or some sort of surface, to ensure your camera doesn't move during the shots.

[yummymummy]

Rick you'll have to post more of these challenges please... every time you post a new one, we get rain and I can't take part until it stops :D ;)

[David]

and ITS dark out there now :) okay,okay, I will do them in the morning when the thunder and lightning stops.

[ricktas]

Um, they dont close ever, so you can go back to the older ones and do them..if you want to.

[seastorm]

Cool!!! I'll see what I can do tomorrow (if it doesn't rain).

[Inspired]

Okay i am going to sounds extremely dumb, but i need to ask as i'm confused. (I am just venturing away from Av which i'm confident with now, so moving on to Tv)!

I don't understand how to read the shutter speed on my camera..i have sat at taken shots at different speeds in a bright area, but they all seem a bit delayed..can't figure out which is the fastest.
So the very first one the display screen is display at 30" can you explain to me what that means does it mean 30 seconds? as it is quite long...
then a bit further along it going 2" 1"6 1''3 1" 0''8 down to 0''3 then it goes to 4 up2 8000.
which one is the fastest...I just sat here (in the lounge not so bright..just natural light from the window) and set the camera to Tv and shutter to 8000(i'm assuming thats the fastes? with 30 being the slowest) i tried it at all diffrent ISO from 100 up2 3200 100 coming up black, and then the picture just being visbale at 3200 - so i'm thinking this is to fast yes? shutter is moving to fast not allowing enough light in? (sorry if i'm dribbling i'm trying to work it out as i type, and get corrected as i go).
SO my question is with 8000 being to fast and 30 obviously i need to find somewhere in between. haha
The challenge says set it to 1/15th, 1/100th and 1/500th - can you please explain how that would read on my actual camera display? is it just the number 15, 100, 500?
Does the " mean seonds and just numbers mean of a second? and the 1''6 mean 1 and 1/6 of a second?
Sorry i have problem confused anyone reading this...hoping i am kinda on the right track! lol

[jjnic]

mine reads 30" 25" ..... 15" ..... 1" , 1/1.3, 1/1.6, 1/2, .... 1/3, 1/4, 1/5, .... 1/15....1/100, 1/500.... 1/4000 which by my understanding means 30 seconds, 25 seconds, 15 seconds....... 1 second 1/1.3 of a second, 1/1.6 of a second, half a second, third of a second etc up to 1 fourthousandth of a second. We are just not used to fractions being expressed as 1/1.3 or 1/1.6 etc which if my rusty maths is correct is 10 thirteenths and 10 sixteenths of a second :-)

jj

[seastorm]

Mine's similar to Inspired. I can say that if you see x" (where x is a number and the quote), it is the number of seconds. If it's just a number by itself, it's 1/x seconds.

The slight difference is that mine shows 1.6", not 1"6 (which is 1.6 seconds).

Hope that helps...

Oh, and I have to apologise, I was supposed to do this challenge 2 weeks ago, I forgot!!! :o

[Newbie79]

Hi all, Went down to a local park and took some photos of a water fountain at a variety of different shutter speeds. The camera was out on the Tv mode, and no other setting where adjusted other than shutter speed.

I took photos at 1/15, 1/100, 1/200, 1/1000, 1/4000.

The water in the photo at 1/15 appears to be a continuous stream (you cant see individual water drops). This gradually changes as I changed the shutter speed right up to 1/4000 where you could see individual water drops. Obviously at 1/4000 the shutter is opening an closing so quickly that the water does not move much (if at all) in this time.

Having taken these photos I thought I would open the shutter to 1 second. What resulted was a very bright (white) photo that lacked detail. It was all washed out. My limited experience tells me that the shutter speed allowed to much light in? So how do i take a photo with the shutter open for a second (or longer) without getting this wash out (or am i getting to far ahead of myself have only just started out?).

