Studies of Movement

Recently, I was reading up on the basics of photography. I do like taking pictures. One might even say I'm "Shutter-Happy". But I almost always use the automatic settings on my point and click camera. Still, it really is a great little camera. I've had it for some time and, generally, I'm quite happy with the results (and if there are pictures that I'm less than pleased with I will run them through Picasa or GIMP until I am satisfied). All that being so, I know that there are ways my pictures could be improved.. but the idea of using the manual settings is a little daunting to me.

However, I've got some vacation coming up and I thought it would be fun to improve my photography skills. Maybe, if I'm lucky, I'll be able to capture some really great shots.

So, I started reading up on the basics of photography which lead directly to reading the manual for my little camera. Turns out that, while it's nothing super fancy, it has quite a range of options and abilities that I have not been utilizing. This opened up all sorts of avenues for experiments!

Eventually, after doing a good amount of reading and taking notes on a few specific settings, I thought I'd put my knowledge into practice. To start off, I figured that playing with shutter speeds would give the most obvious results (good or bad). So the other day, for my lunch hour, I took myself over to Daley Plaza to take some pictures of movement. (the fountain was green since it was St. Patty's day.. Heh)
Here are the results:

too fast.. not enough light got in (i think)
or maybe I was playing with the light contrast right then... 

too slow, over exposed...

this one had the smeary motion that I was going for, but was over exposed.. perhaps it was too sunny?

 this one turned out well, you can see individual water droplets and the color is good too!

Heh.. so, clearly, I still have lots to learn, but it's an exciting beginning!