Help with shutter speeds

gercam

gercam

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Gerry
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This afternoon I was trying to take pictures of my nephew on his skateboard. I could get ones in focus when he was moving on skateboard but if I take them of him jumping he is not in focus but background is.
What are the ideal settings and which lens would be best for this?
Thanks
 
When you say he was not in focus, do you mean he wasnt in focus, or he was motioned blurred?

There could be two issues here, either the camera focusing on something other than him, or the shutter speed being too slow. For moving people, you need above 1/250th or faster to freeze them otherwise you will get blurry moving objects.

Settings depend entirely on the light at the time, time of day, what sort of shot you want. There is no hard and fast rule, but you'll want the fastest shutter possible, so raise the ISO as needed and again depending on the look you want, adjust the aperture. As you make the aperture narrower the shutter speed will slow down, so you need to raise the ISO to compensate.
 
TCR4x4 said:
When you say he was not in focus, do you mean he wasnt in focus, or he was motioned blurred?

There could be two issues here, either the camera focusing on something other than him, or the shutter speed being too slow. For moving people, you need above 1/250th or faster to freeze them otherwise you will get blurry moving objects.

Settings depend entirely on the light at the time, time of day, what sort of shot you want. There is no hard and fast rule, but you'll want the fastest shutter possible, so raise the ISO as needed and again depending on the look you want, adjust the aperture. As you make the aperture narrower the shutter speed will slow down, so you need to raise the ISO to compensate.
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Thanks for your help. He wasn't in focus but background was. The aperture I tried was around f5 - I was hoping to freeze him and have a blurry background. Wrong av do you think?
 
If you looking to freeze him and have a blurry background, to show motion, you'll need to look at panning technique.

Have a quick search on the forum, you'll find loads of advice on this technique.
 
gercam said:
Thanks for your help. He wasn't in focus but background was. The aperture I tried was around f5 - I was hoping to freeze him and have a blurry background. Wrong av do you think?
Click to expand...

Can you post the picture,because again, terminology might be getting mixed up. He was either out of focus, due to the camera autofocusing on the background and not him, OR, your shutter speed was too slow and he is in focus, but just blurred becaise of the motion.. Or both!

If he is blurred because of motion, raise the shutter speed, if he blurred beacuse of mis focusing, make sure you select you focus point manually and dont let the camera choose for you.
 
Methinks from what you are describing you will need to use Tv function and pan.

You can start with a nice high shutter speed and bring the speed down as you get used to his speed.
 
thanks for all your help - watched YouTube and that really helped.

I think the tip to shoot in manual focus is where I was going wrong- my focal point was blurry from focussing on background I think. I will try again in manual focus and see how it goes.
 
gercam said:
thanks for all your help - watched YouTube and that really helped.

I think the tip to shoot in manual focus is where I was going wrong- my focal point was blurry from focussing on background I think. I will try again in manual focus and see how it goes.
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the tip was not to shoot in MF but to choose your AF point manually...Big Difference.
 
Practice panning before you go for the shot you want, its not as easy as it appears.
 
NigelPaul said:
the tip was not to shoot in MF but to choose your AF point manually...Big Difference.
Click to expand...

Woops- real beginner here I think. Understand difference- just didn't read properly or that's what I'm saying anyway
 
ttheduck said:
Practice panning before you go for the shot you want, its not as easy as it appears.
Click to expand...

Think practice practice practical is what I need
 
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