First attempt at long exposure - thoughts?

Mike Hoxbig

Mike Hoxbig

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Hey guys, finally got a chance to head out last night to get some long exposure shots. Any tips or tricks on how and what to improve? Thanks :)


IMG_1010.JPG
f/22, ISO-100, 81 sec


IMG_1017.JPG
f/22, ISO-200, 26 sec


IMG_1028(1).JPG
f/22, ISO-200, 62 sec
 
Nice - something to keep in mind… few lenses - and the 55-250 isnt one of them - are particularly good at f/22. f/14 should give you enough DOF as well as the starburst (caused by the aperture blades) on the street lights.
 
bwana said:
Nice - something to keep in mind… few lenses - and the 55-250 isnt one of them - are particularly good at f/22. f/14 should give you enough DOF as well as the starburst (caused by the aperture blades) on the street lights.
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Thanks bwana. I did try at larger apertures, but the images were coming out terribly blown. Would I need to underexpose it at a larger aperture?
 
Mike Hoxbig said:
Thanks bwana. I did try at larger apertures, but the images were coming out terribly blown. Would I need to underexpose it at a larger aperture?
Click to expand...
From the look of it you're ISO is as low as it will go for for the top image so you'd need to reduce your shutter speed accordingly.
 
When I do my long exposures I try and not go above F16, above that Chromatic creeps in and can put some purple fringes on.

What you can also do to experiment is use welding glass for a ND filter. You can get the glass at a Hardware shop for below R10. You will get a green tint but if you take in RAW you can control that, otherwise just convert to Black and White. The glass is about a 14 stop. So you will be able to take photo's in broad daylight up to 100 seconds easily.

Here is one of the groups in Flickr : http://www.flickr.com/groups/weldingmaskglassfilter/pool/

That is how I started. Then I got myself a ND110 filter and never looked back.
 
Maybe lower the ISO? The 81sec shot feels a little to bright, maybe change the contrast. You should be able to get a decent long exposure at about 15sec, 13 seconds is good too .
 
Kudos on taking the shots

The first shot is one that I think you want to benefit from having slow shutter speed (long exposure) to get the trails of the lights of moving cars. However, past a certain point and you risk introducing other artifacts like the guys mentioned above - chromatic fringing and even blur on parts of the image you might want to be sharper.

The last two images does not have that much movement - not capturing light trails - thus expose only as long as you need to for a good exposure using around f16 and an acceptable ISO.

One trick - for night city scapes that I've heard from a guy shooting film. He would do a long exposure just after sunset before its totally dark. Start taking the picture at that point then covering up the lens and when its dark again open the lens up again. This gets you some more detail from the buildings rather than having the lights overpower everything.
 
Rouxenator said:
Maybe lower the ISO? The 81sec shot feels a little to bright, maybe change the contrast. You should be able to get a decent long exposure at about 15sec, 13 seconds is good too .
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That's a great pic there Roux.

I can't lower the ISO below 100 though, that's the lowest it goes. May have to lower the f-stop and use a filter, or reduce the exposure time.

The problem with reducing the exposure time is that the road wasn't very busy when I took the pic, so I basically had to capture the shot and wait for a few cars to pass.
 
Mike Hoxbig said:
I can't lower the ISO below 100 though, that's the lowest it goes.
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Sorry, my bad... On DSLR you probably won't be able to go lower because their is no need, they can produce noise free pictures even at higher ISO. On compact and bridge cameras you can sometimes go as low as ISO 60 because that's what you need to ensure low noise levels.

Your pictures are quite impressive. If you are keen on taking really long exposure maybe do a shot of something other than a road or a place where one would expect to see movement. A landscape scene is perhaps a good idea? I found that the 16 second limit on bridge cameras makes it a bit frustrating to take nice night time landscape pictures, you'll have more luck with your DSLR.
 
Awesome pic. I'm also keen on trying night time landscapes but as Roux pointed out... its frustrating as hell with having a 8s max shutter speed.
 
That is typical for entry level point and shoot cameras, you can up the ISO if the shot is too dark but there will be noise. Play around with it and see what the output is like. On most bridge cameras you should be able to go as high as 16 seconds.
 
i bought me a bridge camera ...but i dont know how to take these pics :(

anyone care to explain

i did change the mode to "S" shutter mode and the speed to 8secs

thats about it ...and noob question has to be at night right :p
 
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