Camera Settings for Shooting the Runway Made Easy
The photographers’ pit.
In this episode, I share with you how I go about determining my camera settings for taking photos during runway shows. To the uninitiated, that first show can be daunting especially you don’t have a firm understanding of exposure principle-aperture, shutter speed, and ISO-and most importantly, how they work together is a fast-paced environment where it’s necessary to capture movement without blur. You’ve got to be on your game because models won’t and can’t stop for you to adjust your camera’s settings. This takes practice, practice, practice and reading up on how to shoot the runway.
With a telephotos lens like a 70 - 200 mm f2.8, you have a great tool to optimize getting sharp photos of models and their attire against a blurred background. My process is actually quite simple.
Decide on the best aperture for what your shooting
I’m generally at f2.8 or f4 for the runway
Decide on the shutter speed
Models are walking, yet have to appear sharp in photos so I start at 1/500th of a sec. I generally check to see if I can get away with 1/400th of a sec, but I seem to always come back to 1/500th.
If I’m shooting at f2.8 and 500th of a sec, and my exposure (the combination of aperture, shutter speed, and ISO) is less than optimal, it’s time to bump up my ISO. In a poorly lit environment that does not allow the use of speed lights, I have to increase my ISO. In many of my photos, I dialed my ISO up to 6400.
Don’t be afraid to up the ISO and don’t worry about grain (it really is over-emphasized). You can reduce grain in post-processing with programs such as Lightroom or DeNoise by Topaz Labs.
Set the white balance (WB) to auto and let the camera work for you.
Remember, if you change your aperture from f2.8 to f4.0 because you want a wider area of focus, you’ve now cut the amount of light entering your lens in half. Your photos will be underexposed. You can’t decrease your shutter speed because your photos have to be sharp, but you can take your ISO from 500 to 1000. If you understand how exposure works, you’ll know to automatically change your ISO when you change your aperture in order to get the “same” exposure instead of changing the aperture, taking a photo, realizing the photo is underexposed, and then trying to find a new combination of aperture, shutter speed, and ISO that will work for you.
Photo from NYC Live Fashion Show February 2022. f2.8, 1/400th sec., ISO 5000. Focal point on eye closes to camera. Note blurriness in photo as focus moves away from the model’s face and toward lower part of top. Also note, the soft, blurry background making the model the the unmistakable focus of the photo.
Here are a few highlights from this episode:
{4:20} For the most part, I'm shooting at f2.8, maybe a f4 and the benefit of this and you'll see this in the photos if you look last week if you went to the shownotes on the website and you saw the photos that I posted, the benefits of this is that your model will be will get the maximum light and you will have a nice blurry background. So unquestionably, unquestionably, your model is your point of focus.
{7:43} Now, we're talking a runway, so these people are moving, and in some cases, they're moving pretty fast. You know that to capture movement, you have to have a faster shutter speed. When you read about shooting runaway, people talk about oh, starting at 250 91/250th of a sec). Look, just move the shutter to 500, move it to 500, take a look at what you get with the first couple of shots, and if your model is not coming out pristine, clear, if there is a blur because of movement, you've got to up your shutter speed to even more.
{10:48} Now, remember, at this runway show or at these runway shows, I am indoors, in a darkened area, the lighting is not great, and because of that, and because I am working at a faster shutter speed, so the length of time that light is allowed to come in through my lens is really short, I need to increase my ISO, despite the fact that for 95% of my photos, my aperture is 2.8 letting in the maximum light.
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