Exposure for Night View

[Hui Song]

After almost two months crazy busy season, I finally have some spare time for photography. Read a lot of threads in this forum last few days. It seams I missed a lot.

Anyway, a few days ago, I stopped at a scenic view point by a road near Bear Mountain north of NYC at 10 pm. The view was great under the moon light. I set the camera aperture to 16 to get the DOF and tried to use exposure setting based on the reading from the camera. The images were always too dark. Then I had to manually increase the ISO and reduce the shutter speed. Until they reached the limit of my camera: ISO 6400, Speed: 30 sec ( I still do not know how to use the "Bulb" speed setting for more than 30 sec on my camera), the foreground finally looked light enough for me. I shot a few more for the sky in different exposure setting in order to combine them in PS.

My previous experience of night view shooting is almost the same: never get the right exposure reading from camera. I have to manually try many different exposure setting. Is it normal? Did I do anything wrong? Also, how to judge the night view image exposure from histogram?

For the moon: I did shoot another picture of the moon in order to stick the moon in PS. But I like the overexposure flare under the small aperture. So I keep it in the final image. Does it look OK for you?

One more Q: Has anyone used ISO 6400 before? Is it OK to shoot at such high ISO. I did some noise reducing in LR. The image looks OK in screen. But I never print my photo out. I don't know how the printed image will look with such high ISO setting.




Nike D600, Lens: 14-24 mm / F2.8, Exp: 30.0 sec at f / 16, Focal Length 15mm, ISO 6400

[Shadowman]

Looks fine. In Bulb mode you trigger the shutter with a remote. Your camera manual will have the part number for the device. I use a universal remote purchased from promaster, code #9156, I am sure they have updated since I last purchased.

www.promaster.com

[Hui Song]

John, thanks for your info. I will study the long exposure with a remote for Bulb mode. Also the "startrails picture" is one of the things I want to try after I get the remote.

[Otavio]

Hi, Hui. To exceed the standard 30 seconds, you have to set the camera to manual mode ("M"). Once there, turn the dial until the maximum exposure time, ie 30s. One more "click" in the dial and you will go to "bulb" mode. Then you can use a bulb. If you prefer to use a IR (remote), select the trigger mode to IR (instant or 2s timer, as you wish) and the word "BULB" will be replaced by "TIMER". At this point your camera will start exposing the sensor at your first click (remote) and finish the picture when you click again.

I just shot some long exposures last night. If you wanna check them, here is the link Night long exposures @ the beach

[Wavelength]

What an image!!!!!

[Polar01]

Hui if I may make a suggestion, with ultra wide lens their use of hyper focusing ability comes into play, you could have shot that at f/5.6 (sweet spot two stops from max f/2.8) and still have a depth of field from 2.2ft to infinity if you focused on something as close as 4.6ft away. This would have allowed you to adjust the ISO down by 3 stops from your 6400 to 800 helping to reduce noise in the shadows which you have been their at ISO 6400.
This is one of the reasons I love ultra wide lens as they allow me to focus on something very close yet still have large depth of field to get everything in focus.
I use a app on my smart phone called Field Tools (Depth of Field Guide) iPhone 4

Cheers: Allan

[Colin Southern]

Looks fine. In Bulb mode you trigger the shutter with a remote.

As an "aside", although normally one would use a remote (and I certainly do), I believe bulb mode for Nikon works a bit differently than bulb mode for Canon in that the Nikon implementation allows one to press the release once to open the shutter and then you just press it again to close it, so in theory, you could probably get by without a remote for long exposures.

[Colin Southern]

Hui if I may make a suggestion, with ultra wide lens their use of hyper focusing ability comes into play, you could have shot that at f/5.6 (sweet spot two stops from max f/2.8) and still have a depth of field from 2.2ft to infinity if you focused on something as close as 4.6ft away.

Just keep in mind that narrow apertures are needed for the "starburst" effect though.

[Polar01]

Colin you are correct again, I forgot about the higher apertures needed for the starburst, I was only thinking about a lower ISO setting.

Cheers: Allan

[Colin Southern]

Hui,

You did really well.

