What Is Bulb Mode

What is shutter speed.

What is bulb mode.

Bulb mode is a setting that refers to the shutter speed of your camera. This is 30 seconds in most cameras. If you ve turned the shutter speed dial on your camera past 30 seconds you might have noticed the strangely named bulb mode. It allows your shutter speed to be any length you choose.

It basically makes your camera function like a camera from 100 years ago when you had to squeeze a bulb to open the shutter and then release the bulb to close it. One second one minute 17 minutes or anything else. In short think of bulb mode as time travel mode. Bulb mode is simply a shutter speed option that you can select in manual mode on your camera.

The exposure ends when you lift your finger to release the button. In the early days of photography it took a long time to take a photo. Bulb mode simply allows the photographer to take a picture for as long as the shutter is depressed that means pushed down not sad. You can use bulb mode by choosing manual mode or shutter priority then start scrolling your selector wheel all the way to the end of the shutter speeds.

The key with bulb mode is that your camera s shutter stays open for as long as you hold down the shutter release button. A typical image to capture using this feature is one of star trails when the night sky is clear. The bulb mode known as time on canon is intended for exposure times that exceed the maximum predefined shutter speeds. It s possible to use bulb mode for shorter exposures but it would be much easier to just select the predefined desired shutter speed.

Simply aim the camera to the north or south celestial pole depending on which hemisphere you live. Bulb mode is an exposure setting that is used when seeking to use a shutter speed of more than 30 seconds. Generally this would be used in extremely low light situations such as taking photos of the night sky. It allows shots to be taken that are minutes long rather than seconds.

When you are in bulb mode an exposure begins when you press the shutter button of your camera and continues as you hold the button down.