Entry 7 - Portraiture

Two more pics today. One which turned out very neat - with the whole background motion-blurred - and another with a simply awesome composition.

I know what your thinking: your wondering how I took this picture, aren't you? A poorly planned portrait will usually turn out the opposite way, with the subject blurred and the background relatively crisp. I wish I could give you a long winded scientific explanation of why this picture turned out as it did, but how this picture came to being is as much a mystery to me as to you. Almost. I can tell you my guess: This picture was taken with flash on, usually not recommended, but in this shot it served my purpose. I quickly moved my hand downward while pressing the shutter button, and that is how a predecessor of this frame came about. On seeing the results, I experimented more.
Since I was moving my hand fast downward when I took the picture, the background is blurred. The only part of the picture which isn't blurry, is the subject, the part of the picture which the flash was projected onto.

Camera: Canon EOS DIGITAL REBEL XS
Shutter Speed: 1/25th of a second (note that if the shutter speed was faster, the background wouldn't be      blurred, and you lose the effect)
Aperture: f/3.5
ISO: 800
Focal Length: 18mm

Sorry for the extra long entry. That last pic took a bit of explaining.

Don't try this at home. We had a particularly straight length of road, we could see cars coming from far off.

Camera: Canon XS
Shutter: 1/500th sec
Aperture: f/14 (if it was much lower I couldn't have had the trees/horizon of road be in focus)
ISO: 1600 (though I recommend much lower)
Focal Length: 18mm