- The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honours the servant and has forgotten the gift. Albert Einstein #

Ever wondered what difference a Leaf Shutter makes? The following article by Brad Kaye gives a good overview: https://www.captureintegration.com/the-leaf-shutter-advantage-for-strobe-sync/

The two images below from his article demonstrate the difference in how the two work.

Without the leaf shutter involved, the fastest shutter speed you can use and still sync a strobed flash into is limited by the last time value the focal plane shutter is entirely open all at one time. Faster than that, the focal plane curtains chase each other thru the frame, with the digital sensor (or film)never having the opportunity to see the entire frame open at once.

This motion allows for fast sync speeds with very little light falloff, allowing you to shave ambient exposure out of your scene, whether it’s the ambient/modeling lights in your studio, unwanted objects on location, or simply to shape light in a way outdoors mid-day that isn’t wholly dependent on the sun.

Photographing rain means freezing the motion at a certain speed. At what point does it look most like rain? The following images are taken with no wind, but a steady rain was present. At very slow speeds up until around 1/40, the rain tends to blur into a mist. Looking at the images from 1/40 to 1/100, the rain appears more like streaks. After this point, the streaks become shorter and shorter until at 1/1600, mostly raindrops appear.

Having shared this with several friends, the conclusion was summed up by Rob as follows: “1/40 and 1/100 seconds are the most appealing to me. Below 1/40, it’s hard to distinguish rain from mist, and above 1/100, the rain looks more like dirty streaks/spots on a window than like rain. I suppose that might be because we never actually see rain as individual drops frozen in mid-air in the real world.”