Shutter Speed Photo Challenge

I finally got my camera back!  I can’t even begin to tell you how excited I am now that it’s back with me.  I missed it.  Well, as much as you can miss an inanimate object…

While it was getting fixed I definitely kept myself busy.  One of the best things I did was make a new camera strap that has extra padding in it, which is awesome and so comfy!  My shoulders and neck use to get so sore carrying around my camera all day but the strap definitely helps with that.  I honestly couldn’t wait to put the strap on my camera once I got it back.

I also had Madison from Wetherills Say I Do write a guest post about photo composition and the rule of thirds.  Her tips greatly helped me in setting up my photos for the challenge!  You can check it out here.

Enough about me, let’s get on to the second challenge!

If you want to catch up on what we’ve been up to, you can find the Photography Challenge information here.  And if you want to find out what the first challenge (aperture) was all about, you can find that post here.

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No Bad Foto Challenge #2: Shutter Speed

What mode we shot in: Shutter Priority Mode

Definition of Shutter Speed: Shutter Speed controls the length of time that the light is allowed to hit the camera’s sensor.  Shutter Speed gives the photographer control over how motion is captured.  If your shutter speed is faster than your moving subject your photograph will freeze the movement.  This means you’ll have a photograph that is sharp and in focus.  If your shutter speed is slower than your moving subject your photograph will be slightly blurred, which usually represents a subject in motion.

The challenge: 

• Set the ISO between 800-1600 because you’ll be taking an indoors photo.
• Take a picture of running water at 1/60 and 1/1000 shutter speed.

The Photos:

I used higher ISO settings because I have no natural light in my kitchen (unfortunately). That’s the curse of living in an apartment complex where your kitchen backs to someone else’s apartment.  I ended up using a lamp to get a little light in the photo which caused a lot of grain in the background (which happens when you use a higher ISO in lowlight situations).  I also used a tripod to keep the camera steady.

If this picture was taken in better lighting (say, outdoors) it wouldn’t be so dark and grainy. I don’t think this shutter setting was supposed to be used to capture a good photo, but to show us the difference of the movement in the photos when using different shutter speeds. The above photo freezes the water while this photo gives us the feeling of movement.

I also took some motion photos while we were at Disney in January.  For not knowing what I was doing I’m pretty proud of these photos!

What I learned: 

Shutter speed is actually pretty easy to grasp.  The part that was the most difficult for me was getting enough light to take my water photos, but that’s because the natural light in our apartment isn’t that great.  One thing I will take with me from this lesson is that (unless you’re using a tripod) the shutter speed should always be greater than or equal to “1/focal length”.  This means that because I have a 55mm lens, to prevent shake, my shutter speed cannot be slower than 1/60.

Bonus Printable:

In celebration of completing our second challenge and the fact that my camera is finally back, I’m offering this super cute (in my completely biased opinion) printable for free!

 If you’re following along, how did your photos come out?  What was the hardest part of the challenge for you?  While you’re here, make sure to link up your own blog posts about the challenge!

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