Shutter Speed Experiments

By
Lynda Giddens
– Fri May 13, 2011Posted in: Assignments, Photography

Earlier this week in Digital Photo Magazine, I read Experimenting with Shutter Speed with Bryan Peterson, author of amazing photography books such as Understanding Exposure and Understanding Shutter Speed. I have four books of his, including the two I just mentioned, and I love his writing style and enthusiasm for photography.

In the article, he recommends going out into your backyard to experiment with 1/4 and 1 second shutter speeds:

The results are unpredictable, but experimenting like this often results in a fresh approach to shooting familiar subject matter.

I was eager to try this along with some of the suggestions he gives in the article, such as moving the camera around in circles and zooming during exposure.

Playing with Shutter Speed

05-13-11 - Shutter Speed Experiment - Abstract 01

05-13-11 - Shutter Speed Experiment - Abstract 02

05-13-11 - Shutter Speed Experiment - Lilly Plant

The first two are in my backyard, looking up at the trees while moving my camera. I was purposely trying to capture sunflare and succeeded in the first shot shown! I took a LOT of these and narrowing it down to two was difficult.

The second one is just a camera zoom during the exposure of our bloom-less lily.

Shot Notes:

I walked out into the bright sunny day and set my shutter speed to 1/4 second. I was going to use Shutter Priority at first, but decided I’d rather have full control over the exposure and switched to manual. I’m glad I did because as soon as I metered against the blue sky I realized anything I tried in this light at 1/4 second would come out greatly overexposed.

Unfortunately, my ancient and entry-level DSLR can’t go ISO below 200. Aperture depends on the lens and my 18-105mm can go up to f/32 fully zoomed. Even on these maximum settings to let in as little light as possible at 1/4 second all I got was a bunch of white with a tiny dash of color here and there.

How I Made it Work

I ran inside and put on both my neutral density filter and my circular polarizer, both of which reduce the amount of light getting to the lens. That trick worked and I was able to set proper exposures in bright daylight with the longer shutter speed.

Now YOU Try!

I was a little lost when I started this experiment, so I hope these tips will help you if you want to try it out!

  • If you have manual control (check your manual if you have a point and shoot!), start at the lowest ISO value and highest aperture value then adjust the exposure as needed.
  • If you have only programmed controls, try using the Night setting as it usually sets a longer shutter speed.
  • If your exposures are still too bright, use an ND filter and/or circular polarizer if you have it. If not, try holding sunglasses in front of the lens.
  • If that fails, wait until it’s darker outside or try to make it darker inside!

Please let me know if you give this a shot! If you have any awesome 1/4 second exposures I’d love a link!

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