City Escapes Nature Photography: May 2011

CITY ESCAPES

Nature Photography, LLC

Newsletter

May, 2011

1 - 2 - 3 - Jump!

Understanding Shutter Delay

Modern digital cameras have revolutionized photography, making it easier and cheaper than ever to record in pictures everything from your children’s sporting events and the family vacation to professional portraiture and product photography. While many features of digital cameras make photography easier and more fun, there are a nagging few that are true headaches to deal with. Learning to cope with these frustrating traits can further maximize the enjoyment of photography in the digital world.

A common problem among point-and-shoot and non-professional level digital cameras is what is known as “shutter delay.” This occurs when there is a pause between the time when the shutter-release button is pushed and the shutter actually opens to take the picture. In some camera models, this delay can be close to a second long. While in our normal perception of time, a second does not seem very long, in photography, it can mean the difference between getting the shot at precisely the right moment or losing all impact. Imagine trying to capture the moment when your son’s bat connects with the ball in his first hit in Little League, or the ball popping back up into the air as your daughter dives to dig a hard spike in her high school volleyball game. Now imagine that same moment only a second later. In both cases, the ball is long gone. Your son is no longer in mid-swing, and is possibly no longer even holding the bat, and rather than flying through the air, your daughter is lying on the floor, her heroics lost to posterity. In action photography (which in the realm of family photography includes capturing that delighted grin when something special happens that lights up a child’s face), capturing the moment is all about timing, both the photographer’s and the camera’s.

Improving one’s ability to freeze the moment requires practice, certainly, but also entails understanding your equipment. To this end, take time to play with your camera, paying attention to how long it takes to actually open the shutter after you push the button. Get a feel for that delay, and learn to incorporate it into your timing. It may feel awkward at first to “rush the shot,” pushing the shutter-release button before you actually want the image to be taken, but with practice it will begin to feel more natural, and the results will be much closer to what you were trying to achieve with the image in the first place. Find something to practice on: try to capture the pendulum of a clock at its zenith, or go to a dog park and try to freeze the Frisbee-catching dogs mid-snag. If you have children with lots of energy to burn (before they become human tornadoes inside the house), try this one: count to three and have them jump up into the air. Aim to capture them in mid-leap. Hint: depending upon the duration of your shutter delay, it is often advantageous for you to press the shutter release on “three,” even though they shouldn’t jump until the next count: “one – two – three (press the shutter release) – jump!”

The solution to shutter-delay frustration is straightforward: be aware of it, know how long the delay is in your camera, and practice. That’s it. Nonetheless, many people don’t get the images they want because they haven’t taken the time to get really comfortable with this unfortunate feature of their digital camera. Take a little time, practice, and watch how quickly you become the envy of the neighborhood with your amazing action shots.

Happy shooting!

Don’t Forget to Enter Our “Get the Word Out” Event

There is still time to get your name in the hat for a free limited edition print! You will be entered in the drawing once for subscribing to our newsletter, and once for liking us on Facebook, so be sure to like us and double your chances to win. Remember, the drawing will only be held if we get either 75 subscribers to our newsletter or 100 fans on Facebook, so tell all your friends, too. The deadline to enter is June 17, 2011. For full rules and to see the winner’s choice of images, see April’s newsletter, or go to our blog.

May’s Fun Fact

May 15 is National Peace Officer’s Day. In honor of the men and women who serve in this often thankless role, this month we look at the symbol of the goal they are striving to achieve: peace. That symbol, of course, is the white dove.

* White doves are also known as Sacred White Doves, or Java Doves.

* Female doves are dams, males are sires.

* The white doves that are occasionally released at weddings to symbolize love are not actually doves. They are white homing pigeons.

* The dove with an olive branch in its beak, a symbol of truce, comes from the Biblical tale of Noah. A dove returned to Noah with an olive branch in its beak, proving to Noah that the waters of the Great Flood had receded, and land was once again above water.

* Doves drink in a unique manner. They put their beak into water and suck, as if drinking from a straw. Most birds cannot do this, but rather take a small sip of water into their beak, then tilt their head back to swallow.

* It is thought that the Mesopotamians first domesticated the dove around 3000 BC.

* The dove was one of the sacred animals of Aphrodite, the ancient Greek goddess of love.