Shutter speed to stop motion a fountain?

Jamesbjenkins

Hey all, this past week I did some scouting for a wedding I'm shooting in February. It's at a catholic church and there's this lovely fountain in front of the sanctuary where the ceremony is being held. In my mind's eye, I see a great picture of a fountain 1/3 right in foreground, people milling in the OOF background, left 2/3 of the frame.

My question I'd love some feedback on is this: What's the best shutter speed, aperture combination to stop free falling water in its tracks (like from a fountain), while still letting enough ambient light in to properly expose the background without me having to fiddle with crap in post? The wedding is at 2pm, so for ease of discussion, let's assume it's a bright, partly cloudy day. I'll probably be shooting at either ISO 100 or 200, depending on weather...

I'm sure there's lots of experience I can tap. Thanks in advance for your replies!

pathfinder

Falling water is harder to stop than you might think. Depends on how close you are visually to the falling water too.

I think you will need flash - speedlites - for the look you are wanting.

This frame was shot at 1/1250th and it certainly does not stop the water movement.



This is 1/250th of a sec



How about a long shutter speed with the water being quite blurred, with just a pop of second curtain flash to light your bridal party?

If you really want to stop falling water droplets, I think you need at least 1/3000th or faster, which is effectively in speedlite territory ( even though your shutter speed with a speedlite may be as long as 1/12th )

I would suggest a wider aperture to put the water fountain out of focus, as I do not think you can capture the bride as sharply as desired and still have the fountain in the background tack sharp too.

kdog

pathfinder wrote: »

If you really want to stop falling water droplets, I think you need at least 1/3000th or faster,

How "stopped" do the droplets need to be? This is 1/1600 and the droplets look pretty stopped to me, or close enough for government work.

Jamesbjenkins

kdog wrote: »

How "stopped" do the droplets need to be? This is 1/1600 and the droplets look pretty stopped to me, or close enough for government work.

The surfer picture looks a lot closer to what I'm thinking of than Pathfinder's shot of the girl in the first picture. The consensus from my reading several blogs elsewhere was that you have to be at a minimum of 1/1000 depending on how the water was falling.

My plan for the fountain shot was to get really close to minimum focus distance, shooting wide open and try to frame the shot with as much of the face of the church and wedding party in as possible. I'll probably be shooting the Nikon 14-24, so framing should be cake.

What's the rest of the EXIF on that surfer shot? I'm mainly concerned about getting the right exposure for the background. I can always use NR in lightroom if I have to jump the fill light, but I'd rather not.

Thanks for the feedback guys! This is good.

kdog

Jamesbjenkins wrote: »

What's the rest of the EXIF on that surfer shot?

Here you go. Not sure how helpful this will be, I had tons of light.

Camera Model: Canon EOS 7D
Lens: EF500mm f/4L IS USM
Image Date: 2012-01-03 13:31:46 (no TZ)
Focal Length: 500mm
Aperture: f/8.0
Exposure Time: 0.0006 s (1/1600)
ISO equiv: 200
Exposure Bias: +1.00 EV
Metering Mode: Center Weight
Exposure: shutter priority (semi-auto)
White Balance: Auto

Jamesbjenkins

kdog wrote: »

Here you go. Not sure how helpful this will be, I had tons of light.

Camera Model: Canon EOS 7D
Lens: EF500mm f/4L IS USM
Image Date: 2012-01-03 13:31:46 (no TZ)
Focal Length: 500mm
Aperture: f/8.0
Exposure Time: 0.0006 s (1/1600)
ISO equiv: 200
Exposure Bias: +1.00 EV
Metering Mode: Center Weight
Exposure: shutter priority (semi-auto)
White Balance: Auto

Wow! ISO 200 and f/8, at 1/1600? Tons of light is an understatement. Thanks for sharing.

Icebear

Your problem is angular momentum (OK, that's prolly not the right tech term.) The closer you are to the subject, the greater the blur you get from any amount of absolute motion of the subject. The surfer water looks sharp because it's far away. Water falling only moves so fast. The closer the subject, the faster the angle changes. That's what gives you the blur.

angevin1

Joel, that's one Neat as Heck Surf Shot!!

kdog wrote: »

How "stopped" do the droplets need to be? This is 1/1600 and the droplets look pretty stopped to me, or close enough for government work.

Sand

Icebear - I think the term you want is "relative angular velocity".
In any case the important factor is how many pixels of the photo does the water cross in the exposure time. Since the water accelerates as it falls this will depend on the height of the fountain (how far the water falls), the fraction of the photo frame the fountain fills and how much of the fountain that needs to be frozen. Looking at Kdog's great photo, you can see that the water above the surfer's shoulder is frozen and lower than his butt it is blurry (only look at the water behind him). It would be interesting to see what one gets with bracketed shutter speeds from 1/500 to 1/4000 seconds. I would try it, but they shut off the water on my local fountain.

Moving Pictures

Sand wrote: »

I would try it, but they shut off the water on my local fountain.

Fer a second, I thought you were going to tell us they soaped it.

Which would give you a rock-star inside track on the shapes and angles DSS challenge.

babowc

James! Will you be shooting this with the D700?
Give it a go with a dry fountain shot to see what kind of SS you'll need.. that might give you a starting point!

Jamesbjenkins

babowc wrote: »

James! Will you be shooting this with the D700?
Give it a go with a dry fountain shot to see what kind of SS you'll need.. that might give you a starting point!

I'm picking up the 700 from the post office tomorrow. They tried to deliver while I was at work today. Thankfully, I'll have plenty of time to play with it before the wedding. I'll upload a few shots once I get to shoot them.

Jamesbjenkins

So, I shot the wedding in question this past weekend. I got to shoot some of the fountain shots I was dreaming up. Here's one of them.



Once I get some more of the session processed, I'll post more.