Shutter Sisters

sunday school: going slow

By

There is a time for going slow, and there is a time for moving fast.  And then there is a time for going slow when all around you is moving fast.  I recently realized this when I found myself in a crowd of downtown tourists whizzing by me on all sides from all directions.  I am not a fast walker.  I am a stroller, an ambler, a meanderer, a wanderer, a dilly-dally-er of the highest order.  This is especially true when I have a camera in my hands and music in my ears.

Instead of picking up my pace to keep up with the crowd, I decided to slow it waaaay down, and just stand around as everyone rushed past me.  It was a bright sunny day, and I could have easily snapped sharp images of people as they walked by, but I decided to capture the sense of being surrounded by motion by using a slower shutter speed.  To do this, I decreased my ISO to 100, narrowed my aperture to f/16 and was able to get the shutter down to 1/10 of a second, which was plenty slow to capture all the commotion of the moment. 

Sometimes (or always, in my case) it’s a good idea to slow down and let the whirlwind swirl on by.  Your life won’t pass you by because it’s not in that whirlwind.  It’s with you, however long you may dawdle, in this moment, in this place.

Do you like to slow down in the midst of a fast-paced world?  Show us how.  Guide us on a little stroll through your images.

Comments

  5. I’m constantly watching the movement of life from a quiet corner, although sometimes I get inside and let myself go with it all. It’s such a rush to *be carried* away for a while in the "whirlwind." Not to do anything necessarily, but to be carried away by it.

    Even when your surroundings in a city are quiet, with no tourists, or businessmen and women, you can always find fast moving modernity. At least that was my feeling when I took this photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/iluskaikeda/4747214619/in/set-72157623497391968/.

    There was nobody walking around downtown Buffalo that day, but the metro rail was still going as always

  8. Life is so full. Sometimes I feel there is so much to do and see and feel and understand that I have to move faster than the speed of light if I am to even glimpse or brush the surface of it all. My favorite moments/memories though, are the ones where chronos (the ticking of the clock and the checking off of days) paused and became kairos (like the clock/calendar is holding it’s breath). Those moments that become vivid and unblurred by the hurried ant-like action of the rest of my life.

    Thanks for making me pause for a moment and remember that.