Shutter speed is the element you can get creative with. It doesn’t necessarily equivalent to long exposure. In fact, we won’t touch on light trails or any other long exposure that requires tripod and ND filter.
In this tutorial, we are taking a look at how to use slow shutter in daily life.
Motion blur
If you wonder what shutter speed is needed to freeze a motion, the answer is 1/250 minimum. Any shutter speed slower than 1/250 will create motion blur.
It also depends on how fast the subject moves. If the subject moves at a high speed, the exposure time can be shorter. Otherwise, the motion blur will appear to be fading out.
Without an ND filter, motion blur is easier to capture indoors and in the late evening.
The key is to keep your camera steady, otherwise it will become camera shake. Lean on the railing or anything sturdy. You don’t need a tripod, it’s only 1 second exposure time max. Hold your breath!
ICM
ICM stands for intentional camera movement. This technique creates painterly abstract images. I point the camera to a bunch of Hydrangea and tilt up & down to get this pastel color.
Panning
It’s a camera movement where the camera pivots from left to right or the other way around. You might have seen pan shots in movies before. The camera is usually locked to a tripod.
This is a handheld whip pan 270 degrees in the blue hour and the light source is the street lights. The bottom half is the reflection of the sea.
Wave panning during the sunset would also be nice.
Water
When slow shutter speed meets water, interesting things happen.
1. Turn a waterfall into silky texture
2. Smoothen water reflection and make it look still
Photographing a waterfall with the phone is fairly easy. For the Android phone, switch to the Night Sight mode. For iPhone, turn on Live Photo > Long Exposure and Night mode.
Slow down the shutter speed to capture what we don’t normally see with our bare eyes.
Switch to manual mode and have fun! Check out this video 👇🏻