Luis.A Posted September 30, 2008 Share Posted September 30, 2008 Hey guys!!! first time poster here :) .. So be kind :D ... Well I am taking a photography course at my uni and was given the assignment to research what the shutter is and what it's capable of doing. I can't for the life of me understand any definition I've found. Could someone be so kind to explain this to me in detail(in noob terms? I need to know about shutter speeds and for what kind of photography they are used for. Thakns in advance!!! P.D: Here is to hoping this is post numer 8,000,000!!! :p Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
highonsnow Posted September 30, 2008 Share Posted September 30, 2008 Hey WarLuigi, To start off, the shutter is like a solid window blind, it allows light into the room when up/open and blocks all light when it's down/closed. It's primary purpose is to expose the film of the camera or the digital sensor of digital cameras to the light which has been carefully focused upon the film/sensor through the lens. Without over complicating things, pretend we're on an automatic setting on a digital camera - Auto mode (drunken night mode). The camera controls a varied range of things which will result in a generally accepted photograph - good balanced photo with reasonable exposure... your typical point and shoot produces decent photos in auto mode (generally, but this is a WHOLE other discussion..!). If the camera is in auto mode, it will calculate the ISO (sensitivity of the sensor, it varies from photo to photo depending on light conditions), the shutter speed and the aperture of the lens. What is the aperture? That's the small opening that lets light through, it can be set manually or controlled automatically depending on the results desired - different topic also. The shutter speed, aperture and ISO are all carefully balanced to produce a resulting photograph of (hopefully) acceptable exposure. Shutter speeds can vary between anything like 1/8000th of a second to 30 seconds - it basically means how long the light has been allowed to reach the digital sensor inside the camera so it can view the light which is being focused through the lens. If you were to ignore the ISO and the aperture and focus on the shutter speed, this is what you can achieve with various shutter speeds. With a fast shutter speed under excellent lighting conditions (very sunny day) with a shutter speed of 1/1000th of a second, you can take a photo of someone running and they will appear nicely lit with little or no motion blur (depending on how fast the person was running and how the photo was composed). With a fast shutter speed under poor lighting conditions (late evening to nighttime) with a shutter speed of 1/1000th of a second you are almost guaranteed to have a really dark photograph, practically completely black and totally under exposed as a result (no image). With a medium shutter speed under reasonable lighting conditions with a shutter speed of 1/100th of a second you can take a photo of someone running and achieve some sort of blur to give a better appearance of motion and action in the photograph. With a slow shutter speed under reasonable lighting conditions with a shutter speed of 1/4 of a second you can take a photo of moving water in a river or waterfall in shadowy conditions to make a beautifully smoothed picture of water moving while the remainder of the photo is crisp clear (provided you use a tripod to avoid camera shake). With a really slow shutter speed under really poor lighting conditions (night time by the sea) with a shutter speed of approx 20 seconds you can take a photo of the moon and the reflection on the water with good clarity (definitely need a tripod for this one!). Sports photography generally uses fast shutter speeds where as night photography will most certainly require slower shutter speeds (to allow more light into the sensor). You can achieve some amazing effects from long exposure photography - trailing car lights (streaking across the photo), flash photography with long exposure is also very possible with some very stunning effects. Remember this one important thing - the slower the shutter speed, the more of a need for a tripod to avoid total blurring of the photograph. It's acceptable for some objects or features of a photograph to be blurred due to their motion, but you must always avoid your own motion caused by natural body movement (nobody has surgically stable hands when standing or kneeling or otherwise, honestly!). Some useful features like image stabilisation will reduce apparent camera shake caused by the camera used at long focal lengths or slow shutter speeds, but it's not the savour in all situations. Hope some of that info helps! Feel free to ask some more questions! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luis.A Posted October 1, 2008 Author Share Posted October 1, 2008 highonsnow!!!!! WOW!!!! You completely blew my mind with this explanation. NOW i get it .. Thank you so much for taking the time to respond to my question, and I will be asking some more questions in the future. All thats left is for me to translate it all to spanish since it's the language spoken here... BUT THANK YOU SO BLOODY MUCH!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yusuf M. Veteran Posted October 1, 2008 Veteran Share Posted October 1, 2008 Great job highonsnow! You explained it really well. :yes: /highfive Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prince Charming Posted October 1, 2008 Share Posted October 1, 2008 Another thing to touch on might be flash sync speeds and shutter types. Focal plane shutters such as found in most DSLRs can only sync the flash speed to about 1/200th or 1/250th of a second. Leaf shutters are more capable of syncing flash to any shutter speed, for example the Canon G9, can flash sync at 1/2500th. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
highonsnow Posted October 1, 2008 Share Posted October 1, 2008 Cheers lads, was kinda looking forward to putting something like that down in writing, I prefer explaining things like that without getting TOO technical, once you get the general jist of it the rest will fall into place and the technical elements will be more understandable. Thanks for that Pandya, I'm still only getting used to trying to visualise the results of a photo from the direction of the flash (bounce, etc), really interested in getting one of those Pocketwizards to expand my ability to get some dramatic lighting in difficult locations (still have to invest in the several flashes needed to achieve that goal though!). Flash is still experimental for me although I got some nicely lit shots from using the bounce from a ceiling over the weekend.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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