1. Capturing Motion and bending time

2. It is a very old cliché that photography can “capture a frozen moment” (yawn).
This very ability to ‘freeze’ motion, or to ‘dam-up the flow of time’ can produce images which appear static and lifeless.
In fact, as photographers we have the ability to stretch or compress time. We can also imply movement, and in doing so visually suggest life itself (since living things tend to move) with just a few simple photographic techniques.

3. Capturing Motion Lesson Objectives
Experiment with time lapse photography
Produce a short stop-motion film
Use flash to freeze motion
Use motion blur to suggest movement
Reflect on personal response

4. Stop frame photography
Some methods of capturing movement
Using Shutter speed
Blur
Panning
Flash
Cinematic Film
Stop frame photography

5. Dagguerre c.1840
This very early photograph required an exposure time (shutter speed) of several minutes. Only one person who was standing relatively still appears in the image … can you find them?
Why do the horses, carriages and other people present not seem to show?

6. Jaques Henri Lartigue, c. 1910 Fast or slow shutter speed?

7. Fast or slow shutter speed?
Photographer Unknown
Fast or slow shutter speed?

8. Robert Capa, c.1936

9. Flash
Some early equipment for producing a quick flash of light.

10. The ‘electronic flash’ that we use today was developed in the 1940’s
Harold Edgerton, c.1940
The ‘electronic flash’ that we use today was developed in the 1940’s
The flash lasts for about 1/1000 of a second.

11. Incorrect flash synchronisation

12. How might this photograph have been made
How might this photograph have been made? (Hint: think about how the flash was fired)
photo by Eliot Elisofon, 1952

13. Chris Monaghan
This photograph was made using flash AND a slow shutter speed at a disco / party. The short flash has ‘frozen’ the dancers motion, while the slow shutter speed has allowed the red disco lights to create an additional blurred image.

14. Light-Writing using a small torch and long exposure time.
The subject is the artist is Pablo Picasso

15. Student’s photographs
Motion blur using the Pan technique
Camera rotated during exposure

16. A freeze frame shot is used in motion films when one frame is viewed several times, in order to make an interesting illusion of a still photograph.
Time-lapse photography
is a cinematographic technique whereby each film frame is captured at a rate much slower than it will be played back. When replayed at normal speed, time appears to be moving faster and thus ‘lapsing’.
Stop Motion photography
Is a technique where individual photographs are taken, moving the objects between shots. The images are then viewed one after another, like a cinematic film.

17. Edweard Muybridge

18. A famous photograph demonstrating what the photographer Cartier Bresson termed ‘the decisive moment’
Henri Cartier Bresson, Behind the Gare St. Lazare, 1932

19. Experiments
Produce a stop motion film with about 30 images which records the movement of an object across a desk - use tripod & available (ambient) light. View the finished ‘film’ on the camera by scrolling through the images. Print thumbs and write a brief explanation in your sketchbooks
Take a photograph using flash to freeze motion
Take a photograph which uses blur to create an impression of movement - use available light only, no tripod used.
Take a photograph which combines movement blur using available ambient light with flash to create a sharp image
Experiment with other ways you can capture movement
Document these in your sketchbook explaining your techniques