Does anyone have any rules of thumb for shutter speeds required when shooting landscapes and the foliage is moving around because of wind? (It's always windy where I live. If it isn't windy I wonder what's happened to the air.)
Normally I first set the aperture to what I need for depth of field and the shutter speed has to fall where it may. However, I don't really know until I process the results whether or not all the foliage has been blurred because of movement. It would be good to know in advance then perhaps I could compensate with higher ISOs.
Hi Anthony,
As Keith said, there are no rules that universally apply. The subject's on sensor magnification (focal length and distance to the camera)
will determine how much of its motion (wind direction and speed, and type of leaf) will be visible.
You are correct in choosing the Aperture for the DOF you need, and letting shutterspeed fall where it may. How important is the movement in the total scene's composition? If it distracts (rather than convey the type of weather condition) then using shorter shutter speeds is the only alternative (assuming no lulls in windforce). That may require boosting the ISO, which in turn may lead to loss of Dynamic range and more image noise. So it's a trade-off, no magic tricks to change that. The only thing I can think of is the use of a Tilt (and Shift) lens to allow the use of a wider aperture, yet use the Scheimpflug adjustment in the tilted plane of focus to (partially) compensate for that change in DOF.
Cheers,
Bart
