Bus smudges

The photography challenge over the weekend was to experiment with shutter speeds.  
 

This isn’t something I’ve really tried before – and before I read the AYWMC email, I didn’t have a clear understanding of the effects that could be achieved. 

My old camera had a setting that allowed the shutter to remain open while my finger was on the button, but I didn’t really use it. 

This camera has shutter speeds as slow as 15 seconds (by the way, is anyone else confused as to why the symbol for seconds is the same as the symbol for inches), and super, super fast – too fast for the amount of light I had available to me on Friday night, standing at the base of Nelson’s column in Trafalgar Square. 

I experimented with buses and traffic, going towards Big Ben, under the Admiralty Arch, and then side on, to get some bus smudges. 

There was a trick – the bus had to be moving quickly enough for this to work – that is, enter and exit the shot area while the shutter was open, which meant only shooting while the bus was coming at a green light.

Then I had to think about framing, and trying to exclude some of the traffic signage from the shots. I really want to try this again with sparklers – a long shutter speed is how to capture messages ‘written’ in sparklers.