Shutter To Think

EVERYTHING YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT CAMERA SHUTTERS BUT WERE AFRAID TO ASK

- Seth Shostak

OF ALL THE COMPONENTS OF A CAMERA, few are as iconic as the shutter. The name of this magazine is testimony to that.

However, it’s not likely you tax your brain thinking deeply about shutter mechanisms. You set a speed, you push a button. Who needs to know the details? 

Maybe you. Shutters affect more than exposure. They can limit your flash options, distort your pix, or possibly lighten your wallet.

The earliest cameras didn’t have shutters. Emulsions were slower than continental drift, and making a snap was anything but snappy. Lens caps served as the original shutters, and even decades later some cameras sported nothing fancier than a metal flap that could be swung off to the side of the lens. Cheap, reliable, and no annoying click.

By the late 19th century, dry plates and baked emulsions greatly increased the speed of films, and suddenly exposure times were well under a second. Few photogs were able to swing flaps or switch lens caps in an eye blink, so pneumatic and clockwork shutters were incorporated into cameras.