Guest Posted February 28, 2022 Share #1 Posted February 28, 2022 (edited) Advertisement (gone after registration) Disclaimer: Since this may be useful for reference, I decided not to pile on to the increasingly emotional debate in another thread about sharp picture with the M11 ... In Profifoto Magazine 7-8/2020, I found an interesting article about research undertaken by a professional photographer (Donat Achermann) in the Swiss Air Force. He investigated the validity of the 1/focal length rule of thumb to determine correct shutter speed for hand held pictures, in light of transition form analog to digital photography, taking into account sensor size and resolution (= pixel density). He validated his calculated minimum shutter speed for optimum sharpness with 8 cameras, including compact, crop sensor, full frame, and medium format; using different focal lengths. Applying his math, here are the resulting recommendations for current Leica M cameras and common focal lengths (shutter speed, last column, should be rounded up to the next higher available if you would like to be on the safe side, or down if your are feeling adventurous, e.g. Leica M11 calculated 50mm ss 1/174 I would gamble a bit and use 1/160). Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here… Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! As always: YMMV. Edited February 28, 2022 by Guest Quote Link to post Share on other sites Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! As always: YMMV. ' data-webShareUrl='https://www.l-camera-forum.com/topic/330268-optimal-calculated-hand-held-shutter-speed-swiss-air-force-research/?do=findComment&comment=4392424'>More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted February 28, 2022 Posted February 28, 2022 Hi Guest, Take a look here Optimal (calculated) hand held shutter speed - Swiss Air Force research. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
Al Brown Posted February 28, 2022 Share #2 Posted February 28, 2022 (edited) Very interesting. So for the 75mm focal length (my longest lens on the M10-R) I would multiply 75 by 2.9 and get 1/217 (1/250 to be safe). Would be about right... I have the shutter speed for all focal lenghts set to 1/250 minimum just to be sure. Always sharp. Edited February 28, 2022 by Al Brown Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaapv Posted February 28, 2022 Share #3 Posted February 28, 2022 56 minutes ago, mzbe said: Disclaimer: Since this may be useful for reference, I decided not to pile on to the increasingly emotional debate in another thread about sharp picture with the M11 ... In Profifoto Magazine 7-8/2020, I found an interesting article about research undertaken by a professional photographer (Donat Achermann) in the Swiss Air Force. He investigated the validity of the 1/focal length rule of thumb to determine correct shutter speed for hand held pictures, in light of transition form analog to digital photography, taking into account sensor size and resolution (= pixel density). He validated his calculated minimum shutter speed for optimum sharpness with 8 cameras, including compact, crop sensor, full frame, and medium format; using different focal lengths. Applying his math, here are the resulting recommendations for current Leica M cameras and common focal lengths (shutter speed, last column, should be rounded up to the next higher available if you would like to be on the safe side, or down if your are feeling adventurous, e.g. Leica M11 calculated 50mm ss 1/174 I would gamble a bit and use 1/160). Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here… Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! As always: YMMV. One glass of wine will halve these values . It is basically pseudo-mathematical nonsense. The ability to hold a cemers stable varies widely by individual. 5 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
SrMi Posted February 28, 2022 Share #4 Posted February 28, 2022 54 minutes ago, mzbe said: Disclaimer: Since this may be useful for reference, I decided not to pile on to the increasingly emotional debate in another thread about sharp picture with the M11 ... In Profifoto Magazine 7-8/2020, I found an interesting article about research undertaken by a professional photographer (Donat Achermann) in the Swiss Air Force. He investigated the validity of the 1/focal length rule of thumb to determine correct shutter speed for hand held pictures, in light of transition form analog to digital photography, taking into account sensor size and resolution (= pixel density). He validated his calculated minimum shutter speed for optimum sharpness with 8 cameras, including compact, crop sensor, full frame, and medium format; using different focal lengths. Applying his math, here are the resulting recommendations for current Leica M cameras and common focal lengths (shutter speed, last column, should be rounded up to the next higher available if you would like to be on the safe side, or down if your are feeling adventurous, e.g. Leica M11 calculated 50mm ss 1/174 I would gamble a bit and use 1/160). Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here… Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! As always: YMMV. The minimum handheld shutter speed depends a lot on the photographer. The table says that you need 1/(2.2f)s for a 24MP camera and 1/(3.5f)s for a 60MP camera. Those who can handle 24MP cameras at 1/(f)s can operate 60MP cameras at less than 1/(2f)s. Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
