dragging the shutter?

Hi all again , can anyone in easy terms expain how to drag the shutter plz, im Reading lots about it but u guys r the ones to ask! Im using

canon 50d & tamorn 17-50 2.8 , canon 50mm 1.8 , canon 550ex flash & sunpak 120j. I want to master this shutter drag but first need it

expaind a bit better? I hear lots bout 2nd sync curtain and draggin the shutter but can't get it fixed in my head!!! Old age maybe. Plz help

guys and my brain can then rest.

Thx a million

 

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<p>http://www.photo.net/wedding-photography-forum/009NM4</p>

<p>The link will give you the details, but the short answer is that dragging the shutter is a technique used with flash photography so that you use the exsiting light in a room to light up the background rather than having it go inky black. Let's say the exposure for your flash unit is f/8 and you have the shutter set to the high speed that works with flash, usually 1/250 of a second. Meter the room and it might tell you that f/8 and 1/30 of a second would give you enough light to shoot without flash. So you set the camera at f/8 and 1/30 but shoot with flash. The flash will provide the main light on your subject but the 1/30 shutter speed will allow the existing light in the room to adquately light the background. There are lots of details -- the 1/30 might be too slow to stop action in the background and the background might go orangeish (tungsten light or household light bulbs) or greenish (fluorescent lights) -- but I'll leave those to the link provided by Bilal.</p>

<p>Yeah, it was tricky for me to understand exactly at first, but that pretty much sums it up. When using flash, you sort of get two seperate exposures in one. If you take a photo of the kids playing in a relatively dark room in your house without flash, you will find it hard to make a good exposure - and if you do, you will end up likely having perhaps to use a slower shutter speed (1/30 as craigs example). So you snap the shot and the kids show up perhaps parts appear blurred around the edges or worse or with blur trails (depending on if how much they are flailing their little arms around). Now - put the flash into this exact same exposure. You will still get the exact same exposure in the background, but within that 1/30'th of a second exposure, there will be a very brief 1/1000th of a second of light from your flash - so it will illuminate the little tykes for 1/1000th of a second only - result, you get a sharp and brighter little dude on top of the old darker background which very will may include a bit of those blured trails if they were moving a bunch, but, instead, their central figure will appear sharp and in great detail.</p>

<p>If the little guy was holding pretty still and you shoot at 1/30th with flash, he may very well appear perfectly sharp without any blurred edges or trails.</p>

<p>And about those leftover blurred trails - that is where the issue of "rear curtain sync" AKA "2nd Curtan Sync" comes into the discussion - the shutter was open for say 1/30th of a second, and your camera's default setting may be "front curtain sync" - this means that the flash is emitted during the initial moments of the 1/30th second....so little suzzy running from left to right in your frame - you will freeze her on the left side of your frame, and perhaps her blurred reminant trail will continue across the screen. Now, in "rear curtain sync", the flash fires at the very end of the 1/30 second exposure time - result - little suzie's blurred trail appears first and she is frozen to the right of the trail. This is genearlly desired because it appears more..."natural" from a logical motion perspective - if she is running left to right, her trail should appear behind her - it just looks better really most times </p>

<p>In the end, this method allows you to get the best of both worlds - a brighter background and capture sharp brighter deatil in your foreground. And again - if the person is in the darker room described not moving much at all - they will appear many times perfectly sharp - but using this technique with things moving more, will give the blurred reminant trails of the background exposure which can be fun, imply motion, and give a creative look to your photos. Also using these slow shutter techniques, you can get creative, shake you camera to blur the background, but freeze your subject at the same time - you can shoot a shutter speed of 1 second or so and zoom your lens in during the exposure to give a really cool effect <a href="http://digital-photography-school.com/using-the-zoom-effect">http://digital-photography-school.com/using-the-zoom-effect</a> ...</p>

<p>Anyway, good luck, and have fun</p>

If a camera has a flash sync speed of 1/250 sec, that is the fastest speed at which the shutter is fully open. If you use 1/500, the shutter curtain will be only partially open as the flash fires and part of the photo will be covered by the curtain. You can use a slower shutter speed than sync speed, 1/125, 1/60, 1/30, etc. and the shutter will likewise be fully open as the flash fires allowing more ambient light in the background to be recorded.

<p>A shutter "drag" is flash plus any shutter speed below the synch speed.</p>

<p>Common shutter drags will be near 1/8 or 1/4 second. It's situational. They could be longer or shorter, but they'll all be below the synch speed. The purpose is to let other light in besides just the flash.</p>

<p>Set up a flash exposure for synch speed, make that photo. Make another photo with the same settings, except changing <em>onl</em><em>y the shutter speed</em> to about 1/4. Compare the two photos on your LCD screen. The second photo is with a "dragged" shutter. You may notice some background areas that are illuminated by ambient light, instead of just the flash.</p>

<p>Balancing flash and ambient takes a little practice; but the two comparison photos above will help you understand the concept of shutter drag.</p>

<p>http://strobist.blogspot.com/2007/09/lighting-102-33-balancing-flashambient.html</p>

<p>I would also direct you to Neil Van Niekirk's site. There is a section on dragging the shutter. After you've read about the theory, try some practical reading, such as the following, from the wedding forum archives.</p>

<p><a href="http://www.photo.net/wedding-photography-forum/00PFGA">http://www.photo.net/wedding-photography-forum/00PFGA</a></p>

<p>Be sure to look at the link to Marc William's previous info as well.</p>

<p>Also, don't get confused about second curtain sync and dragging the shutter--they are two different things. You can do one without doing the other, and they are for different purposes. They often used together, but they aren't the same thing. For example, you don't have to use second curtain sync to drag the shutter.</p>