Night Time Long Expsoure

 So this week I thought I’d write about night time long exposure as it’s one of my favorite photographic styles. This type of photography can be lots of fun but you need to be careful, especially shooting along roads at night and police will often stop to see what you are doing late at night along a highway.

    I have had a lot of students ask me how to do night time long exposure and it’s really pretty easy and some trial and error. You will need the following equipment:

1. DSLR camera with a charged battery and memory card installed
2. Good, sturdy tripod
3. Remote shutter for your camera, I recommend a cable release or Triggertrap
4. A good, sharp lens, aperture doesn’t really matter but I prefer something like the Canon 40mm STM Pancake lens with F/2.8

    Now, just find a good location at night, I prefer to shoot after 11pm myself but your mileage may vary. Set your camera up on your tripod and hook up the cable release. You will need BULB mode on your camera as your shutter setting. Now, set your lens to as wide as possible and set your focus to manual mode and your ISO to 100.

    They way I do it, I wait until a nice stream of vehicles are coming and then press the cable and hold it for 20-30 seconds and you can get some pretty cool warp speed effects that makes the cars look like they are streaking by. The image below is one I shot I call Wall of Light. This image was actually chosen by AI to be in a school publication last year.

    Night time long exposure is not limited to shooting traffic along the road, you can use the exact same settings to shoot landscapes as well, say a nice home in your area or just about anything. I am also including one I did of a local lake at night I call this one Twilight Lake. This image was chosen by an independent judge to be in AI’s Veteran’s show last year in the Second Life gallery. As you can see, you can make some fantastic images at night, so don't think daytime is the only time you can shoot.

    Go on out there and try it for yourself!


Comments/Questions

How to shoot Lightning.

So this week I wanted to talk about shooting lightning. Its that time of year where we start to get the right weather to create lighting. The first and foremost important thing is to realize that lightning can be a great thing to capture it is also dangerous. You want to make sure that you take the right steps to protect yourself and your gear. Some of the very obvious things you don’t want to do are stand under a tree. Use an umbrella. Some other info I found was:

•    Avoid putting yourself above the surrounding landscape. Seek shelter in low-lying areas such as valleys, ditches and depressions but be aware of flooding.

•    Stay away from water. Don't go boating or swimming if a storm threatens, and get to land as quickly as possible if you are already on the water. Lightning can strike the water and travel a substantial distance from its point of contact.

•    Stay away from objects that conduct electricity, such as tractors, golf carts, golf clubs, metal fences, motorcycles, lawnmowers and bicycles.

•    Avoid being the highest point in an open area.Swinging a golf club, or holding an umbrella or fishing rod can make you the tallest object and a target for lightning.

•    You are safe inside a car during lightning, but be aware of downed power lines which may be touching your car. You are safe inside the car, but you may receive a shock if you step outside.

•    In a forest, seek shelter in a low-lying area under a thick growth of small trees or bushes.

•    Keep alert for flash floods, sometimes caused by heavy rainfall, if seeking shelter in a ditch or low-lying area.

As far as equipment you need a tripod, camera remote (I prefer wireless) a good rain cover. In my bag you will find:

Rokinon 14mm on my D600 with Rain sleeve

Nikon D600, Rokinon 14mm F2.8, Phottix Aion Wireless Remote, Induro CT314 Tripod, and Optech Rain shelve.

As far as setting go I set my ISO to 100 and my shutter to bulb with a F stop of F/5- F/11 The reason I set the camera to bulb it I let my Phottix Aion remote do all the work, I can set it up so that it shoots 30 seconds at a time for as many shots that I set up. I usually start with 100 shots. I set the camera up and then raise the ISO to about 500 and open the shutter for about 10 seconds just to give me an idea of how the scene will look once exposed. If I like it then I bring the ISO back down to 100 and then hit the play button on the remote and it starts triggering the camera. Out of 100 shots I’m lucky if I get 3 good images sometimes its none. There is no way to cover every viewing direction so you have to set the camera up and hope that its pointing in the right spot. To get this right I would use your judgment and look at radar to see what direction the storm is travelling. If you need to you could always change your cameras view and then reset the remote to start shooting again. I hope this helps some that are struggling with capturing Lightning. Please post your images in the Google Plus page I would love to see them.

TBT

Thursday Ambassador

 Works Cited:

"How to Photograph Lightning, From Start to Finish." PetaPixel RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 June 2014. <http://petapixel.com/2013/04/10/how-to-photograph-lightning-from-start-to-finish/>.

"Lightning Safety." Government of Canada, Environment Canada. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 June 2014. <http://www.ec.gc.ca/foudre-lightning/default.asp?lang=En&n=159F8282-1>.

Bag Links

Rain Sleeve:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=&sku=583456&gclid=CjkKEQjw5qmdBRCn--70gPSo074BEiQAJCe7zZuagGc2zro2bjNYnCs56TG2u7dccwyVZbC22DRspJ7w_wcB&Q=&is=REG&A=details

Phottix Aion Wireless Timer And Shutter Release

http://www.uniquephoto.com/accessories2/phottix-aion-wireless-timer-and-shutter-release-for-nikon-upto-60m-ph16375/?utm_source=google_products&utm_medium=shopping&utm_campaign=sc&scid=scplp772994

Rokinon 14mm

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/769555-REG/Rokinon_FE14MAF_N_14mm_Ultra_Wide_Angle_f_2_8.html