Freezing fast moving objects really just comes down to one thing.
A fast shutter speed.
Basically the faster your shutter speed is the more likely you are to freeze a fast moving object. Whether you are trying to photograph a car, a bike, someone running or even your favourite pet.
It all comes down to having a fast enough shutter speed to freeze the object.
A slow shutter speed will leave you with a blurry image and a broken heart. So to avoid the sadness of a blurry picture and wondering if you’ll ever master the great thing that is photography. Here are some tips to freeze that object and improve your photo’s.
You’ll need to be shooting with a SLR camera for this one too.
A general rule I’ve used myself in my sport photography career, where I have photographed everything from car racing to bike racing and to multiple ball sports is to use the 1/1000th of a second shutter speed.
Generally a shutter speed of 1/1000th will freeze whatever you are trying to photograph. Above 1/1000 as in 1/2000th and 1/4000th is super fast.
When you go a little slower at 1/125th and 1/60th or 1/30th of a second that’s when you’ll end up with a blurry image.
I don’t think in my 20+ years of photographing sport a shutter speed of 1/1000th has failed to freeze the action.
Some examples here.
Fast Shutter Speed
To freeze this cool guy as he jumps over the obstacle I used a shutter speed of 1/2000th of a sec. As you can see he is frozen in time and these sized dogs as cute as they are, they are super fast and be tricky to photograph.
So going above the 1/1000th of a second really helped to guarantee a frozen image.
Slow Shutter Speed
For this picture I purposely used a slow shutter speed of 1/30th of a second. And I also did a little bit of a pan too. A pan is when you follow the subject whilst still shooting.
The colour of the cyclists uniforms was really cool so I wanted to merge the colours a little bit and create a nice blur.
But again if I wanted to freeze the action following the 1/1000th rule would have done that no problem.
Conclusion
So there you have it. A fast shutter speed of 1/1000th or higher (1/2000th etc) will freeze the action. And anything slower (1/500th) will increase the chances of a blurry image.
So aim for a shutter speed of 1/1000th of a second and you’ll enjoy photography that little bit more. Unless you’re looking for a intentional cool blur then you’d aim for that 1/30th setting.
If you have any extra advice for these tips, I’d love to hear them below too.
Til next time!
Chris Lane
Chasing Light by Chris Lane 