Electronic shutter advantages:<\/p>\n
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- Completely silent, so ideal for wildlife and other situations where shutter noise is undesirable<\/li>\n
- A longer life span than mechanical shutters<\/li>\n
- No camera shake, since there is no vibration caused by the movement of the mechanical shutter<\/li>\n
- Ideal for high frame rate video<\/li>\n
- Very fast shutter speeds\/burst rate, allowing the photographer to freeze incredible fast motion and take more photos in the same amount of time<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
But for me it mostly boils down to one thing. The major advantage of electronic shutters, incredibly fast burst rates, is also its Achilles heel – way too many photos to deal with.<\/p>\n
I’ll use my Canon R5 as an example. With the mechanical shutter I get 12 frames\/second, which for me is nearly always more than enough – even when incredibly fast birds are my subjects. If I were to use the electronic shutter, I’d get 20 frames\/second which is nearly always way too many photos to deal with. In a 3 second burst I’d have taken 60 photos instead of 36 and every one of those photos has to be dealt with – stored in camera, downloaded to a computer, transferred to an organizer, reviewed and either deleted or processed.<\/p>\n
No thank you! I’ll stick to the mechanical shutter. I do have a life other than sitting at my computer.<\/p>\n
But on rare occasions I probably pay a price for that choice. Following is a recent example.<\/p>\n
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![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/short-eared-owl-3565-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"short-eared-owl-3565-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\nNine days ago I photographed this Short-eared Owl hunting from a fence post. Yes, it’s the same owl featured in my last blog post. In that post I referred to this bird as a male, so I’ll continue to do so.<\/p>\n
The grass below him was thick and tall so it’s highly unlikely that he’d be able to see prey on the ground. But immediately after this photo was taken, he must have heard a vole in the grasses to his left because in a nanosecond he went from looking at me to…<\/p>\n
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![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/short-eared-owl-3567b-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"short-eared-owl-3567b-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\n1\/5000, f\/5.6, ISO 800, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n
diving on prey below him and to his left.<\/p>\n
I got this single photo of him in this ass over teakettle flight posture, with his rear end significantly higher than his front end but his right wing covered his entire head, including his face and eye. I like this photo anyway but I’d love to have a photo where he’s still topsy-turvy but his wing isn’t hiding his face.<\/p>\n
I probably had this owl in my viewfinder while he was in flight for about one second. If I’d been using my electronic shutter instead of my mechanical shutter, I’d have the potential of getting eight more photos (20 instead of 12) of him in flight, giving me a much better chance to get the photo I wish I had. It may not have happened, but it might have.<\/p>\n
I’ll continue to shoot exclusively with the mechanical shutter but on rare occasions like this one I’ll also continue to wonder what I might have missed.<\/p>\n
Ron<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
And an example of when my choice probably wasn’t the best choice. (2 photos)<\/p>\n