Night Photography

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byeomans

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Hello all,

My name is Ben and im new here.

Anyway...In sept i will be flying off to florida on holiday, i am wishing to get some great night time shots of the places i'll be. I've been trying but with no luck, everything is too dark to tell what it is.

Im using a Fuji Finepix S5600, can anyone please give me hints and tips on how to take good night shots.

Im not at home at the moment so i cannot look at the manual but i do have the camera on me, PLEASE, im a noob so try and dumb things down for me.lol.

Thankyou so much.
 
Tripod Tripod Tripod

There's a manual here.

http://www.fujifilm.co.uk/technical/folder.pl?id=248

I see it has a shutter speed of 15 seconds. That should be fine to get a decent pic of neon lights, car trails etc. If a tripod is no good (cost size weight etc) then get a bean bag and use that to keep the camera still. Remote shutter release also helps. Take loads and experiment. Have fun.
 
thanks, but what is the best setting **on my camera** for this to work best ?
 
byeomans said:
Hello all,

My name is Ben and im new here.

Anyway...In sept i will be flying off to florida on holiday,
Click to expand...

I'm off there in sept too. What date? Which airport, who do you fly with.
 
byeomans said:
thanks, but what is the best setting **on my camera** for this to work best ?
Click to expand...

Trial and error - why not do a few practice shots before you go?

Use the manual setting on the dial and adjust shutter speed and aperture to find something that suits
 
You can try aperture priority (probably A or Av on the dial/menu?) set to say f5.6 then the camera should work out how long to open the shutter. Try other aperture values too (f numbers).

As Mobilev says trial and error... keep experimenting and make a note of what works!
 
OK - from the manual, try this. I don't have this camera. So you need to look closely at page 42 and see if this matches what you have.

Set top dial to "M"

Then use the 4 way rocker on the back to set the shutter time. Go with say 5 seconds.
Then use the little button with the +/- sign to set the aperture go with, say F/4 or F/5 - you can go from F/3.2 to F/8 on your camera. So a midway point is probably good.

Take a shot.

Too dark? Either / or:
(1) increase the shutter speed (ie make it longer), or
(2) reduce the f value to something lower

Too light? Do the opposite.

But seriously, get out into town tomorrow and practise.

There are a few night shots in my Liverpool set on flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mobilevirgin/sets/72157594434910977/

Open up the image pages and click the "more properties" link on the bottom right - that will give you some idea of the settings I used on my camera - yours will be different.

Note to all - I don't claim those pics as being in any way a measure of excellence. Just an example of what can be achieved by me. :coat:

No doubt others can point to better examples.

Have a scratch around flickr and see what others have done - do searches for words like: night, neon lights, gas station (yes, really)

Here's an example that may help : http://www.flickr.com/photos/33124677@N00/65449933/
 
mobilevirgin said:
OK - from the manual, try this. I don't have this camera. So you need to look closely at page 42 and see if this matches what you have.

Set top dial to "M"

Then use the 4 way rocker on the back to set the shutter time. Go with say 5 seconds.
Then use the little button with the +/- sign to set the aperture go with, say F/4 or F/5 - you can go from F/3.2 to F/8 on your camera. So a midway point is probably good.

Take a shot.

Too dark? Either / or:
(1) increase the shutter speed (ie make it longer), or
(2) reduce the f value to something lower

Too light? Do the opposite.

But seriously, get out into town tomorrow and practise.

There are a few night shots in my Liverpool set on flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mobilevirgin/sets/72157594434910977/

Open up the image pages and click the "more properties" link on the bottom right - that will give you some idea of the settings I used on my camera - yours will be different.

Note to all - I don't claim those pics as being in any way a measure of excellence. Just an example of what can be achieved by me. :coat:

No doubt others can point to better examples.

Have a scratch around flickr and see what others have done - do searches for words like: night, neon lights, gas station (yes, really)

Here's an example that may help : http://www.flickr.com/photos/33124677@N00/65449933/
Click to expand...

Thanks mobilevirgin, that seems very helpfull.I'll give that a try later tonight.
 
Lots of things to take at night out there, Buildings, Parades, Fireworks!!!!
 
Great advice there from mobilevirgin.

I would add that remember that you are "painting with light". Moving lights can fill parts of your screen to add to the composition. Flashing lights can appear solid with a long exposure, and so on...

Have a ball!
 
HIMUPNORTH said:
Great advice there from mobilevirgin.

I would add that remember that you are "painting with light". Moving lights can fill parts of your screen to add to the composition. Flashing lights can appear solid with a long exposure, and so on...

Have a ball!
Click to expand...

Im sorry if this is a dumb question but does a long exposure occour when i press halfway down ( for however long i wish ) ?
 
Your camera will fire at the set exposure no longer how long you hold your finger. This is unless you have the camera set to BULB which will open the shutter for a slong as you have your finger depressed. At night you have a fair latitude for opening but if using fingers do it via a remote trigger (to avoid camera shake). If you don't have a remote then use the timer function.

Sounds like you need to read the manual. I know us guys aren't famed for it but I won't tell anyone. :thumbs:
 
For doing test shots at night turn the ISO to its highest and the aperture to its lowest so you can get a fast shutter speed. The shot make not look great with little depth of field and plenty of noise, but it is only a test to quickly see the effect of the exposure without having to wait several seconds.

When you have it right you can reduce the ISO while increasing the shutter speed to compensate, then do the same while closing the aperture down to give the effect you want.

Generally speaking you do not need to do anything different at night as you would in the day time, the camera's metering will still work pretty well. You do though need to be more aware of the issue of freezing motion with the slower shutter speeds so depending on the effect you want then you need to make sure you keep the aperture as wide open as necessary and the ISO as high as is usable.

Hand holding can be a lot more difficult otherwise, a tripod makes such a big difference that you should do everything possible to make sure you have something you can use. Even if is just a mini table top type one you can place on benches and walls etc.

Also when shooting a road or light trails somewhere that is not well lit then camera's meter will see the traffic as the dominant light source and try to keep that down, under exposing the background. So if you want to capture the full scene then you need to meter when when there is a break in traffic, or using spot/partial metering on the background

Michael.
 
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