SrMi Posted February 28, 2022 Share #5 Posted February 28, 2022 (edited) Another analysis of minimum handholding shutter speed can be found here: Rules of thumb for handheld shutter speed The conclusion is specific to author's handholding capabilities. For a 24MP sensor: Twice the exposure of the 1/FL rule still seems pretty safe, and 1/FL is solid. Edited February 28, 2022 by SrMi Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted February 28, 2022 Share #6 Posted February 28, 2022 (edited) 17 minutes ago, jaapv said: One glass of wine will halve these values ;). It is basically pseudo-mathematical nonsense. The ability to hold a cemers stable varies widely by individual. The premise of the original research was to translate the old 1/fl rule to the new reality of higher resolution digital sensors, with an understanding the analog film had a typical full frame sensor resolution of 5MP (slides: 8MP). The author confirmed this equivalence and acknowledged that of course this is a rule of thumb, not a scientific recipe. To calibrate to your wine or coffee intake, age, and general aptitude you can take advantage of these calculations if you have established your individual performance vs. 1/fl on analog film. E.g. if with your M6 (everybody of course should have one of those!) you outperform the rule, let's say 2/fl works to your satisfaction, just scale the numbers I provided accordingly? They would still translate between Leica M generations, e.g. with your own superhero shakiness factor you would still know the expected change in shutter speed going from M10 to M11. Edited February 28, 2022 by Guest Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaapv Posted February 28, 2022 Share #7 Posted February 28, 2022 Advertisement (gone after registration) It is just that I have a big problem with building a hard exact mathematical edifice on a soft and undefined biological foundation. To me that is GIGO. 2 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
pgk Posted February 28, 2022 Share #8 Posted February 28, 2022 The concept of a shutter speed actually guaranteeing a 'sharp' image is in itself flawed. It is quite possible to take images suffering motion blur at any shutter speed and sometimes a very low shutter speed unaccountably results in a surprisingly 'sharp' image. All the 1/fl recommendation did was to increse the probability of an acceptable 'sharp' image by offering a simple 'rule of thumb'. Applying mathematical formulae to an undefined probability doesn't really help much unless we actually a) know the probability, and b) find it acceptable for ourselves. 3 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tashley Posted February 28, 2022 Share #9 Posted February 28, 2022 1 hour ago, jaapv said: One glass of wine will halve these values . It is basically pseudo-mathematical nonsense. The ability to hold a cemers stable varies widely by individual. Totally. This is the length of one man’s piece of string… 1 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
aristotle Posted March 2, 2022 Share #10 Posted March 2, 2022 (edited) If you discount subject motion (which you often can't), the real determining factor is print or display size. If you make the equivalent of a contact print (36x24mm), you can get by with much less than 1/f. If you make a 36"x24" print, you'll need much faster if the viewer is observing the print at the same distance as from the contact print. an 8x12 print is someplace in the middle. I am assuming that the table above was based on some geometric analysis of how much "typical" handheld camera motion translates to subject motion across the surface of the sensor in units of pixels as a function of lens focal length. Whether or not this is noticeable to an observer is a function of how the image is displayed. The only way that you would ever notice subject motion across say...three pixels...for example, would be if you could discern three pixels in the printed or displayed image. Unless you are cropped way in, this usually isn't the case. Having said that, this sort of table (or something like it) could be used as a rule of thumb to determine a limit indicating where handheld operation breaks down in terms of where extra pixels won't buy you anything. That is, the place where camera motion is more limiting than sensor resolution in terms of how big you can display if you plan on handholding. For many (or even most) applications, folks aren't resolution limited anyway, so you really are unnecessarily limiting yourself if you aren't allowing yourself to handhold at speeds slower than what the table lists. Edited March 2, 2022 by aristotle Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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