Low light slow shutter blur pics


PixelHero

New Member
Apr 17, 2010
55
0
0
What do u do when u'r photographing in low lights.. In order for Enough exposure, u have to use slow shutter.. But slow shutter will cause blur photo.. Increasing iso causes too much noise.

I was photographing my kids dance performance and already using max aperture and iso1600. Shutter speed can't go faster as photo will be too under exposed.
 

Yeah. K-5, and sometime 6400 as well. That is a lot of advantage in low light. And of course the duper fast AF. :)
 

Get a K5 and you'd be able to use iso 3600 :)

Hurhur... Wanna get k5 too but budget constraint.
Wait I strike immediately go buy haha
 

maybe u can get an external flash?
 

did you use a prime lens?

they are really useful in low light conditions :D

and if the shutter speed still not fast enough maybe you pan your camera to follow through the action...(but of course this ain't easy your skill must be very pro :sweat:)
 

Thanks for the tips.. Too bad can't use flash ..
Next time I trying panning ..
I'm using kx with tamron 17-50mm f/2.8
Other than getting new cam and new lenses .. Any other technics I
Can use?
Thanks
 

Dont limit yourself to iso 1600.
Go 3200 or even 6400, some minor PP will still get you a good picture, compared to a blurred pic.
 

Normally if I can't get the shot with iso 1600, I'll bump it up to 3200 or even 6400. Some noise is better not getting the shot (or blurry shots). Also, you can try shooting in raw. Sometimes, noise isn't so obvious when the pictures are resized for viewing.
 

use tripod/monopod. or any point that can hold your camera sturdy and reduce vibration.:)

you may pan too even with tripod.
 

Last edited:
What do u do when u'r photographing in low lights.. In order for Enough exposure, u have to use slow shutter.. But slow shutter will cause blur photo.. Increasing iso causes too much noise.

I was photographing my kids dance performance and already using max aperture and iso1600. Shutter speed can't go faster as photo will be too under exposed.

then if you can't do anything about this, and flash is allowed, you can try using that.
 

use tripod/monopod. or any point that can hold your camera sturdy and reduce vibration.:)

you may pan too even with tripod.

may not be handshake problems, but shutter speed too slow to catch the motion

as he mentions, it is a dance performance.
 

and if the shutter speed still not fast enough maybe you pan your camera to follow through the action...(but of course this ain't easy your skill must be very pro :sweat:)

panning will only be applicable in very specific conditions, i.e. that of a car moving along the road, for the subject to remain relatively sharp. subject needs to be moving in a relatively straight line and maintain roughly equivalent distance for this to be ok.
 

Lol.
Frankly, Kx and tamron 17-50/2.8 is already very good for low light. Few points from me :
1. Have realistic expectations. Don't expect no noise at high ISO. I always find that many new users who never used film have unrealistic expectations that pictures are supposed to be 'noiseless'.
2. At normal viewing sizes (Eg. 1200x780; 1024x768; etc) that fill up your whole LCD or TV. The noise is usually not apparent
3. Do use high ISO 3200 if necessary for the Kx
4. Use a high enough shutter speed ( likely above 1/125)
5. Wait for the movement to 'freeze' or reach its peak before snapping (that will not need as fast a shutter speed)
6. You don't need to expose for the whole scene (much of which is dark or black). In many such concert situations, the dark parts trick the camera to using a slower shutter speed (ie. expose more). You only need to expose enough for the subject, which is often lit by stage lights.


Hope that helps.
 

Great Tips! Thanks all for helping.
will try to do more shots and hope can get better shots instead
 

Lol.
Frankly, Kx and tamron 17-50/2.8 is already very good for low light. Few points from me :
1. Have realistic expectations. Don't expect no noise at high ISO. I always find that many new users who never used film have unrealistic expectations that pictures are supposed to be 'noiseless'.
2. At normal viewing sizes (Eg. 1200x780; 1024x768; etc) that fill up your whole LCD or TV. The noise is usually not apparent
3. Do use high ISO 3200 if necessary for the Kx
4. Use a high enough shutter speed ( likely above 1/125)
5. Wait for the movement to 'freeze' or reach its peak before snapping (that will not need as fast a shutter speed)
6. You don't need to expose for the whole scene (much of which is dark or black). In many such concert situations, the dark parts trick the camera to using a slower shutter speed (ie. expose more). You only need to expose enough for the subject, which is often lit by stage lights.


Hope that helps.

pinholecam,

Thanks for the guide here.

But do you shoot in Av mode or M mode?

Tried going around Orchard last night and take some Xmas lighting photos w/o a tripod on a kit lens. Photos turn out dark, unless flash is used.
 

Its hard to tell what went wrong unless you post up some pics with the exif. Did you set a sufficiently high iso, or set a sufficient range for auti-iso? K-x should have no problems at all shooting christmas lights if paired with a tamron 17-50, but don't expect it to work miracles if you only allow it to shoot at iso 100 at night.

Correct exposure depends on three factors - shutter speed / aperture / iso. You cannot cheat the laws of physics for shutter speed and aperture - you need a sufficiently high shutter speed to counter handshake and motion of the subject, and aperture is limited by your lens.

Thus the remaining option is to push ISO.

You can consider looking into noise reduction software, good noise reduction software can allow you to use very high iso with good results. E.g. Lightroom 3, Topaz denoise.

Also consider that if you are going to be resizing a picture for the web, e.g. facebook or on a blog, you can get away with A LOT of noise in the original picture. Its only obvious if you are posting high res photos on flickr.
 

What do u do when u'r photographing in low lights.. In order for Enough exposure, u have to use slow shutter.. But slow shutter will cause blur photo.. Increasing iso causes too much noise.

I was photographing my kids dance performance and already using max aperture and iso1600. Shutter speed can't go faster as photo will be too under exposed.

Since you are using the Kx, you can go to ISO3200 or even 6400 and you will still be able to get good photos.
 

May i offer a more low-level solution?

I don't think bumping up iso will solve the problem. From my limited experience, when dealing with challenging or tricky lighting, the correct metering mode is important.

Multi-segmented metering with AE locked to AF point and using auto 11 point AF is a recipe for very random and cranky results.

hope i'm not stating something that's too obvious cos that's my learning experience.
 

pinholecam,

Thanks for the guide here.

But do you shoot in Av mode or M mode?

Tried going around Orchard last night and take some Xmas lighting photos w/o a tripod on a kit lens. Photos turn out dark, unless flash is used.

Maybe you can share the photo to see what is wrong.

Either mode is fine. What is important is the exposure is correct. For night scenes with dark and brightly lit areas, its hard to tell. Best way is to take a shot exposed correctly, review on the LCD and then fudge exposure accordingly.

If you have ppl as subjects with these Christmas lights, then you either need to position them such that they benefit from bright enough light sources (Eg. Shop windows) or use flash. Expose for the bkgnd of course but usually in such cases its a compromise between DOF, exposure, ISO and shutter speed.