Thanks heaps

Matt

[etherial]

Hi Matt, good work here, you're getting the concept of shutter speed. Have a look at the exif data of your images for the change in aperture which is what the camera is adjusting for you to maintain a good exposure.

To answer your question about a 1sec shutter in a bright scene like this, have a look at the smallest aperture you lens will do (a clue it is in the first image posted above!) and you will see that any image you take with slower shutter at that aperture in this scene will be over exposed. Something you can do (which I haven't had experience with yet) is to put filters on your lens which will limit the light and allow longer exposures of bright scenes.

[Amadeus]

Ok, I am going to give this a crack this afternoon!

[ricktas]

Matt, well done. There are a few things you can do to get a longer shutter speed.

1. Change your aperture to the smallest (f22 usually)
2. Use filters on the front of your lenses (polariser or Neutral Density - ND)
3. Shoot at a different time of day when the light is not so bright (dawn or dusk).

[Amadeus]

Hellooooooo, do I post my efforts here or somewhere else?

[ricktas]

Post em here with details of what you learnt from the challenge.

[Amadeus]

Ok, so the quicker the shutter speed, the sharper the detail... ;-)

That was fun, heh.

[ricktas]

OK, so you learnt that the faster the shutter speed, the more it stopped motion, but what did your camera do to aperture at the same time?

[Amadeus]

Ah right... yes... f/32 on 1/15, f/14 on 1/100 and f/6.3 on 1/500... so the quicker the shutter speed, the wider the aperture as well...

[ricktas]

yep, there you go, you learnt the first part of the exposure triangle. Yep Triangle. The other part is ISO. Shutter speed/aperture/ISO all work together to create a 'correct' exposure. Learning how they interact is a big part of moving to manual mode.

Why not head over to the aperture challenge (http://www.ausphotography.net.au/forum/showthread.php?t=24083) now and have a go at that one, and learn some more about how they inter-relate.

[Amadeus]

Thanks Rick for the encouragement. Yep, I'll do that one next. Ta.

[Newbie79]

Hi all,

I took the kids out into the back yard and gave them some sparklers and took some photos in the Tv mode adjusting only the shutter speed. I took photos varying from 3.5 seconds to 15 Seconds.

The two photos here are 3.5 seconds and 15 Seconds. In the 15 second one I told my daughter to stand really still and only move her arms. She did a great job but as you can see even the slight body movement from moving her arms is enough to blur her. Some of the other photos I took, my wife walked through the frame and a ghost of her is stretched across the whole image.

Before I took the photos of the kids I took some general shots of the back yard using different shutter speeds. I was amazed at how good the photos turned out with such little light available. It showed me how shots at night (of still subjects) can turn out much nicer without the use of a flash by adjusting the shutter speed.

If nothing else the kids had fun :xmas31:

Matt

[ricktas]

What you have achieved there is referred to as 'painting with light', and it can have amazing results if you 'draw' around the outlines of things. Now looking at your photos, in Tv mode, have a look at the apertures your camera chose for each photo of differing shutter speed lengths. Learning the inter-relationship between shutter speed and aperture is one of the fundamentals of photography.

Good results, and it does look like the kids had fun!

[Gemini2261]

I went for a bit of a challenge this morning...I have a bit more respect for photographers now!

Snagged by wild blackberry & nearly went for a sixer on the 45 degree granite rockface.
Attacked by a nest of meat ants (maybe I should have photographed them).

I am now aware that I need to improve on my lens changing dexterity on location in tight spots!

Pic's in order:
1/15 F18
1/100 F6.3
1/500 F3.5

As the speed increases the aperture widens...Yes?

[ricktas]

Yes as the speed increases the aperture gets larger to let the right amount of light in to get a good exposure. Also though, look at the water in the lower left of the frame and note the white foam bits, especially compare how the top photo looks to the last one. See how a faster shutter speed 'freezes' the water more, where the slower one captures some of the movement and leaves the water looking slightly blurry.

