Assignment, Week 3: Fast shutter speeds

Theme: Chaos

Drawing once again on our blur equation:

we can see that yet another way to reduce blur (besides the shake speed-reducing techniques we tried last week) is to simply reduce the exposure time (shutter speed) - with a short time to actually record the photo, we don't have much of an opportunity to shake, and thus there is little or no blur. This works for moving subjects as well.

As we discussed in Week 1, the three parameters that control exposure are shutter speed, aperture, and ISO. If we wish to minimize shutter speed, we would achieve this by maximizing the aperture (largest aperture = smallest f-stop number) and the ISO (highest ISO sensitivity).

This week's assignment will simply be to utilize short shutter speeds in taking low-light photos. Since utilizing fast shutter speeds will also reduce blur from moving subjects, you may also try shooting fast action scenes, such as sports.

For sports, the following games are going on at Berkeley (according to the calbears website) - as Berkeley students you can attend all the games for free - bring your camera and start snapping away (there's a good chance there'll be Daily Cal, Golden Bear Sports, or other shooters as well, so don't worry about being the weirdo taking pictures of all the players).

February 14, 2008 7pm - Women's Basketball vs. Arizona State
February 16, 2008 1pm - Men's Rugby vs. Saint Mary's College
February 16, 2008 1pm - Women's Basketball vs. Arizona
February 17, 2008 12pm - Women's Lacrosse vs. Northwestern
February 17, 2008 2pm - Women's Gymnastics vs. UCLA
February 17, 2008 2pm - Women's Gymnastics vs. UCLA
February 17, 2008 2pm - Women's Gymnastics vs. UCLA
February 19, 2008 3pm - Women's Softball vs. Netherlands Olympic Team
February 20, 2008 1:30pm - Women's Tennis vs. Stanford
February 20, 2008 3:30pm - Men's Rugby vs. British Columbia
February 22, 2008 1:30pm - Men's Baseball vs. Kansas State
February 23, 2008 11am - Men's Baseball vs. Utah Valley
February 23, 2008 1pm - Men's Rugby vs. Utah
February 23, 2008 1pm - Women's Lacrosse vs. Stanford
February 23, 2008 1pm - Women's Basketball vs. Stanford
February 24, 2008 1pm - Men's Baseball vs. Kansas State

Assignment summary

Shoot in low-light or fast-action (or combination of both) situations.
Utilize high ISO, large aperture, or even underexpose and brigthen later with software - whatever it takes to achieve a fast enough shutter speed.
Assignment folder is here