Cloudy days

[Jenn824]

Hello,
My name is Jennifer and I am new to your group and happy to be here. I am also new to photography.

I have a sony alpha 55, 18-55mm 3.5 lens, a 75-300mm 4.5 lens and a DT 1.8/50 SAM potrait lens.

I totally get the shutter speed, ISO and f-stop and how they effect each other though I'm still learning to use what when. That's hard!!!!

But my question is:

Picture this it;s a cloudy day not very bright about 4:30 in the afternoon. I'm outside with my two doxies trying to catch some running pictures. Well i know if I use 12800 ISO it's going to be grainy, so I adjust all the settings to make it to where it's not to dark but I may not be able to get the shutter speed high enough so it doesn't blur some.

Is there a better lens to use for action? Someone said a lens with a low f-stop is good for action.

Please help and tell me what I am doing wrong or maybe not understanding.

Thank you,
Jennifer

[Doug Pardee]

Originally Posted by Jenn824

Picture this it;s a cloudy day not very bright about 4:30 in the afternoon. I'm outside with my two doxies trying to catch some running pictures. Well i know if I use 12800 ISO it's going to be grainy, so I adjust all the settings to make it to where it's not to dark but I may not be able to get the shutter speed high enough so it doesn't blur some.

What on earth shutter speed are you trying to use?

At ISO 400 and f/8, your shutter speed should be running between 1/200 and 1/800 depending on how heavy the clouds are. That's plenty fast enough to catch any action. Well, if you're at the 1/200 end because of really dark skies, you might want to open up to f/5.6 to get 1/400.

If you've got a polarizing filter on there, that'll rob you of two or more stops with no real value in those conditions. Even so, we're talking about ISO 1600 to get maybe 1/200 shutter speed at f/5.6, even in fairly dark overcast conditions.

[Jenn824]

Hello

thanks for the info. Again I am new at this and trying to learn here. I swear it has rained and been cloudy since I got my camera. lol I believe it is suppose to be a pretty day tomorrow so hopefully I can get out there and try again.