The trouble with playing around with the intentional camera movement technique is that I have a hard time choosing my favourite shots – I love the streaks and blurs created by dialing in a slower shutter speed and moving the camera during the exposure. There’s a lot of trial and error involved, and I end up throwing away a lot of messy photos, but I’m usually pleased overall. Plus, it’s kind of liberating to purposely throw a picture out of focus. Here are a few images from a recent outing to the lovely pine woods of Puslinch Tract:
intentional camera movement
Backyard art.
The dappled light on our smoke bush and willow yesterday morning called for an impromptu excursion into the backyard. I wonder what the neighbours thought of the lady in her housecoat and slippers, shaking a camera at her garden shrubs?
Twisted.
I suspect people may have thought I was slightly nuts yesterday when they saw me hunched over the flowers at the park, making photos. I used the “intentional camera movement” technique (which never disappoints, in my opinion). That method of photography involves shimmies, wiggles and twists of the camera during exposure, and usually, at least in my case, somewhat contorted body positions.
Ah, well. Being nuts helps me make interesting pictures once in a while.
Wiggle it.
Turns out that “Wiggling the Camera” is not the official term for the technique I used to make these photos. I learned that it’s actually called “Intentional Camera Movement”, or “ICM” for short. It sounds a little bland and stuffy, in my humble opinion, though I suppose it does win points for accuracy.
I Intentionally Moved the Camera during a long-ish exposure time (shutter speed of 1/4 second) to achieve an abstract, painterly look here.
Whatever it’s called, I like it.
Do What You Wish 