Shooting moving objects at night

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hotnuts21

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Hello everyone, im hopeing one or two of you experts will be able to give me some advice.

Im still getting to grips with my new D50 and tommorrow night I am going to be taking some pictures of a tricky subject. A tractor pushing a trailer with a lifeboat on it, launching into the sea in the dark. Very dark.

There is a little light coming from the seafront (behind where I am shooting) and the tractor and trailer is lit up in lights. You can see what the trac and trailer look like in the day http://www.aberystwythlifeboat.org....d,47/page,view/catid,8/PageNo,2/key,27/hit,1/ (these are my pics, and our site)

The tractor pushes the boat into the sea at a fair speed, with the boat engines running and as soon as there is enough water, the boat and trailer are set up so the boat can drive straight off at high speed. Punching through any large waves. The tractor then reverses back up the beach as the boat is leaving the trailer.

You can get an idea of the depth etc with these two links, different tractors and boats, but should give you an idea, although they are not moving.
http://www.scarboroughlifeboat.org.uk/images/tractor-returning-+ilb.jpg
http://www.haylinglifeboats.org.uk/images/Atlantic launch2.jpg

I will have a tripod set up near to the beach line and hopefully the tractor will come past me and i can get some shots as it enters the water and of the boat leaving the trailer.

So what I am looking for is some pointers, some things to bear in mind, some tips for setting up the camera best iso settings, which priority mode to use, fstop etc. Some pointers so I can set the camera up with a base idea and then play with it on site and see what happens. Thing is there is not going to be much time so I want to get a head start, feel free to explain any pointers too so I can learn what I am doing as I go. Will of course post any good pics here.

Thanks in anticipation and sorry for the long post.
--
D50 User and Learner!
 
It could be very hard depending on the light.

What sort of time will you be taking the pictures? If it is actually night I think the best settings would be the highest ISO you can get (1600?) and the largest aperture. You will need as much light as you can get to keep the shutter speed up to a useable speed. :)
 
Hello... errrr... 'Hotnuts'

:)

Sounds particularly challenging! I wouldn't have thought the tripod will be a great deal of use to you unfortunately as it appears that the tractor and the other bits will be moving around too quickly... I would anticipate it being quite tricky as it sounds like the cameras exposure meter will likely always be showing undereposured due to the darkness.

Full manual, or aperture priority will be a must and as amp34 says this needs to be on as high an iso setting as your camera allows - unless you hire some light trailers for the evening! I don't know what the lunar situation is, but that may help you slightly if the gods are on your side. Trial and error will win the day I would suggest!

As a further thought, if you want to document the event - and the actual deploying of this vessel into the water is too difficult - why not get some good shots of the crew with the lifeboat before they start the show, then the evening won't have been a complete waste of time if the whole thing proves too tricky!

Good luck, sounds like you may need it!

Gary
 
i think about 4 sets of these shall do the trick

istockphoto_126934_flood_lights_against_blue_sky.jpg



i think what you are attempting to do is near on impossible,
 
Thanks for the heads up its going to be around 8pm GMT and it looks like there may be some moonlight :)

I was worried with the high ISO that it may come out to grainy but I could probably fix that in rawshooter? Have not had much of a chance to play with it yet.

Thanks for the tips, High ISO and large aperture! Then leave the rest to chance!

With the close ups on the boat of the crew (good idea) I can go a lot lower with the Iso because there is lights pointing into the boat for the crew!

thnkx
 
Hmmm, tricky... If its dark I don't think it'll matter if you use high iso or not, your still going to have to leave the shutter open for a few seconds or more ...which means they'll just be ghostly streaks...


This bit is ott... :nuts:

...possibly if you use a flash, it'll be weak and anything small won't reach.. but ... if you fire it as the shutter closes (rear sync flash.. CT did a thread somehwere) you may just light enough of the boat to freeze it up a bit.

...so you'd get ....ghostly streak with semi-fixed boat at its end in the dark....possibly some light of the sea and horizon too.

:thinking::thumbs:
 
Excellent thanks, just need to find out how to switch it on with the D50, but gogole will be my friend I am sure.
 
If your using the on board flash, I doubt it will have enough power to even slightly light the boat ... It might though, if its dark enough, so do try...

.. You could improve your chances by using a directed reflector. ....Make your own out of white card or dare I say it tinfoil for this job... tape..cable ties etc.

As your firing from a fixed point, you need to provide room for the blur part (say from the left hand side of the frame) ...and then use the directed reflector to point and fire at the finishing point, (say on the right) ... you might get the most out of it that way.

possibly. ;)


Just ask them to re-launch a few times, while you test out some ideas.. :lol:

edit...just looked at your pictures again... your gonna have to get much much closer than that btw. ...soz ;)
 
not sure if any body has mentioned this. but shoot it in raw as well as what every body has said.

I have found that in raw mode you have a little extra chance to rescue a picture that is too dark than you do with jpg, and from what you have said, you are going to need all the tricks you can get.

Good luck m8, d50 is a great camera, i only traded mine in a couple of weeks ago because i got offered a very good deal on a d70
 
Forbiddenbiker said:
just looked at your pictures again... your gonna have to get much much closer than that btw.
Click to expand...

Indeed, with just an onboard flash you'll need to be standing a few meters from the boat.
 
Yeah I cant be that close, because its dark and heavy machinery and me with a camera to my face its not safe! I will have to go with what I think on the day, looks like we will get 2 launches in so might get something.

I have been using works D50 and fell in love with it :) So i purchased one second hand on ebay last week and it arrived today along with loads of extra kit. As well as the standard lens that comes with the camera it also come with a sigma lens of the same spec, which I dont understand which lens would be best to use.

This is the one that comes with the camera
www.photodo.com/product_1053.html

This is the one that was obviously purchased in addtion.
www.photodo.com/product_1121_p2.html

There is also a nice sigma 55-200mm lens and a wide angle filter/lens/adaoter that screws into the main lens!

Cant wait now!
 
cant see why they would buy the sigma when they already had the nikon kit lens, unless maybe they desperatly wanted a 58mm thread.

Maybe they bought it in error thinking it was a faster lens? or perhaps they just happened to have it left over and bundled it in to get rid of it.

you could probably sell it on, you seem to have gotten a good package there m8.

how did the project go, by the way
 
Yeah, backpack, tripod, wide angle lens, remote control and more. Good kit to get started with and should see me through for a while.

Now as for the project! First and foremost it was an exercise to test out a beach launch at night, as we had never done one, plenty in the day. We always launch into the harbour, but it needed to be tested. And thats about as far as it got I am afraid.

The plan was to run through the first time and get everything right, I was then going to stand back for the second attempt and take photos.

The sea was massive, and as the boat launched it was hit by a huge wave, which sent the boat launching out the top of the trailer. (wish I had my camera for that!) IT also engaged the trailer disconnect, so as the tracotr come back up the beach, the trailer was still in the water!!

So we had to revert to plan b and carry out an equipment recovery, which in itself was good practice. Needless to say it was very late by the time we had finished and we didnt do a second run, and so I got no photos at all!!

All the best laid plans and all that. In future I will either be involved or not (and photograph)! I nearly took the camera out first, but as we were starting it started to rain, which looked like it would clear for the second attempt!! So I left it in the boathouse!

Thanks for all the tips and help, no doubt I will be about asking for some more help, I just had my first play with photomatix, which was interesting!
 
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