CAMERA MOVEMENT FOR INTENTIONAL BLURRING
There comes a time in a landscape photographer's life when creativity must be found by moving beyond the comfort zone. It is far too easy to fall into a habit of reviewing other photographer's best images from a location, then trying to come up with an excellent version from that same location. It is possible to create more emotionally stimulating images by shooting smaller scenes and violating some of the standard rules of photo composition. Not so serious photographers who have a smartphone camera can also try out this technique.
An excellent alternative to stimulate creativity is the exploration of intentional camera movement (referred to as ICM). I first became quite interested in ICM after seeing the work of Wendy Bagnall. Her work is found on Instagram @wendybagnall_ (there is an underscore at the end). You will discover that she also takes advantage of multiple exposures, a subject for next time. It's a bit odd that landscape photographers use sharpness of details as one measurement of image quality, but here we are promoting intentionally blurred images.
There are some great advantages to ICM. Number one is there is no need for a tripod, although a tripod can improve some images. You don't need the most expensive lenses to come away with outstanding results. What you do need is the ability to recognize what will work and what won't. Some knowledge of basic composition, technique and settings will make a huge difference. If you are into selling your work, these images appeal to a far greater audience than those that show a specific location. And you can make minor changes to colors to suit your client's color scheme.
Selecting the Scene
Certain scenes work better than others. At least 90% of normal landscape scenes will not work out well. Look for scenes with strong horizontal or vertical lines. Examples of strong horizontal lines would be beach scenes that have horizontal lines (sand, water, land, sky). Desertscapes might have similar strong lines. Examples of strong vertical lines are tree trunks, flower stems and fence posts.
Subjects with blocks of color will keep the result simpler and more pleasing. Too many details in the subject will make your result look less intentional and less pleasing. Your subject will work best if the scene features either strong contrast or substantial color differences or both. The white trunks of aspens work better than trunks that blend in with the forest background.
If regions of your subject already have indistinct edges, this seems to work quite well. Examples might be foggy areas or clouds. Finally, it's best to have the greatest luminance, saturation and contrast near the center of the image. The rule of thirds also works well. Let's look at a few examples before discussing technique.
I am constantly on the lookout for locations where water has drowned trees. This happens in areas susceptible to landslides or avalanches and in areas of hot springs, such as those found at Yellowstone National Park. The picture to the left was taken a few years ago, so I knew when and where to look. The other photographers with me had a ball with their assignment to photograph the trees with ICM. Positioning was critical. My goal was to lead the eye through the trees toward the lighter area on the back right. It took many attempts rotating the camera in a vertical path to get the composition just right (below).
Barbara and I spent a few days at the beach recently. While I would have loved to capture some huge curls of turquoise water, the conditions were a bit lackluster for that goal. With a slight amount of color in the sky, and after about 200 attempts, the image below was my favorite. The lines of the sky, surf and beach dictated horizontal camera movement. Photographing waves works best when you are photographing away from the sun or the sun is behind a cloud and there is color in the sky.
Here is another reasonable composition that had promise for ICM. The lack of many distinct features, the presence of attractive colors and the area of brightness toward the middle led me to give it a try. Greater luminosity on the left side was offset by greater saturation on the right side.
Technique
Intentional camera movement requires reasonably long exposures. Smart phone camera users will need to download an app such as Final Cut Camera or Pro Camera by Moment to add this function to their phone's camera.
Your selection of shutter speed will depend somewhat on the subject material. a 1/15 second shutter speed is a good starting point. With a long lens consider starting with 1/30 second. With a wide angle lens, consider starting with 1/8 second. Then experiment by adjusting up and down. The amount of blur you get will depend both on shutter speed and the speed at which you pan either vertically or horizontally. There is no great way to see your results other than experimenting with shutter speed and panning speed, then viewing your results on the LED screen.
Do your best to hold your camera in one place as you rotate it around an axis through the center of the camera. This is easiest done with the camera close to your body as opposed to having extended arms. You may try this with or without a two second timer. To capture the most ideal results, you will try to time your movement so brighter or more saturated areas are centered in the frame. Start with the camera to one side of the desired frame. As you sweep across the scene, try to time your exposure for the composition you want.
An option I have not shown above is to use an ND filter to slow your shutter speed to one to four seconds. Then start your image for one-quarter to one-half of the exposure before you start your motion and pan slowly. You may want to move both ways if exposure time permits. This result will give you some sharper areas in the image, which may give you an desirable effect.
You may use a tripod to provide more even panning. This will also make some of the high contrasting edges look sharper. I find a tripod to be a bit limiting, however, as it slows me down as I move around to recompose the scene.
Expect that it may take dozens of tries to get your best result. Don't give up until you like your results!
Presentation
Our eyes are so used to seeing dead sharp images on metal or face mounted to acrylic that acceptance on those presentation formats might not be acceptable to us. I favor presentations that help the images resemble and artist's abstract paintings. This requires canvas prints or prints on watercolor types of papers. A collection of prints can make a statement in a home and can help you cement a new style into your portfolio.