how to set u'r camera for moving object?

lifa · May 5, 2008

i try to take a picture of some bikers at Kings park but most of them were blur. can someone help me about how to set u'r camera for a moving object like this? (my camera is Nikon D40x...). i tried using the auto mode for moving object but still it wasnt very nice.
thank you for u'r help

Overread · May 5, 2008

hmm well setting the camera to shutter priority mode will let you set the shutter speed for your camera whilst auto setting your apature to an appropriate value. After that its experimentation (some other might be able to give you some rough values to work with) but raising your ISO to 400 or even 800 will also help you increase shutter speed by letting more light in though then you have to be carefull of the noise in the shot at times.

ANDS! · May 5, 2008

Increasing the ISO doesn't let more light in. It simply increases the "films" sensitivity to light, which means you DONT have to let more light in to get a proper exposure.

As for capturing an action shot depends on what you want to do:

Do you want to FREEZE everything, including the background? Use a faster shutter speed (which means a "smaller" aperture).

Do you want to simulate action? Use a "slower" shutter speed, and track the subject of your shot. He will be in focus, and everything else will be blurred.

As for what I would've done. Well you are outside, so "light" isn't a problem. I wouldn't just exposed using AP-priority, and let your camera determine how fast your camera needed to flash. AP because you would use that to determine what kind of DOF you wanted, since light isn't an issue.

djacobox372 · May 5, 2008

ANDS! said:
Increasing the ISO doesn't let more light in. It simply increases the "films" sensitivity to light, which means you DONT have to let more light in to get a proper exposure.

As for capturing an action shot depends on what you want to do:

Do you want to FREEZE everything, including the background? Use a faster shutter speed (which means a "smaller" aperture).

Do you want to simulate action? Use a "slower" shutter speed, and track the subject of your shot. He will be in focus, and everything else will be blurred.

As for what I would've done. Well you are outside, so "light" isn't a problem. I wouldn't just exposed using AP-priority, and let your camera determine how fast your camera needed to flash. AP because you would use that to determine what kind of DOF you wanted, since light isn't an issue.

It's extremely difficult to get a result sharper then the photo he gave via tracking.... of course that method can create amazing results, but a super fast shutter speed is the only way to guarantee a sharp photo.

Set auto iso, set the shutter speed to 1/1000 or faster, and shoot away.

You should try the tracking method, but shoot continuously while tracking the target then delete the 9 out of 10 blurry photos. A tack-sharp tracked photo is 1 part skill 9 parts coincidental luck.

JIP · May 5, 2008

ANDS! said:
Increasing the ISO doesn't let more light in. It simply increases the "films" sensitivity to light, which means you DONT have to let more light in to get a proper exposure.

As for capturing an action shot depends on what you want to do:

Do you want to FREEZE everything, including the background? Use a faster shutter speed (which means a "smaller" aperture).

Do you want to simulate action? Use a "slower" shutter speed, and track the subject of your shot. He will be in focus, and everything else will be blurred.

As for what I would've done. Well you are outside, so "light" isn't a problem. I wouldn't just exposed using AP-priority, and let your camera determine how fast your camera needed to flash. AP because you would use that to determine what kind of DOF you wanted, since light isn't an issue.

I agree with all this and more you really need to get back to basics and start to lear more about exposure and how your camera works. If you wand to just pull your camera out and make an image like this work you need to have some fundamentals. First things first I think this image is just out of focus mabye some of the background has some motion blur but most of it looks out of focus. A few things to try a better time of day better light better angle and better focus. I don't know if you have evr been there but a nice place to go to learn about this kind of photography (albeit with skating) is http://www.skateperception.com/ .