Shutter speed: How fast should you be going?

The shutter speed setting of your camera is what I believe is going to be the primary means of control. The shutter speed determines how long (or short) the sensor or film is exposed to what you're trying to take a picture of.

By increasing the length of exposure, you increase the amount of light going through your lens and hitting your sensor. The longer the shutter is open for, the steadier the camera is going to need to be held.
A good rule of thumb to go by in regards to stable hand-held shutter speeds is:

 1/Focal Length (mm)

 So, if you're shooting at a 50mm focal length, the slowest shutter speed that you should be using is 1/50s. With an Optical Stabilization system (IS for Canon), you can often shoot at much slower shutter speeds comfortably hand-held. I find that I can shoot at 50mm with IS enabled at a shutter speed of 1/10 comfortably and even slower with some steady breathing. Without IS enabled, I find that my slowest hand-held shutter speed is limited to 1/30.

The easiest way to test at which speed range you can comfortably take pictures hand-held is to find an object in the house that isn't moving with appropriate lighting to be perfectly exposed at shutter speeds around 1/10 and 1/30.

Higher shutter speeds are essential to freezing movement using ambient lighting. Water spray, ball movement and jumping subjects come to mind.

While it's easy to get a higher shutter speed (increasing ISO or using flash), in direct light it can be very difficult to achieve a slower shutter speed; this is where aperture comes in to play.

Camera Settings and You!

So I've come to realize, that a lot of photographers out there (pros excepted) don't know what the settings on a camera do. It's tough to make sense of the jumbled mess that is shutter speed, f/stop, and iso. 

I'm going to write a few articles outlining the specifics of each setting and how they complement each other.

Light Painting

Photography is all about light. Light reflected from (or directly from) the subject you're shooting goes through the lens (or other focusing or non-focusing element) and onto your recording medium. There are several different ways to alter how exactly light hits your medium and what gets recorded onto it.

Light painting is one of those techniques.

Light painting can be used to illuminate a subject, add artistic meaning to a scene, or even be the subject in itself. It requires a long shutter speed and a source of light. Normally, you'll want to put the camera on a tripod to reduce any amount of movement that could attribute blur to the resulting image. For very long exposures, it often helps to put the camera on timer and mirror lockup (if your camera supports such features) to further reduce movement.

A good technique to add the light trails (as seen in the image above) to a long exposure image is to use a flashlight (with the lens portion off, exposing the bare bulb) or an LED light. Trace your light source through the air, in the desired fashion you would like your trail to show up in the image. Make sure to point your light source towards the camera, otherwise you may be just illuminating the area around you.

Light painting most often refers to painting the highlights and exposure onto the subject itself.
Whatever the light hits will be illuminated based on the intensity/length of time that area has light on it.

Both techniques can be combined! Producing spectral results as shown:

UBC Rail Jam

So, I hit up the UBC Railjam yesterday (Nov 6th). Here are a few slick shots:
all photos subject to copyright - contact me for non-personal use

So this baller kid, Daichi, organized the whole event. I went to high school with him. He's legit, as shows by this awesome pre-season event. Personally, I think UBC needs to be a little more stoked on shred events. More legit photos to follow.

The BIRTH

A simple website was conceived today. Today being November 7th, 2009. Sweet.