Imagine the following scenario – you’ve spent countless hours planning, organizing, and perfecting every single detail for that picture-perfect wedding. Finally, the big day arrives, with everyone dazzling in their best attire and beaming smiles all around.
But then it happens – the dreaded sight of blurry images after meticulously lining up those once-in-a-lifetime shots. Although you feel like throwing your camera out the window, we recommend you stay calm.
It turns out blurry photos aren’t always a lost cause. Some can be given a second chance at life, spruced up to get an honorable place on your mantelpiece.
In today’s article, we’ll show you a few techniques that can help rescue your precious memories if you ever have to deal with the curse of blurry photos. But first, let’s identify the cause(s).
Before we dive into the techniques to save your blurry photos, let’s first understand the main culprits behind these out-of-focus disasters.
In most cases, there are three notorious offenders of a less-than-sharp outcome:
Camera shake usually shows up when shooting handheld with a slow shutter speed.
With this setting, even the slightest movement can cause visible smudging in your images. Usually, this happens in low light conditions since you need a slower shutter speed to get adequate exposure.
This is why it’s important to understand the settings on your camera, especially shutter speed, ISO, and focus (which we’ll talk about a bit later). When you understand the settings, it’s easy to think ahead and adjust for what the camera needs to take a spectacular photo.
Sometimes, your camera may find the background or another random object far more fascinating than your intended subject. But it’s usually not the camera’s fault (well, at least not entirely).
When your focus doesn’t seem to want to stay put, you’re usually dealing with incorrect or confusing focus settings. It’s also something that happens if you’re in autofocus mode. In this case, you can blame the camera since it will automatically calculate where the focus should be.
So, to solve this problem, you may want to get more comfortable with using manual focus settings.
Dancing guests, whirlwind toddlers, and even the swish of a bride’s veil can easily become motion blurs in your photos. But this doesn’t mean you have to admit defeat and accept all your wedding photos will be a hazy blur.
After all, wedding photos of unsuspecting guests having a blast are amazing (when done right). And they can be the perfect funny addition when creating unique photo books for your wedding to share with family and friends.
The problem with energetic subjects who can stand still is also connected to slow shutter speeds. So you can easily capture dynamic moments with a fast shutter, which can be easily solved from your camera’s settings.
Whether it’s for a wedding or for your business social media account, you need engaging photos that look sharp and attract the eye of the viewer. So blurry photos are not part of the solution.
Fortunately, with a few proactive measures and in-camera adjustments, you can minimize those pesky blurs and avoid heartache altogether.
Here are a few solutions to get you started toward a sharper photo future:
Besides tripods, there are a plethora of other devices like monopods and gimbal stabilizers. These trusty tools will keep your camera steady, even when you’re not feeling quite as confident in your unwavering grip. Tripods are particularly helpful for long exposures or low-light situations where slower shutter speeds make it easy for blur to creep in.
As we already said, it’s important to learn your camera settings. If you know and understand the settings, you can take amazing wedding pictures even if you’re an amateur.
For instance, the formula to avoid blurry pics includes a higher shutter speed (to freeze movement) and good lighting.
But good light is not always available, so to counterbalance any low-lighting condition, you’ll have to open up the aperture (use lower f-numbers) to allow more light to come through the sensor. If adjusting the aperture isn’t enough, you can also crank up the ISO setting (but beware of introducing noise).
Overall, the perfect, non-blur photo requires a delicate balance of shutter speed, aperture, and ISO (also known as The Exposure Triangle).
To keep your intended subjects in focus and the limelight, familiarize yourself with autofocus modes. For instance, single AF (autofocus) mode is great for capturing still subjects, while continuous AF excels at tracking moving objects to maintain sharp focus throughout.
If you’re faced with blurry photos despite taking necessary precautions, there are still some things you can do to save your cherished memories. You will have to work with photo editing software, so we’ll go through several techniques that can bring life and sharpness back to your images.
We’ll talk about two of the most well-known photo editing software tools (Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom), but you can find similar features in other photo editing tools.
If there’s a tool out there that can help revive an image teetering on the edge of blur doom, Photoshop is the one to choose.
Here are a couple of features that can help:
Lightroom also has a couple of user-friendly aces up its sleeves when it comes to correcting blurry photos. These aces are called the Clarity and Texture sliders, and you can use them together or separately, depending on your needs.
Boosting the Clarity slider can make edges and details pop while increasing the Texture slider targets finer details without affecting the overall contrast. Find these helpful sliders in the Develop module and tweak them to taste.
But remember not to overdo it!
In the unpredictable world of photography, blurred photos can lurk around every corner, threaten special moments, and perplex even the best of us. But with our trusty arsenal of in-camera strategies, photo editing secrets, and a sprinkle of dedication to experimentation, blurry photos won’t be that much of a problem anymore.
Remember – always be prepared with a tripod or stabilizer on hand, master the exposure triangle dance (shutter speed-aperture-ISO), and utilize your camera’s autofocus skills like a boss.
But if blurs still manage to sneak into your work (as they often do!), wield your newfound power with Photoshop filters or breathe life back into your photos using Lightroom’s sliders. Don’t be afraid to experiment but also avoid using filters and corrective tools too much. Knowing when to let go of a blurry photo is also part of the process.
