Techincal

There are several ways to express motion in your photos—ranging from freezing the motion with a very fast shutter speed to panning along with your subject using a slower shutter speed.

Freezing Action

In order to give an image a stop-action look, you’ll either need to use your camera’s sports/action mode (indicated by the running figure on the basic shooting mode dial), or your shutter-priority mode to set a fast shutter speed. In this mode, denoted by the Tv (time value) or S (shutter) mode on your shooting dial, you set the desired shutter speed and your camera will automatically set the aperture to get the best exposure. By using a shutter speed of at least 1/500—and especially at 1/1000 to 1/5000 second—you can freeze nearly all activities, including those that happen too quickly to be perceived by the human eye

Panning

This is another highly effective way of portraying a sense of motion when photographing a moving subject—you’ll follow the subject with your camera during an exposure. If this is done properly, you’ll get a relatively sharp subject against a very blurred background. The subject will rarely be entirely sharp, though, and some blurring of the subject can heighten the feeling of motion.  In order to get this effect, you’ll want to use your camera’s shutter priority mode and set it for a slow shutter speed. Settings of 1/15 or 1/30 second will enable you to handhold the camera during an exposure. If you’re using your camera’s basic shooting modes, you can often get a somewhat slower shutter speed with the landscape mode. Although it is designed to give you great depth of field when photographing landscapes, this mode will also utilize a somewhat slower shutter speed.

Motion Blur

One of the most exciting ways to portray movement in a photograph is to allow a moving object to become blurred. This approximates the way that our eyes perceive a fast-moving object. To record a moving subject as a blur, you must use your camera’s shutter priority mode to set a slow shutter speed, but the exact slowness depends on several factors, such as the speed of the subject. For example, a Ferris wheel in motion at dusk can be blurred at a shutter speed of at least 1/30 second. Also, a subject passing across your field of view blurs more quickly than one headed straight toward you.