London lights

John wells

John wells

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Not sure if this is the right place for this but I was down in London village with work and had a bit of time to shoot down by the river.

Normally I shoot during the day so don't have lighting issues, but I'm struggling with the shots of the city and the lights that seem to blur into each other, any one got any ideas/settings they use as a standard for this type of nighttime/dusk shooting.

I was in Ap mode between f7-11 and taking a time reading from the camera

John
 
Post a couple of shots up here (with the apperture, ISO and shutter speed) that show the problem.

Did you use a tripod or was the camera on a steady surface?

Without knowing the ISO you used I'd guess, at between f7 and f11, the shutter speed would be too slow. There is also the chance that in low light the camera could not focus properly.

Dave
 
Hi there will do once I've got my Mac running, I was on a tripod Ido was 100 and shutter time was between 8-40 secs to get a balanced exposure in the histogram
 
How stable was the tripod with all the wind we've been having. Even slight motion at night into lights will mess the whole thing up
 
Wind was low, tripod was my lightweight tripod one, I'll shrink an image down tonight to get on here to show you what I mean
 
here is one of them that should highlight the issue
 

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I'm struggling with the shots of the city and the lights that seem to blur into each other
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John, I am not quite sure what you mean by this? High intensity lights from offices and other sources will tend to burn out the edges of thin window frames at night as the light slightly wraps around. The row of lights at the bottom which have created a star effect seem reasonably sharp, given the distance across the Thames.

Can you give us a bit more to go on? Camera, Lens etc. I certainly would never use or recommend a lightweight tripod. They are rarely up to the job.

I must admit I wouldnt personally do night shots with aperture priority mode on. I would always go manual, same goes for focussing, as the latter can 'hunt' in the dusk and dark for a fixed point. Maybe this is what you are alluding to?
 
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I agree with @shreds, I think. That picture is about what I'd expect. Well exposed (well done for getting out before the sky gets too dark!), and reasonably sharp. Where you've got bright lights, such as in the "cheese grater" building, they're so bright that they do tend to wash out the edges of the windows, but that's normal too.
 
Hi both that is my issue Stewart with the cheese graters lights, as i stated before its an unusual time for me to shoot so think i might just avoid it going forward, but I've seen others with shots similar and the effect doesn't appear to be as bad so wondered if i should under expose to counter the issue I'm not sure

shreds said:
Can you give us a bit more to go on? Camera, Lens etc. I
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Canon 6d with 24-104l on 39 secs at iso 100 f11
 
....dont give up...

You might try underexposing a little, there is usually quite a bit of exposure latitude shooting at night, and a good deal of it is intuitively 'shooting on the hoof' and with experience you will discover what is best, which makes it a lot of fun in my view. Given how bright the location is, even later into the night, I would hazard a guess that your exposures are plenty long enough and therefore creating a series of test shots will allow you to nail the exposure. Try bracketing until you are happy with the results. Maybe even try combining a number of shots, using HDR as it is designed. There will be plenty to ditch, but that is part of the learning curve.

But make sure you use a fixed stable platform/tripod, if doing so. It can get windy along there, with down droughts from the tall buildings creating a micro climate of its own, and vibration from trains can also sometimes be felt, depending how close you are to the bridges, although I don't think that is the problem on your shots.

At least with digital, such shooting is not costly like it was in film days.
 
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Unless you start bracketing and blending or use a HDR technique your image is about as good as it will ever get. 6D is somewhat limited in the DR department too which won't help you but even a couple of extra stops of DR won't be enough to fully remedy the issue in a single frame.
 
thanks Brazo, not that great at blending and PS to be honest.
 
I wouldn't be disappointed with that. Try and get out in the evening a bit more (even if not in London) and see if you can improve using some of the good advice given here.
 
A "straight" night shot is always going to be a compromise.

You need to decide if you want detail in the lights, in which case you will lose detail in the dark areas, or else expose for dark areas and accept that the highlights will be burned out (clipped.)
 
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