Kinetic Photography

The Magazine For Photographers
2 hours ago
3 min read

Vibrant cityscape at night with skyscrapers and dynamic light trails. Buildings glow with multicolored lights reflecting over water.

What Is Kinetic Photography?

When you hear the word kinetic, the first thing that probably comes to mind is motion, and that is exactly what this technique is built around. Kinetic photography, sometimes called camera tossing, is a style where the camera itself becomes part of the movement while taking the photo.

Instead of holding the camera steady like we normally would, you intentionally move it. That movement might be a shake, a swing, a bounce, a spin, or in some cases even a brief toss into the air. Kinetic photography overlaps with techniques like panning or intentional camera movement, both of which I already talked about a couple of weeks ago (if you remember ;)).

The results are usually unpredictable, which is part of the appeal. Some photos might look chaotic, others surprisingly beautiful. Often the photos end up looking almost like digital artwork or computer-generated/video game graphics (depends heavily on the scene of course too).

How To Do Kinetic Photography

1: Slow Down the Shutter

For the camera movement to show up in the photo, the shutter needs to stay open long enough.

Start with:

1/5s – 1 second for a bit of motion
1–5 seconds for more dramatic results

If you are shooting in bright daylight: use ISO 100, stop down your aperture (f/11–f/16), maybe use an ND filter if the scene is still too bright.

Longer exposures give you more time to move the camera and create stronger motion effects.

2: Choose a Scene with Light and Colour

Kinetic photography works best when the scene contains strong visual elements, such as:

Bright lights
Neon signs (like from Restaurants or bars)
Street lights at night
Colourful scenes
City scapes (a very popular scene)
Night scenes all together are especially good for kinetic photography because light sources stretch dramatically when the camera moves.