As I've told you in the previous post, the past couple of weeks I started taking photography classes. After learning about the basics, we came out of the school to shoot the city, and practice a bit on what we've been learning.
This first field class took place by night, in one of Porto's most busy - and touristy - areas: Cordoaria.
The following photos were a first test on this technique, and after we returned to the school, we used this photos as practice material to post-editing class. Although being the first experience and approach on shooting during night time with a trypod, I think the steps you'll need to follow are pretty simple, and you'll be able to try it for yourself easily.
Here's what you need to know:
What you'll need
First you'll need a camera, and make sure you choose the right lens. Keep in mind that if you want to shoot a landscape (urban or natural), it's recomended to use a wide angle lens. If you're going for details, then your kit lens, or normal focal lenght lens will do perfectly. Make sure, whatever lens you choose, it allows you to go for the lowest full stop possible - such as 1.4; 2; 2.8... look at your lens and search for this numbers. Try to keep it under 4.
And a trypod, so you're able to reduce the shaking of the camera while shooting.
How to shoot
The secret for shooting at night, and create those asrtistic lightleaks in your pictures, is to work with long exposure, and open your lens the maximum. That's it. So, what you need to do is set your camera with a slow shutter speed - 8''; 10''; 16''; 30'' or even Bulb (manual); while keeping your lens at 1.4; 2 or 2.8 apperture.
The basics for shooting at night, is that you'll have to keep your lens open long enought so light can come in; and by shooting at slower shutter speeds, you'll alow any light sorce to "paint" your shot while moving - being so car ligts, a lantern, your celphone, or even the stars and the moon.
That's when the trypod comes into the equation. It will stabilize the camera while it's capturing the scene, avoiding shaking in the final result. Keep in mind that if you shoot in a very busy street, bridges or balconies, cars will create vibration through the ground, so, in this case, I recomend you faster shutter speeds than if you'd shoot in a less busy street or location.
How to edit in post
This step is completly subjective, as shooting at night completly "messes" whith your light meter. At the same time, you'll have very dark areas in your final picture, as well as very bright ones. If you want to retain information in the picture, shoot a litle "darker", so you'll be able to recover de darker areas' information in post.
Having said that tough, there are a few tips to balance the levels of each image in the editting process: try not to clip color or tones (tough this will depend on the "look" you want the picture to have); avoid pinkish or redish images; and give the picture cool undertones to "reverse" that tugsten light that most cities have by night due to urban lighting.
That's it! These are the basics to shoot at night. If you're going for a particular look, I suggest you first do a little research on the result you want, so when you arrive to the location you know exactly how to set your camera. Do a little experimenting, try different apertures and shutter speeds, and stick to the one that works best for the images you're trying to produce.
Have you tryed shooting at night before? Have these tips been useful to you? Let me know in the coment section.
See you in next week's post!
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