It’s frustrating! You just got a new shiny camera. You opened it from the box and took a photo. You looked briefly at the LCD, and somehow you feel the picture didn’t come up looking right. You zoomed in a bit more, and you see that your photos look blurry!

I think we’ve all experienced the same thing. What the heck went wrong?

This article will tell you the 4 possible reasons why your pictures are blurry and how you can fix them.

Possible Reason #1: Your camera lens might be dirty

Over time, oil, grease, and dust might accumulate on the front of your lens. This can cause your pictures to look blurry when you take a photo.

The fix for this is straightforward. You use an air blower to blow any hard part from your lens. Remember: Don’t blow air from your mouth to your lens as this will cause moisture to form on your lens, which will cause mold to grow!

After that, use a lens cleaning solution and spray it on a microfiber cloth. Remember: Don’t spray the solution directly to the lens as this will cause moisture to sip into the lens and cause mold to grow!

Once you spray the microfiber cloth solution, all you need to do is rub it in a nice and slow circular motion.

Possible Reason #2: You are not selecting the focus area properly

You may have blurry pictures because you didn’t select the focus area properly. The default setting for a new camera is to set the focus area to Wide. This means the camera will automatically look at the whole scene and select what to focus on.

Sometimes it works, but sometimes it’s not selecting the right thing to focus on.

To fix this, change the focus area to either center or flexible spot on your camera.

Now, all you need to do is point the focus area to the object that you want to be sharply in focus, half-press the shutter, recompose the scene and fully press the shutter. This technique is also called the focus and recompose technique in photography.

When you’re using this technique, please make sure you are not stepping forward or backward. When you step forward or backward, you change the focusing distance, resulting in a blurry photo. Only move your camera up, down, or sideways after you lock in your focus.

Possible Reason #3: Your shutter speed is too low, and your hands are shaking…

Another possible reason that you get blurry pictures is that your shutter speed is too low. This will be even magnified when you’re not steady holding your camera when taking a picture of your object is moving too fast.

We often called his motion blur in photography.

To remedy this problem, hold the camera using the correct technique to minimize shake, turn on the Image Stabilization or use a Tripod altogether.

This will remedy you for causing a motion blur because you don’t hold the camera steadily.

What if your subject is moving too fast and is causing a motion blur? You can use a faster shutter speed. Start using a shutter speed of 1/500 seconds or faster if you want to freeze a moving subject.

Possible Reason #4: Your subject is moving towards or away from you

Finally, the last possible reason you have blurry photos is that your subject might be moving towards or away from you when you took the picture.

By default, the camera is using the AF-S or Autofocus Single mode. This means that the camera is only calculating the focus distance once. If you use this mode and the subject is moving towards, or away from you when you shoot, the focusing distance will be different, and you’ll end up with a blurry, out of focus photo.

If you want the camera to keep calculating the focus distance when your subject moves away or towards you, switch to the AF-C or Autofocus Continuous mode. This mode will make the camera calculate and re-calculate the focusing distance as the subject moves towards or away from you, ensuring you have a sharply focused subject.

So, those are the four possible reasons why your photos might look blurry or not sharp.

There are other causes as well, such as you have a malfunctioning camera. But try those four fixes first before contacting your camera dealer.

If you are a beginner and want to learn how to use your camera properly, check out the Beginner’s QuickStart Guide to Photography course that you can take for free on this website. You can find the link below in the video description.

I hope you’ll be able to take sharp pictures after you read this article and I’ll see you around!