Kid's Pictures with R4

[Estima1892]

Hi All,

What's the best settings for taking candid pictures of children at play? Do you use sports-scene mode to capture? Most of the pics taken with my R4 for these moments are blur.
Also, how do you increase the shutter speed to snap fast moving subjects?

TQ & Regards.

 

[brianj]

Hi All,

What's the best settings for taking candid pictures of children at
play? Do you use sports-scene mode to capture? Most of the pics
taken with my R4 for these moments are blur.
Also, how do you increase the shutter speed to snap fast moving
subjects?

I have never used sports mode, but you are right in saying that the fastest shutter will help if you are getting blurred subjects.

I just had a look at the shutter speed which is shown on the LCD when you half press the shutter. In various modes, and in my lowly lit lounge room, the shutter on normal photography mode was 1/5 sec, but if I changed to sports mode it went up to 1/9. As I have my ISO set to AUTO, it has most likely raised the ISO to achieve this near doubling of shutter speed.

So one way would be to lock the ISO to say 200 or 400, but then you would get an increase in noise. I also tried turning on the flash and then it jumped to 1/32 so this would be another way if it was not very bright.

Of course the easiest way would be to take the shots in bright light, where the shutter spead would be naturally very fast.

One of the most difficult shots for a camera is fast movement in low light, so you are probably reaching the limit for a simple P&S camera and would be better served using a DSLR.

Brian

 

[Estima1892]

Hi brianj,

Thanks for the tips. Will give them a try.

If you were to see "carryman"'s photos (R4 is such a handy camera) of the gulls, you'd notice that the shutter speed is 1/2000s. I wonder how he did that.

Cheers.

Hi All,

What's the best settings for taking candid pictures of children at
play? Do you use sports-scene mode to capture? Most of the pics
taken with my R4 for these moments are blur.
Also, how do you increase the shutter speed to snap fast moving
subjects?

I have never used sports mode, but you are right in saying that the
fastest shutter will help if you are getting blurred subjects.

I just had a look at the shutter speed which is shown on the LCD
when you half press the shutter. In various modes, and in my lowly
lit lounge room, the shutter on normal photography mode was 1/5
sec, but if I changed to sports mode it went up to 1/9. As I have
my ISO set to AUTO, it has most likely raised the ISO to achieve
this near doubling of shutter speed.

So one way would be to lock the ISO to say 200 or 400, but then you
would get an increase in noise. I also tried turning on the flash
and then it jumped to 1/32 so this would be another way if it was
not very bright.

Of course the easiest way would be to take the shots in bright
light, where the shutter spead would be naturally very fast.

One of the most difficult shots for a camera is fast movement in
low light, so you are probably reaching the limit for a simple P&S
camera and would be better served using a DSLR.

Brian

 

[brianj]

Hi brianj,

Thanks for the tips. Will give them a try.

If you were to see "carryman"'s photos (R4 is such a handy camera)
of the gulls, you'd notice that the shutter speed is 1/2000s. I
wonder how he did that.

I think its just the fact that he is shooting into the sky, and due to exposing on the underside, although the image does not look overly bright, I think it would have been a very brightly lit sky. So taking your shots in a bright conditions is the easiest fix. An auto camera will choose a faster shutter speed as the light increases.

I did think of one other way, which is how people take moving cars so the background is blurred. If the kids are all moving in the one direction, slightly pan the camera so they are sharp and the background is blurred.

Brian

 

[rube39]

The sports mode works fine for me when I want to take moving subjects.

Rube