panning

Turbulence in Motion /  by Todd Henson

On a recent walk through the woods I felt the pull to try something different, to experiment with a style of photography I don’t often practice, something more abstract and dynamic. I decided to use intentional panning of the camera to create motion blurred images of static scenes, something I’ve seen other photographers do but haven’t very often tried myself.

Horizontal panning, where you move the camera in a relatively straight line left and or right, is sometimes used to create beautifully abstract images of shorelines where there’s nothing distinct or recognizable in the photo but instead just a blur of lines and colors. The closet I can easily come to shoreline is along a creek or river, so that’s what I decided to try first. I experimented using longer or shorter shutter speeds, and I tried moving the camera both left and right during an exposure, as well as just moving left or just moving right. It was fascinating seeing all the various effects this created.

Inside Saturn

In this first image I swung back and forth very quickly, never stopping my motion. I was using a wide angle lens, 16 mm, and I was fairly close to the creek, so when I panned back and forth it created curved instead of straight lines. At first I’d considered trying to straighten them in software, but instead I decided to accentuate the curves by distorting them even more. To do this, instead of choosing my specific lens in Lightroom’s profile section I chose a GoPro lens profile, which created a more fisheye view. I also adjusted some of the colors, making them more saturated. I figured, there’s nothing real or recognizable in this, so no reason to stick strictly to what I saw.

Another fascinating effect you can create is when you’re panning but you slow down enough, or even stop for brief moments during the exposure. This created the image below, where there is still plenty of motion blur, but you can also see some of the scene, the creek below, the far banks and the trees of the forest beyond. Using the same techniques in slightly different ways can give vastly different results.

Creekside Flashbacks

Focusing downward, on the moving water of the creek and small sections of disturbance, while still panning horizontally, created the following image. I imagine it as a closeup of the storms on Jupiter with the beautiful bands of colored clouds, storms raging within. The browns at the top are from the bank on the other side of the creek. They are very streaked and blurred from the motion. Interestingly, the moving water has a very different look than the bank. Some of the water closest to the lens seems to have very little motion blur to it, while a small section of disturbed water flowing over rocks takes on the form of the white storm clouds.

Storms on Jupiter

You can also pan vertically, up and down. As with the horizontal panning, you can pan both up and down in a single exposure, or pan just upward or just downward, each creating different effects. How fast you pan and when and where you start panning also make a difference. Below are two examples of panning vertically at a stretch of trees. The first includes some of the sky, whereas the second is of the forested hillside but stops just as it hits the sky.

Dancing Trees

Hillside

Finally, on the way out I decided to try the horizontal panning technique with the road. I love this effect. It gives the feel of being in a car looking out a window at the road and scenery flying by. And yet here, I was standing in one place and panning my camera along the road. With most exposures the road was blurry, but in this one I managed to capture the painted lines relatively well focused. It might have been interesting to do this as a car went by, panning with the car.

The Road in Motion

If these techniques are new to you then give them a try sometime. The key is creating slow enough shutter speeds to let you move the camera during the exposure. To do this you can lower your ISO as low as your camera allows and stop down your aperture until you get slow enough shutter speeds. In the case of these images I used ISO 100, apertures between f/18 and f/22, and shutter speeds of 1/20 to 1.3 seconds. The rest is all about moving your camera. And you don’t need to restrict yourself to horizontal or vertical movement, you could also rotate it or move it in various directions. Experiment!

One final comment on post-processing these. By using such small apertures you will begin to notice sensor dust in your images. That’s an unfortunate side effect of small apertures, the depth of field is so great you start to see actual dust accumulated on your camera sensor. This is easy enough to get rid of in software, but you should know to look for it. You’d think with photographs this abstract it wouldn’t be a concern, and yet it really stood out in some places.

I had a lot of fun creating these images. Sometimes experimenting and using techniques you usually don’t can be an exhilarating experience, giving you new ways to look at the world around you, new ways to visualize the sorts of photographs you’re capable of creating. I hope you’ve enjoyed this, and I hope it inspires you to try your own experiments.

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Farm From the Road: The Story Behind the Image /  by Todd Henson

Farm From the Road (Mount Jackson, Virginia)

My brother and I were on a trip to see the Fourth of July fireworks from Skyline Drive, in Shenandoah National Park. We were curious what the valley would look like from the mountains. On our way there we passed through Mount Jackson, Virginia. We knew of a covered bridge in the area and wanted to see it. But the bridge didn’t end up the highlight of that drive, at least not for me.

We passed by the farm in the photo above, with the green fields in the foreground. Something about it caught my eye. As a kid I’d always been fascinated by the foreground blur seen from the passenger seat of a car. Something about the farm brought back that memory. So I asked my brother to turn around and drive down the road again. This time I had my camera ready, set with a slow enough shutter speed to allow the foreground green crops to blur while we drove by.

