The Photographer's Eye: Graphic Guide

STREAKING

Also known as motion blur, this is one kind of photographic fuzziness that is thoroughly accepted by viewers, and is almost never rejected as being some kind of mistake (the same can’t be said about out of focus). Here is almost the entire practical range in one repeated action—a girl on a bike cycling across the field of view. The shot, using a 200mm telephoto, was panned left to right, which comes naturally, and simply means keeping the subject more or less in the same position in the frame. At 1/1000 second everything is frozen sharp, but as a slower and slower shutter speed is set, the background begins to streak. The girl and bike stay fairly sharp all the way down to about 1/10 second, although some bits that move in different ...