Think about what would happen to the water if you took this on an overcast day and had a shutter speed of say 1 second.

[Gemini2261]

Yes, it is a magic little spot down the road...I might go down there very early one morning & experiment with the lower light levels.

[Amadeus]

Gorgeous scenery... beats my hideous road shot. Lol.

[ricktas]

Gorgeous scenery... beats my hideous road shot. Lol.

Your 'hideous' road shot taught you something, that is all that matters. The only true 'bad photo'; is the one you don't learn from

[Amadeus]

Awww thanks Rick. You're alright. Heh.

[FallingHorse]

OK - digging up an old post here but it inspired me to go out and practice panning and using longer shutter speeds!

1. Tour bus - moving really slowly as it just turned the corner. 1/40 sec
http://i1015.photobucket.com/albums/af280/fallinghorse/Panning%20Technique%20practice/_MG_3489972x648.jpg

2. Highway - 130km/h zone - 1/60 sec

http://i1015.photobucket.com/albums/af280/fallinghorse/Panning%20Technique%20practice/_MG_3556940x626.jpg

3. Another one on the highway in the 130km/h zone - even though the focus is on the rear of the vehicle rather than the front, I think this one turned out the best.

http://i1015.photobucket.com/albums/af280/fallinghorse/Panning%20Technique%20practice/_MG_3533972x567.jpg

[ricktas]

so Fallinghorse, what did you learn. This thread is about trying out new photographic skills and learning from the experience, so what have you learnt about your camera and settings whilst doing this challenge?

[FallingHorse]

Oh - I should have put that in my post - the first thing I learnt was that as the shutter speed slows the aperture closes to compensate for the amount of light the long shutter speed allows in. I practiced on a waterfall at the botanic gardens earlier in the day and the sun was quite bright - the aperture was f 29 & f32..... at first I thought I was mistaken until I sat down and thought about it :)

[ricktas]

That is exactly what these challenges are for. Using what you have learnt about camera settings, you could now start to calculate the settings needed when you encounter a given situation in future. Well done.

[barrythelizard]

I liked the Av mode challenge but then got stumped on this for a bit. Mostly because I didn't understand what the numbers on the camera meant until after I took the photo and looked at the EXIF data - oddly enough the manual doesn't explain in enough detail to be helpful. My camera seems to have a wide range of options in this department including one that is 60 seconds! (at which point I thought that the camera had given up all hope of me being able to select the right setting and gone into hibernation).

With that in mind I failed to get exactly the right shutter speeds but I did manage to get 3 photos of a moving vehicle with approximately the right shutter speeds :)

1. 1/15th
2. 1/125th
3. 1/1000th

To shoot a moving object you should use a faster shutter speed, unless you want it blurry to show movement. The camera changed the f/ setting each time I changed the shutter speed, even so the first one is very light and they get progressively darker so I guess you need to be careful your shot doesn't get over or underexposed.

1.
http://barrythelizard.jalbum.net/Clair%27s%20Pics/slides/ferry1%2015.jpg

2.
http://barrythelizard.jalbum.net/Clair%27s%20Pics/slides/ferry1%20125.jpg

3.
http://barrythelizard.jalbum.net/Clair%27s%20Pics/slides/ferry1%201000.jpg

Thanks :)

[tanz]

I did this challenge today but both my girls were sleeping so had to find something around the house that moved and ended up just putting the sprinkler on outside. But I wouldn't make a very good student because once I got out there I forgot which shutter speeds I was supposed to use and then I forgot to set the ISO and left it in auto. I took 4 photo's and there is a noticeable difference in the water drops but what I have also learnt from doing this wrong is that my camera actually adjusted the ISO more than the aperture, and even though the aperture did change it wasn't by very much, where the ISO in the 1st pic was 100 and the last one was 2000 so in future I should remember to set the ISO myself. I will attempt to do this challenge again tomorrow with the right settings and post the results.