To capture a sharp view of the farm I panned the camera from the car, keeping the lens pointed at the farm while we moved by in the car. This takes practice. You need the right shutter speed to give the effect you want, and you need to keep your camera steady as you pan. My brother kept the car as steady as he could and I kept the camera as steady as I could. I used a shutter speed of 1/20 of a second, which in this light required an aperture of f/18 at ISO 200.

We probably drove over the stretch of road 3 or 4 times before deciding to move on. I’ve no clue what we might have looked like to someone at the farm. But I’m pleased with the results. It was a fun day, and we still had the fireworks to look forward to the following evening.

For this image we were moving slowly, maybe 35 miles per hour, and the subject was at a distance, so I was panning very slowly. But you can also try photographing subjects much closer to the car, or from a faster moving car, requiring you to pan much faster and creating much more motion blur in the foreground or background.

Have you ever photographed from a moving car? Give it a try sometime (just be sure you’re a passenger). It can be a lot of fun, and you never know what you might create.

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9 Creative Uses for Slow Shutter Speeds /  by Todd Henson

4 sec exposure of Washington Monument, D.C.

Using slow shutter speeds to create long exposures is a great way to add a little more creativity to your photography. The uses for slow shutter speeds are almost endless. Below are 9 examples.

Examples of Slow Shutter Speeds

1. Waterfalls

Waterfalls are a classic example of using slow shutter speeds creatively in landscape photography. As you slow the shutter speed the water begins to blur, turning into a silky smooth flow instead of frozen droplets of water. The shutter speed you choose will depend on your personal preference and the speed of the water. How smooth do you like the water? Do you want to show a little motion but still capture some of the raw energy of the water? Or do you want to completely blur the water into a rolling milky stream? This technique almost always requires a tripod to stabilize the camera during the exposure.

Here I show examples of several waterfalls and rapids shot at different shutter speeds so you can see the effects different shutter speeds have. At faster shutter speeds (shorter exposure) you can see more movement in the water. At slower shutter speeds (longer exposure) the water turns into a milky flow. Which image is best is a personal preference.

2. Whitewater Sports

When shooting sports you can use faster shutter speeds to freeze the action, or use slower shutter speeds to add a little creative blur, showing motion. Whitewater sports, such as kayaking, is a great example of adding a little drama by slowing down the shutter speed and capturing motion blur in the water, and sometimes in the athlete as well. As with waterfalls, which shutter speed you choose is personal preference, and a factor of what you’re trying to capture. Perhaps you want to fully freeze the athlete but show a little motion in the water spray. Or perhaps you want a longer exposure to show a lot of flowing motion in the water. The longer the shutter speed the more difficult it will be to capture a sharp image of the athlete, but depending on how the athlete is moving it can be done. And a little motion in the athlete is not always a bad thing, especially if you’re trying for a more artistic photograph. This technique can be performed hand-held or with a tripod. If you use a tripod loosen the head to allow you to move the camera.

3. Landscapes with Water or Clouds

Long exposures can still water in a landscape or blur moving clouds in the sky. Longer exposures are more likely to still the water, and longer exposures will blur the clouds more. If the clouds are moving very fast or you use a very long exposure you can turn the clouds into nothing more than white streaks in the sky. If the water is reasonably flat you can sometimes still it enough to show reflections that more closely match the subject. Instead of wavy reflections you can capture straight ones. You can see an example of this in the photo of the Washington Monument. This technique usually requires a tripod.

20 sec exposure. The water near the camera is perfectly still and the clouds show some motion blur. The extra gold and blue tones are caused by a Singh-Ray Gold-N-Blue polarizer.

4. Turning People into Ghosts or Removing People from a Scene

Have you ever been to a monument or other scene that you’d like to photograph without any people, but there are too many people around and they never leave the scene? Sometimes you can use a very long exposure to eliminate most or all of the people, provided the people are moving fast enough. Slow the shutter down (use a long exposure) and you will start to blur the motion of the people. Slow it down enough and the people won’t even show up in the final image. This doesn’t always work, but give it a try. This technique is best used with a tripod.

To create ghosts you choose a middle ground shutter speed, something slow enough to blur the people, but fast enough to capture them. You really have to experiment with this technique. Which shutter speed you choose depends on how fast the people are moving and how blurry, or ghost-like, you want to capture them.

Many people have become ghosts in the first photo below. The second photo uses a slower shutter speed, but it's not long enough to make all people completely disappear. You can still see some blurred motion from them. But if I'd taken an even longer exposure, perhaps 10 or 20 seconds, most of the people would have disappeared.

