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This is my low-light hand-held shooting technique: Assume a stable posture, usually not leaning in any direction. Support the camera's weight with the left hand. Grip firmly with the right but let the index-finder loose. Press the shutter-release halfway and wait for a focus-lock (When using AF) Breath in Exhale Gently press the shutter-release fully. Wait ...

Some "tricks" Ninja breathing, as above. Learn to hold breath at critical moment. Body braced in as stable a position as you can get it. "Think like a rock" :-) ie elbows in against body, head pulled down against body, "hunched" posture feet placed consciously firmly and maybe slightly spread. Brace against something !!! - Lamp post railing, corner of ...

I saw this Joe McNally video a while back and found that it helped me a good deal, especially as I have a mild hand tremor. Also relaxing, watching your breathing and making sure you roll your finger over the shutter button rather than press or stab at it makes a big difference.

A big reason is that it just makes getting the shot sequence consistent and accurate. In general, you're looking to keep the vertical plane level through the whole sequence and move along the horizontal plane in smooth, even, steps. A panoramic head is simply going to make that easier to do with less effort and risk of a muffed shot at all kinds of focal ...

In addition to the fine answers from the other users, there's one more thing you can do: Take many pictures and throw away the blurry ones. Camera shake is random movement in random amounts, and if you take enough pictures you should be lucky enough to find at least one where there is no shake. Depending on the situation, "enough pictures" can mean anywhere ...

Set an automatic timer Typically you set an automatic timer to try to jump in the picture, but I've found that if I set my auto time to 2s I can press the shutter button, and then wait 2s for the camera to take the picture itself without me introducing another "shake" by pressing the shutter button. It doesn't work all the time (with the 2s pause the scene ...

One way to reduce impact of inherent unsteadiness would be to work towards shorter shutter time - use a faster aperture (lens), higher ISO and/or more lighting. That would also reduce motion blur resulting from subject's movement or wind during a longer exposure. A couple of times I've caught myself boneheadedly sticking to ISO 200 and shooting several ...

Do you have any suggestions on how I can manually focus with the three stop light loss without losing the flexibility of working handheld? If you'll excuse the trivial level of the answer - which works well for me - I on occasion use an LED torch for night lighting for focusing purposes either when the flash focus assist light is ineffective or I'm not ...

Leica manuals have some instructions on this, but it basically boils down to not holding on to the lens, pretty much as you initially described. In portrait mode, rotate the camera so that the shutter release is at the top and your right hand index finger is on it. Hold the other side of the camera at the bottom corner with your left hand. If you need to ...

This is going to sound stupid (and I'm not a professional photographer) but I've been in your situation. I try to place my camera on an (ideally near-flat) object, lower my center-of-gravity (typically by spreading my legs or crouching down), and press the shutter after I exhale (and just before I inhale). Many times I wish I had a tripod when interesting ...

Lean against a wall or other solid object Tuck your elbows into your side, don't hold them out to the sides Support the weight of the camera from underneath with one hand Take deep breath and slowly exhale Squeeze the shutter release, don't stab at it Use burst mode and take 2-3 shots, one is likely to be sharper than the rest

BRASSF Breathe (take a few breaths; you don't want your muscles starved of oxygen) Relax (let the last breath out about halfway; you don't want your muscles straining to keep your lungs inflated) Aim Squeeze (take up the slack in the shutter button; i.e. it should be a hair from taking the picture) STOP (wait for your viewfinder picture to settle on your ...

Just a few final suggestions: Try using the strap and loop it around your shoulder then elbow to get some tension on it, it's quite difficult to explain but you're basically wanting to have to 'pull' the camera down, just don't pull too hard. Remember shake will be increased if you have your shutter speed set to less than the focal length you're at. So if ...

I find that resting my camera against my head works really well (and it's something I've never seen suggested), even just eye-to-the-viewfinder works well. Of course you need to remember not to move while the viewfinder goes dark though! If I want to take long exposure (second or more) photos without a tripod, then I tend to rest my camera on my shoe, or ...

If tripod is too heavy, monopod and Gorillapod can work. Personally I have found monopod to be superior to Gorillapod, and both are of pretty similar weight; but the monopod is longer, while Gorillapod fits into pocket of outdoor jacket. So, most likely you need multiple devices and pick one of them per the situation. You might also want to experiment with ...

Two methods I find useful: Shooter: cradle camera in the sitting position, like one would a rifle: sit, with thighs in front and near your chest, cross legs a bit if more comfortable. Rest camera on knees and shoot away. Downside, you are low to the ground, but rock steady. Strap method: This one works when you think it shouldn't. Get a piece of nylon ...

This applies to hand held photography when you cannot use another object to stabalise your camera. Watch your breathing, if you have time, take a deep breath once you have done that hold it and release the shutter, Make sure you are holding the camera with one hand and the other is cupping the lens. Its also a good idea to make sure your feet are shoulder ...

They can all be decent guidelines. In general, ignoring the focal length doesn't make a lot of sense though since it is always going to magnify shake. A lot of other factors come in to play though and these are just rules of thumb. If you have any kind of image stabilization it will throw these off. Also, some people are much more steady than others. ...

If you are carrying a backpack, or some scarf for example (you can take of your shirt of as weel) it's very easy to put the machine on top of it and point it to your target. After you release the camera because it's pointing to where you want, the scarf (for example) might let the camera move a bit, as the camera sinks into it or moves into a more balanced ...

A good rule of thumb is to never shoot slower than your focal length. For example, if you're shooting at 24mm don't go below 1/30 (1/20 being too slow). If you're on a 200mm, try not to shoot below 1/250. This is of course a general statement and does not take into account skill, balance, weight of camera, hand positioning or caffeine intake ;) This info ...

A panorama head is the most useful when your panorama includes both near and far objects. The reason for this is that the effect of rotating accurately around the nodal point becomes more important if your objects are near. The second reason for panorama heads as I see it, is that older software (10 Years ago-ish) did not include the possibility of ...

A panoramic head on a stable tripod allows you to rotate the camera around the nodal point of the lens. This has the effect of making it appear each shot was taken from the exact same spot with no change in perspective. It is especially effective with lenses that have no barrel or pincushion distortion at normal focal lengths of around 50mm. For a ...

Just came across a thorough quide on holding a camera, with principles based on military marksmanship manuals. Covers how to grip the camera, body position, standing/kneeling positions, bracing, breathing, aiming and shutter release. Worth a read. From Pentax forums. Making the Most of Long Exposure Handhelds