Tip 14 - Motion Blur

camera settings

Jan 17

I talked about “blur” several times in the past. This one is a bit special.

When we talk about blur, what first comes to our mind usually is the background blur. Yes who doesn’t like the dreamy feel of an image with that nicely blurred background? I’ll also talk about foreground blur and intentional blur in the composition chapter later.

All the above blurs fall into the same category as they are typically created with shallow depth of field from wide aperture (or small f-stop) settings on your DSLR.

Today’s blur has nothing to do with aperture or shallow depth of field. Instead, it’s created by slow shutter speed. This might work particularly well in indoor or dim light settings.

Camera settings

👉Make sure to set the camera on somewhere steady if you don’t have a tripod. Or hold the camera still if you choose hand grip position.

👉Dial down your aperture by increasing f-stop values to at least f6.3 or larger.

👉Use a “slow” shutter speed than the “safety” 1/250sec I often mentioned before - eg. 1/50 sec or even slower

This set up allows you to create the motion blur from the moving subject while keeping the rest of the photo sharp.

The definition of “slow” above is a relative term

👉If you photograph a race car, try 1/250 sec or even faster

👉If you photograph someone running, 1/50-100 sec

👉If you photograph someone walking, 1/20-1/30 sec or slower

The bottom line - the faster your subject moves, the faster you want to set your shutter speed.

Since this type of images doesn’t require high end camera with low light performance or a fast lens, anyone with a DSLR can try it.

For example, this black and white photo was created on my first DSLR camera over 15 years ago when I was taking pictures of everything and trying out different genres and styles.