I've decided to produce this post to help you understand everything you need to know on shutter speed basics. So let's begin with the most basic thing of all, what is shutter speed?
Shutter speed is simply the speed at which your camera takes a shot. Inside your camera, there is a shutter. Whenever you take a photo, the shutter opens and then closes. When it opens, light comes in the sensor, the sensor captures the picture, then the shutter closes. Faster shutter speeds are able to freeze the motion. Longer shutter speeds come in handy when we don't have enough light. If the shutter opens and closes quickly, not a lot of light will be able to come inside the camera. Your pictures could turn out under exposed depending on your light situation. You won't have such a problem on a sunny day for example if your shutter speed is 1/1000 of a second or 2/1000 of a second. This issue more commonly occurs indoors.
Imagine you are taking a photo of a sunset. If you choose a very quick shutter speed, your image will turn out dark. This is when you would slow down the shutter speed. It could be several seconds long. It comes down to the lighting and also on the aperture value you have picked. By making these adjustments, you will no longer have the problem of your photos being under exposed and too dark, but another problem arises; it will be necessary to use a tripod to keep the camera still. If you hand moves even a tiny amount while you are taking the shot, or the subject moves, your picture will turn out blurred. Alternatively you can put the camera in a place where it will be totally still.
When you have plenty of light, can you still produce any nice effects by slowing the shutter speed down?
Of course this is possible! An example is when you take a photo of moving water, like a river or a waterfall. This approach will create a silky, dreamy effect on the picture of the water. You should to adjust your aperture to compensate for the abundance of light entering your camera. Some effects require us to adjust the aperture enough that the shutter speed can be as slow as two minutes! You might need an aperture number of about F18 or F22. This means that the aperture size will shrink so that there is less light coming in. It might still be over exposed and you might need to use a filter to block out some of the light.
This technique can also be used if you are standing on a bridge in the city to take shots of roads with vehicles on, to make the vehicles disappear so that all you can see is that nice streak of their headlights and rear lights.
Understanding Shutter Speed Basics
To change the shutter speed on your camera, you will need to locate the shutter speed dial. As you increase the shutter speed, you will see the F number getting smaller. This is because as you increase the shutter speed, less light will enter your camera, so the camera picks up a smaller F number, so the aperture opens up to get more light to come inside the lens. It is a good idea to experiment with taking some photos at various shutter speeds. If you make the shutter speed one or two seconds, you will easily be able to hear the shutter open and then close one or two seconds later.
With longer shutter speeds, it works best if you put your camera on a timer, so that your pressing of the button to take the photo won't make the camera shake in any way, even when you are using a tripod. Another tip is to slowly roll your finger off the button when you take the image with the timer, so the camera isn't subjected to any small sudden movements.
If you want a sharp picture of any moving subject, such as water or children (who often move around in unexpected ways), it would be best to use a fast shutter speed. 1/1000 of a second is a nice and fast shutter speed, but you sometimes don't need to use such a quick speed.
For night time long exposure, we will examine this in another post.
I hope you found this article on shutter speed basics to be valuable and that it helped you to grasp the main concepts of the topic.
Shutter speed is simply the speed at which your camera takes a shot. Inside your camera, there is a shutter. Whenever you take a photo, the shutter opens and then closes. When it opens, light comes in the sensor, the sensor captures the picture, then the shutter closes. Faster shutter speeds are able to freeze the motion. Longer shutter speeds come in handy when we don't have enough light. If the shutter opens and closes quickly, not a lot of light will be able to come inside the camera. Your pictures could turn out under exposed depending on your light situation. You won't have such a problem on a sunny day for example if your shutter speed is 1/1000 of a second or 2/1000 of a second. This issue more commonly occurs indoors.
Imagine you are taking a photo of a sunset. If you choose a very quick shutter speed, your image will turn out dark. This is when you would slow down the shutter speed. It could be several seconds long. It comes down to the lighting and also on the aperture value you have picked. By making these adjustments, you will no longer have the problem of your photos being under exposed and too dark, but another problem arises; it will be necessary to use a tripod to keep the camera still. If you hand moves even a tiny amount while you are taking the shot, or the subject moves, your picture will turn out blurred. Alternatively you can put the camera in a place where it will be totally still.
When you have plenty of light, can you still produce any nice effects by slowing the shutter speed down?
Of course this is possible! An example is when you take a photo of moving water, like a river or a waterfall. This approach will create a silky, dreamy effect on the picture of the water. You should to adjust your aperture to compensate for the abundance of light entering your camera. Some effects require us to adjust the aperture enough that the shutter speed can be as slow as two minutes! You might need an aperture number of about F18 or F22. This means that the aperture size will shrink so that there is less light coming in. It might still be over exposed and you might need to use a filter to block out some of the light.
This technique can also be used if you are standing on a bridge in the city to take shots of roads with vehicles on, to make the vehicles disappear so that all you can see is that nice streak of their headlights and rear lights.
Understanding Shutter Speed Basics
To change the shutter speed on your camera, you will need to locate the shutter speed dial. As you increase the shutter speed, you will see the F number getting smaller. This is because as you increase the shutter speed, less light will enter your camera, so the camera picks up a smaller F number, so the aperture opens up to get more light to come inside the lens. It is a good idea to experiment with taking some photos at various shutter speeds. If you make the shutter speed one or two seconds, you will easily be able to hear the shutter open and then close one or two seconds later.
With longer shutter speeds, it works best if you put your camera on a timer, so that your pressing of the button to take the photo won't make the camera shake in any way, even when you are using a tripod. Another tip is to slowly roll your finger off the button when you take the image with the timer, so the camera isn't subjected to any small sudden movements.
If you want a sharp picture of any moving subject, such as water or children (who often move around in unexpected ways), it would be best to use a fast shutter speed. 1/1000 of a second is a nice and fast shutter speed, but you sometimes don't need to use such a quick speed.
For night time long exposure, we will examine this in another post.
I hope you found this article on shutter speed basics to be valuable and that it helped you to grasp the main concepts of the topic.
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Now that you've gained a good level of understanding about the basics of shutter speed you might want to have a look at some other great tutorials to help you along your way as a budding photographer