What's a good shutter speed for normal use of a point & shoot digital camera? Is 2-1/1000 good?

Question

Ok, let me clarify . . . I'm looking to buy a digital camera for basic point & shoot type purposes--vacation, family events, etc. My Dad has an old digital camera with a max shutter speed that is too low, so action shots are often blurry. I have to keep my camera expenditure to a very low minimum (dirt-poor student) and I want to make sure that the cheap-o camera I'm looking at isn't going to give me the same problem with with blur. Thanks for your time and expertise.

By the way, it's an HP, if any of you know positives/negatives about this brand.

Answer 1

Hi,

It depends also on the aperature (f-stop) and ISO. You have to balance to all three out. the 1/1000 is very fast meaning you are going to need to open the aperature as wide as possible to let in more light. I would suggest about putting the camera on an aperature priority mode ("A" on your mode selection) or Program ("P), usually they will figure the shutter for you.

For normal shutter is usually about 1/40 ~ 1/160 second in the daylight. Hope that helps with your point and shoot camera.

Answer 2

NO. U should use the "auto" setting and let the camera do the work, until you have a much better understanding of photography.
That fast a speed for the shutter causes you to use a wide open lens (large aperture) and that results in very narrow depth of field and difficult focus problems. In average day light you should be set with an ISO of about 100 to 200 at the most and for snap shot shooting an F stop around F22. Then let the camera pick the correct shutter speed to match the F stop and ISO settings.

Answer 3

The answer to you question depends what you plan to take a picture of and what effect you want.

Faster shutter speeds "stop" things - in other words a moving car or someone running will look like they aren't moving if you shoot with a fast shutter speed like 1/1000. If you want them to look like they're moving, you'd use a much slower one - 1/250 maybe.

Your shutter speed will also depend on the amount of available light and the aperature (or 'f' stop) your camera is set to. Many P&S cameras allow you to choose the shutter speed you want and then set the aperature for you. If there's not enough light for what you're trying to do, you can sometimes change the speed (or sensitivity) of the camera - similary to choosing a "faster" film. Not all cameras allow changing the ISO speed though.

Answer 4

2-1/1000 sounds fine.
With anything slower than say, 1/10th, you'll need a tripod to prevent motion blur. So unless you plan on travelling with a tripod, the slow end of 2 seconds is fine.
With anything faster than say, 1/500th, you're probably pointing the camera directly at the sun. So the fast end of 1/1000 is good too.
Normally, the shutter speed will be somewhere between 1/40th and 1/200th of a second.

Answer 5

Aye steck et on Auto man, ye canna do bettna thart .

Answer 6

There may be something of use here.