When setting up your camera make sure that your tripod is placed on secure ground and ensure that it is not going to move during the long exposure. Choose your compositionĪrrive at your location while it’s still fairly light to help you easily compose your images. Night landscape photography: On the night Step 1. To avoid the cold draining your batteries keep them close to your body, (inner pockets for example) to keep them warm, and make them last longer. Also shooting at night means you will likely have to shoot with temperatures dipping below zero, in these conditions, it is not unusual for your batteries to last half as long as usual. Long exposures can quickly drain camera batteries so make sure they are fully charged and that you have a spare. I find a spare wind-up torch works well, as you are then not reliant on battery power. ![]() I often work in remote locations so I always carry a spare torch with me to find my way back to the car, particularly as my main rechargeable torch often runs out of power. Using artificial lights can enhance an image by introducing more colours and complimenting the composition. Light pollution will have the most dramatic effect on the sky when there is a new moon or the moon is yet to rise. While light pollution (brightening of the night sky caused by streetlights and other man-made light sources) can mean it’s harder to see as many stars, it can also add some much-needed colour to a sky. Night landscape photography: Light pollution A great example of night cityscape photography is Brassai’s series of Paris by Night which features a variety of scenes in thick fog and uses the streetlights to create stark contrasting black and white images. ![]() Add a fair amount of drama and a Halloween edge to your images by shooting when mist or fog sets in, it can transform a mundane scene in the day to a spine-chilling one at night, but be careful as water droplets can settle on the lens surface during long exposures and are very difficult to detect in the dark. Clear skies work well for star trails but don’t ignore cloudy or partly cloudy nights. While sometimes you may find you can recover enough information to make a single exposure work, it is always best to gather as much information in the field as you can.The moon peeping through clouds creates a dramatic effect.Īlso, keep an eye on the forecast. If your darkest bracketed exposure still has blown highlights, reduce the exposure. If your brightest bracketed exposure still has clipped shadows, brighten it up. With the high dynamic range, check your highlights and your shadows to ensure you have detail in both. This way it won’t trick you into thinking you have proper exposure when you don’t. Your LCD screen is not a great way to check exposure which is why I recommended in Part 1: Preparation to turn the brightness down. Bracketing exposures by programming your camera or by adjusting your settings manually is the best way to ensure you capture detail in both the shadows or highlights.Ħ) Histogram - Use your histogram to help you evaluate your exposure. The lights of buildings and vehicles are quite bright while the shadows are dark, making the dynamic range more than cameras can capture in a single exposure. If your camera’s auto white balance does a good job, that can often be a great choice as well.ĥ) Bracket exposures - Night city scenes present a challenge as they have a high dynamic range to capture. Using live view can often help me find my happy place with the color. Like all imagery, choice of white balance is subjective for the look and mood you want to portray so you may have a preference for warmer or cooler tones. Be aware of this dichotomy and try to balance out the intensity of the warm lights with the cool shadows. ![]() The night shadows tend to be very cool but the city lights are very warm. Even if you think autofocus is working for you, I recommend using live view and zooming in on a point of contrast and manually tweaking the focus until sharp.Ĥ) White Balance - Choice of white balance at night can be a bit tricky. If you are close enough to lights and points of contrast, I find autofocus can work quite well, but as it gets darker, when you are further away from the scene, or when you are using a wide angle lens, autofocus will often miss the mark. 3) Manual Focus - Focusing manually is the best way to ensure sharp focus in night photography.
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