When I first got back into photography five or so years ago, I quickly re-discovered that I have a passion for shooting uncontrolled, unscripted, unposed subject. Basically I shoot sports. I was a photographer in the Navy back in the early to mid 1980's and basically hung up my camera's for about 20 years before I decided to get back into it. I purchased my first digital body, a Nikon D80, around 2009 and was smacked in the face with the reality of the fact that I hadn't shot or kept up with the pace of technological change for such a long period of time. I kind of had to "re-learn" how to shoot again! Fortunately my background did come in handy as I did have a basic understanding of how light, shutter speeds, iso, etc ... all play into being able to produce a nice result. Anyway -- this whole digital thing was a wild discovery and .... wow! Instant results on the back of the body via the onboard lcd screen and cheap!!! ( no film, no processing fees, no waiting.. this is great!! :) )
So getting back to the second sentence - I discovered I have a "thing" for shooting sports. Initially I was really pretty hung up on frame rate. (
how may frames per second can a camera body shoot - ie; is it a machine gun? ) I had to have faster and faster frame rates ... I did also discover more robust "pro level" bodies too. Not only did they satiate my growing addiction for faster frame rates, but they also tend to be much more robustly built - made out of metal instead of plastic. And weather sealed. "Ahhh .. this is good - now I can stay out in the pouring rain at football games, or get roosted with mud and rocks at the motorcycle races ... Me like. :) "
Time passes and like all things as we grow and learn, we mature. I find that while I do still appreciate my 8 FPS bodies that I have - which by today's standard in pro class bodies is considered slow - I also have discovered in recent years that I rarely actually use that 8 FPS capability. I rarely shoot in bursts of more than 3 or 4 frames in succession, and am more often than not just single tapping the shutter release. (
shooting single frames as opposed to just mashing down on the trigger and letting 'er rip ) As I come to get a better handle on both light, the gear that I own - and a knowledge of the sports I like to shoot - I find that not only am I slowing down in the machine gunning department of pure frames per second bursts, but I'm also actually slowing down the actual speed at which the captures are made.
"Dragging the shutter" as it is commonly referred to in photo circles. Basically it refers to using slow shutter speeds to achieve a particular look. Slow shutter speeds are not uncommonly used mind you - but they are more typically used on stationary subjects. Sports almost always dictates two basic principles - high FPS and even higher shutter speeds to freeze action. Both of my bodies can shoot at speeds up to 1/8000th of a second shutter speed. Thats very fast and it can make for some really spectacular imagery. But it can also be very "static" too. I've come to dig creating images that are not only reasonably well focused and exposed, but ones that also evoke a sense of movement or action. It's actually kind of a challenge getting it (the camera) dialed in "just so" when trying to setup a scene - but then once you do get it dialed in and can make it repeatable ... one can occasionally come up with some killer grabs! :)
So anyway -- I was up at
Broome Tioga again today shooting a little of both hare scrambles (last race of the 2014 winter series up there) and some MX that they were doing on the MX track. I was doing a little shutter dragging as presented in the photo's here. These and the rest from today's batch will get posted up to
the galleries over the next few days - keep checking back to see if I shot you. :)
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