some night shots

[gheron]

sooo.... decided to have a go at some night shots, some of them turned out alright.... this is my first time attempting night shots so bear with me

on to the pics









forgive the cars dirtiness
Discus

[RONDAL]

Re: some night shots

nice cars.

in terms of photos you need to
a) use a tripod and have a longer shutter so the pics arent so dark
b) use a flash to brighten up all the dark areas
c) combination of a + b

keep em coming

[MusicalGenius]

Re: some night shots

A flash isn't 100% necessary, just a nice thing to have. However the biggest thing that happened in the first shot was that your camera found the light source to be the Calgary Tower and compensated for that bright spot of light.

Otherwise keep on going and enjoy! I know we all will if you post more pictures.

[longsock]

Re: some night shots

why havent you taken the mud flaps off yet? lol , drive alot thru mud?

[gheron]

Re: some night shots

haha thanks guys, i have been to lazy to take the wheels off so i cant get to the screws that hold them flaps haha, i did use a tripod and found that if i went any longer with the shutter speed it was too bright... i am a newb though so what do i know haha

[longsock]

Re: some night shots

haha thanks guys, i have been to lazy to take the wheels off so i cant get to the screws that hold them flaps haha, i did use a tripod and found that if i went any longer with the shutter speed it was too bright... i am a newb though so what do i know haha

Ahh ok, fair enuff Lazyness=good excuse in my book

[VW337]

Re: some night shots

Just turn the wheels all the way to one side and use a stubby screwdriver to pull the flaps off.

[longsock]

Re: some night shots

as much as i hate the mudflaps i wish i never have removed them, where the flaps were it rusted over time, so i got rust spots now...

[Snowcatxx87]

Re: some night shots



All credits to my bro. This was our recent little night shoot. This was taken around 10pm

[Compton]

Re: some night shots

Epic FAIL on those shots!

[RONDAL]

Re: some night shots

the second pic post is better but you are still metering the wrong thing. You should have your camera set to spot metering and meter off the front of the mini, which is the darkest area.

Currently you prolly are metering the entire scene, so your camera will figure out what the average is for the scene and meter accordingly. The bright spot on the right of the photo throws this off and you end up with an underexposed front end on the mini.

Flashes aren't needed, but they do help.
Things you can do without a flash, get the light working FOR you, not against you. This means dont shoot into light, shoot with it. If you have bright areas behind your subject your camera will meter the bright area and cause your subject to be silhouetted.

In your second pic post location instead of having the light above and behind the cars, I would have moved the cars backwards so the light was now above and in front of the cars. This would allow the light to fall over the front end of the cars and your camera would be able to properly expose them.

The handy thing about flashes is you can position them where you want them, and allow them to put light where you want, and dont want it. This is really handy for taking locations that may have poor ambient light, but a great backdrop, and allowing you to expose your subject properly.

For example...



THis location has some light available behind the camera, but its not all that bright. There is also light coming from the sun setting behind the building.

If I were to light the car using just the light behind the camera i COULD expose the car properly, but because the sun set was brighter, i would end up with a blown out (white) sky and losing allt he cool detail in it. This would be acheived by having a long shutter speed of like 5 seconds on a tripod.

If I wanted to use the sunset to light the car, I wouldn't be able to do it. The light never reaches the front side of the car. This is a lot like your second location post. The front end of the smurf would always be black because light doesn't reach there enough to expose it properly.

The flash(es) allow me to expose the front of the car properly, while still keeping the sunset detail in the sky. Now there is a lot going on in terms of how I power the flashes compared to the brightness of the sky to achieve the effect I did, but the basic premise still remains. I have light I have placed on the front end of the car so you can expose the car properly. I could do the exact same setup with a flash in your second pic post location and get the same effect as above because the flash is allowing me to place light onto the front of the mini and expose it properly, while the ambient (light post in parking lot) fills the rest of the photo area.

Hope that helps. Practice more and post up your results.


as for how the above picture was lit; 1 flash about 5 feet off the front of the GTi camera left lighting the front end. 1 flash to the right of the camera lighting the side of the car. (each were set at different brightness settings to get even light across the car). I also had 1 flash behind the car, about half way between the car and the building pointing AT the building. This is how I got the building to be lit. Otherwise it was just a black silhouette. I understand this is far more gear than you have, and more complicated than you wanted, but it was all i had on hand to show you and explain with. I could dick around with 1 flash and do the same thing very easily.

[stefan]

Re: some night shots

the second pic post is better but you are still metering the wrong thing. You should have your camera set to spot metering and meter off the front of the mini, which is the darkest area.

Currently you prolly are metering the entire scene, so your camera will figure out what the average is for the scene and meter accordingly. The bright spot on the right of the photo throws this off and you end up with an underexposed front end on the mini.

good info.. this is why most shots I take in the evening suck