5. Stationary Panning

You can capture some very dynamic photos if you stand still and pan with a moving subject, using a slow shutter speed. The goal is to try to capture the subject mostly in focus but blur the background. This takes a lot of practice. Examples of this are photographing bicycles or vehicles as they pass by on the street, and capturing birds in flight. This technique is most easily performed hand-held. If you use a tripod loosen the head to allow the camera to move.

6. Panning While Moving

Similar to stationary panning, but this time you are moving while panning. The subject could be stationary or moving. As an example of a moving subject, you could photograph a moving motorcycle from a moving car. For a stationary subject you could photograph a farm and fields from a moving car. Objects closer to the camera will exhibit more motion blur than objects at a distance. This technique is most easily performed hand-held.

1/20 sec exposure from the passenger side of a moving car (I was the passenger, not the driver). Notice the motion blur of the green field.

7. Air Shows

Air shows hosting aircraft with propellers are a great place to try slower shutter speeds. When an aircraft has a moving propeller it’s best to try to capture some motion in that propeller. Creating a photograph of a moving plane with a perfectly frozen propeller just doesn’t look right, it looks fake. But capturing some motion in the propeller helps convey the motion of the aircraft. This technique can be performed hand-held or with a tripod. If using a tripod loosen the head to allow the camera to move.

1/50 sec exposure. This is another example of stationary panning. I was standing still while panning with the moving aircraft.

8. Zooming During Exposure

If you have a zoom lens you can really get creative by using a longer shutter speed and zooming the lens during the exposure. This is best performed from a tripod, but you can also try doing this hand held. The key is experimentation. Try zooming out during the exposure, then try zooming in during the exposure. They give different results. Try different subjects, different angles. Look for colors that can blur during the zoom.

9. Moving Camera During Exposure

This technique doesn’t require anything but a camera with a lens. Any camera will do provided you can use slow shutter speeds. You don’t need a tripod. All you need to do is move the camera during the exposure. You don’t even need to look through the viewfinder if you don’t want to. Experiment. Try different subjects, different shutter speeds, different motions. I don’t do this very often, but it’s something worth trying and I’d like to put a little more time into it. The results are usually far more abstract than many forms of photography. You may create photos of abstract blurs of color. Or perhaps you partially pan on a subject, then move elsewhere and create something close to a double exposure.

2.5 sec exposure while moving the camera. Notice the multiple ghosted images of the Jefferson Memorial.

How to Get Slow Shutter Speeds

Hopefully I’ve convinced you to try some long exposure photography. But how do you do it? How do you slow the shutter speed down? There are various ways to achieve slower shutter speeds (longer exposures), depending on what gear you have available.

  1. Shoot on an overcast day, when there is less sunlight, or at night. There’s less light at these times, so the camera will require more time to capture enough light to create the photograph.

  2. Use a smaller aperture. This means apertures with higher numbered f-stops, such as f/16, f/22, f/32, etc. This will limit the light entering the camera and allow you to lengthen the exposure, as the camera needs more time to capture enough light to create the photograph.

  3. Keep your ISO low. Some cameras use ISO 100 or 200 as the standard setting. Keep it here, or try the lower settings. ISO is the camera’s sensitivity to light. If you raise the ISO, for example to 800, the camera becomes more sensitive to light and requires less time to capture enough light to make the exposure. Note that higher ISO’s are, generally, also more prone to noise (grain in film). To create longer exposures set the ISO low, so the camera needs more time to capture enough light.

  4. Use a polarizing filter. A polarizer, in addition to polarizing the light, will also block some of the light entering the camera. Most polarizers will block between 1 to 2 stops of light. This will allow you capture slightly longer exposures. Combining this with a low ISO and a small aperture may be enough to let you get the shutter speeds you want.

  5. Use a neutral density filter. If you want really long exposures you may need to purchase some neutral density filters. These are dark filters that block some light. Think sunglasses for your lens. They’re called neutral density because they are supposed to be neutral in color, not introducing color casts. However, some filters, especially less expensive ones, do alter the color somewhat. You can usually correct this in post processing. Neutral density filters come in many different strengths. For very long exposures look at some of the 5, 10, or 15 stop neutral density filters out there. These will let you capture multi-minute exposures.

  6. Combine any or all of the above to get even slower shutter speeds. Be aware, though, if you use too many filters with wide angle lenses you may begin to actually see the filter in the corners of the frame. If that happens you can remove filters until you no longer see them, zoom in or use a lens that isn't quite as wide-angle, or create the image and crop it in post.

As a reminder, if you use really slow shutter speeds you may need a tripod, or some other support, to hold the camera steady during the exposure.

There are many other uses for slow shutter speeds. But I hope the few examples I’ve shown will prompt you to go out and experiment. Try different shutter speeds of the same scene, see how the different speeds affect the final image. You may be pleasantly surprised by some of the results.

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