THE FINISHED PRODUCT.THESE NIGHT PHOTOGRAPHY ARTICLES DETAIL HOW THE VARIOUS PHOTOGRAPHS WERE CAPTURED
Since I have to work at another job to support my photography habit, plus attack the "Honey Do List" on weekends, I do a considerable amount of night photography.
My service provider has just improved the visitor feedback report and I see where a lot of you are looking for night time exposures. If you are interested, I have created a "DUSK TO DAWN" Exposure wheel, where you match the film speed with the desired f-stop, swing the pointer over to the lighting condition you are photographying and it calculates the starting shutter speed and you can bracket from there. If you would like one of the 4 1/2 inch diameter calculators, please send me a self addressed, US Postal Service "PHOTO MAILER" (6" X 8"), with $0.74 postage and a check for $7.95 and I'll mail it back to you the next day, with one of my "DUSK TO DAWN" Calculator Wheels. THE FINISHED PRODUCT.
If you perfer, I will buy the photo mailer and stamps, if you add $3.00 for postage and handling.
Items that you should have for night photograph include:
MALL ENTERANCE PHOTOGRAPH
The exposure here was a mixture between "Christmas lights" and "Street Light Scene". For 200 ASA film the exposure for Christmas lights is 1 second at f5.6, whereas the Street Light Scene is 1/15 second at f2.0. If you adjust the shutter speed and aperture for the "Christmas Lights" you get 1/2 seconds @ f4.0, 1/4 seconds @ f2.8 and 1/8 seconds @ f2.0, so you see you are within one stop, so bracket.
You can also lie to your camera and tell it that you have 400, 800, 1600 or 3200 ASA film in the camera, so the camera will tell you the metered exposure settings. From there you can return your ASA dial to its proper place, extrapolate the exposure and fire away.
FULL MOON AND HOUSING DEVELOPMENT
This photograph is a double exposure. I first reviewed the moons shaddows on the snow, so that when I photographed the landscape, the over-size moon would be in the proper position to appear to be making the shaddows. I then photographed the full moon using a 1200mm lens. My exposure was twice the reciprocal of the film speed at f16.0. That is, 1/500 second at f16.0 when using 200 ASA film and doing a double exposure. Resetting the shutter I changed over to the 28mm lens and prepared to photograph the landscape. Since a snow cover, moon light scene requires an exposure of 8 seconds at 2.0, with 200 ASA film, I reduced the exposure time to 4 seconds because I was doing a double exposure.
CEDAR CREEK GOLF COURSE
Since this was a single exposure, I used 8 seconds at f2.0, with 200 ASA film and a 50mm lens. My choice of the 50mm lens was dictated by the fact that I wanted to include the Big Dipper.
NORTHERN LIGHTS
Here I opted for the 28mm lens, to capture more of the night sky and the Northern Lights. This lens is an f2.8, so I gave up one stop from my 50mm lens. Since the stars start to go oval and form star trails if the exposures are to long (600 divided by the mm of the lens equal seconds of exposure without star trails...600/28=20 plus seconds exposure). This photo happens to be a 30 second exposure.
HOUSE PAINTING
Here my son walked through the field of view, while swinging a pair of 4th of July Sparklers. Since I took about 18 second for him to walk slowly through the picture, I took a 20 second exposure. The lights inside the house were turned off, to minimize hot spots in the windows. The f-stop was 5.6, using 400 ASA film.
HALE-BOPP
Last year I tried to photograph the Japanese Comet using my big lens. I got several pictures of light streaks, with little or no tail. If I had owned a motorized tracking system, I would have gotten the comet, tail and background stars. Since I did not have time to build a clock driven tracking system, I opted to go with long exposures and a normal lens. To my surprise not only did I get the head of the comet, I captured some of the tail. My best exposures were with a 45 second exposure, at f1.8, with 100 ASA film and a 50mm lens.
The second photo used the light pollution from a neighbors front light to add detail to the forground building. Again a 45 second exposure using the above settings.
From these pictures and my attempts at using 100, 200, 600mm lenses, I definately recommend staying with a 50mm lens, unless you have a clock driven tracking system.