P#12 Q2B: What Is the Best Shutter Speed for Panning Motion and How Do You Get Tack-Sharp Images With Moving Objects in Your Action Photographs When You Want To Freeze the Action?
Shutter speeds and image sharpness in action photographs
During the interview, Charlie Borland explained how he gets motion into his action photographs. I asked him to go into further detail about shutter speeds and getting sharp-as-a-tack images. He was more than happy to share his advice.
How Slow Can You Go?
Charlie Borland: Shutter speed is relative to the speed that the subject of your shot is going. You can get a blurring background behind a NASCAR racecar at a 60th of a second, but if you've got a hiker going through the forest at a much slower speed, you might need a 15th of a second to get some blur going behind them.
The way you go about getting the right effect is going to depend on your light level. If it's very bright and sunny, you want to use your lowest ISO (around 100). Then you would select your maximum aperture, which might be f16 or f22, or even f32. At that point you're going to go with whatever shutter speed that setting gives you.
Ideally, if the light level was fairly low (maybe an overcast day and you're in the forest), you're going to have a lower light level allowing you to use that longer shutter speed.
If it's a sunny day, however, you're going to need to put a polarizing filter on your lens or a neutral density filter that cuts the light going through the lens and allows you the longer shutter speed.
Those are the main tricks to try for getting your shutter speed slow enough to allow the blur to show up a little bit better.
Audri Lanford: Great. When you do want to freeze the action, how do you get tack sharp images with moving subjects -- especially if the light is low?
Charlie Borland: That's a great question. The main determining factor in getting tack-sharp images is your shutter speed. The faster the shutter speed you can get, the sharper your action photographs are going to be.
If you're in a low-light situation and you're not able to go with a really fast shutter speed, you have to start increasing your ISO to allow you to go faster. This, however, can present some other problems, like noise in your digital files and so on.
Another option is to use image stabilizing lenses that counter any movement you might be creating by hand-holding your camera. A tripod is another way to stabilize the camera from that movement and capture a sharp subject as it is moving.
My last bit of advice would be to keep your autofocus set on continuous so the camera is continuously refocusing the lens on the subject as the subject is moving.
Getting super-sharp action photographs is really a combination of all of these factors. You have to use them all and keep trying different ones until you reach the point where you're getting the sharp images in the lower light situations.
In Summary
So how do you get super-sharp images? It comes down to lighting and shutter speed, and playing with the two till you get the right result. With a bit of practice and Charlie's expert tips, you can get you the super-sharp action photographs you've been wanting to take.
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