A few notes ...

1. Your photo is similar to the work of friend and former member Yan Zhang (his website is here) - you might get some inspiration from it.

2. Camera metering of night scenes is complex; the dynamic range of the scenes are usually extreme and the camera will normally try to protect the highlights, which are often pin light sources, with the result that everything else is under-exposed. Using camera metering for a night scene is usually a no-win situation, so normally you need to take an experimental/analytic approach (as you've done), and for scenes like this, needing to combine separate images is common (you did a great job of that). Probably the only in-camera approach that may have worked would be to use a GND filter, but it's likely that the results still wouldn't have been as good.

3. Often the "rules" say not to shoot scenes like this vertically and with things centered. The rules can be broken and the image still work (this is a good example of that), but I'd like to encourage you to also keep other formats in mind. Case in point, I wonder if this may have worked even better if shot as a horizontal with the excellent moon positioned to use the rule-of-thirds?

4. Get to know bulb mode; it's your best friend at night. If you DO want to use camera metering as a starting point, max out the ISO until you get a reading, but don't take the photo; work backwards and then use bulb mode at a lower ISO (high ISO modes reduce the dynamic range that the sensor can record). eg if the camera is suggesting 15 seconds @ ISO 3200, working backwards, that's 30 seconds at ISO 1600, 1 minute @ 800, 2 minutes at 400, 4 minutes at 200, and 8 minutes at 100 - so you'd then try 8 minutes @ ISO 100 in bulb mode, and go up or down from there.

5. I have quite a lot of low-light / night-time work in my landscape galleries; you might get some ideas from there too.

[rpcrowe]

Rather than messing around using bulb and counting off the seconds or using your watch to time the exposure. I suggest that you get an inexpensive remote timer like this. I have one very much like it and, despite the low price, it works just fine...

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Timer-Shutte...item56607d0ef8

IMO, it is worth twelve bucks to simplify my life doing night exposures...

[noeta]

Nothing much to add really other than I really like this shot.

[Hui Song]

Hi Otavio, Using the bulb speed or Timer is new for me. I do find both bulb and "--" in my camera display. Thanks for your info.

BTW, You certainly get some nice long time-exposures pictures in your "Night long exposures @ the beach".

[Hui Song]

Hi Nandakumar, I am glad that you like this picture.

[Hui Song]

Hui if I may make a suggestion, with ultra wide lens their use of hyper focusing ability comes into play, you could have shot that at f/5.6 (sweet spot two stops from max f/2.8) and still have a depth of field from 2.2ft to infinity if you focused on something as close as 4.6ft away. This would have allowed you to adjust the ISO down by 3 stops from your 6400 to 800 helping to reduce noise in the shadows which you have been their at ISO 6400.
This is one of the reasons I love ultra wide lens as they allow me to focus on something very close yet still have large depth of field to get everything in focus.
I use a app on my smart phone called Field Tools (Depth of Field Guide) iPhone 4

Thanks Allen for all your input.
I got this Ultra wide angel lens before Christmas. This is my second time using it and have no idea about its hyper focusing ability. BTW, that night, I was too excited to calmly check DOF carefully even I have a DOF app. I just used the F16 with focus distance of 5 feet, base on my experience with my 24~300 mm Lens, it will have DOF 3 feet to infinity.

I will definitely love this Ultra wide lens as you do!

[Hui Song]

As an "aside", although normally one would use a remote (and I certainly do), I believe bulb mode for Nikon works a bit differently than bulb mode for Canon in that the Nikon implementation allows one to press the release once to open the shutter and then you just press it again to close it, so in theory, you could probably get by without a remote for long exposures.

I read the Nike D600 User's Manual. When using the speed "bulb", you have to keep the shutter-release button pressed until the exposure is complete. Last night, couldn't wait to get the remote, I tried a few times the speed "bulb" by hand holding the shutter release button in my front yard for 60 sec, 120 sec, 240 sec and 360 sec. All the picture are blurry except the 60 sec one. I will attach the 60 sec test picture here.


Exposure: 63 sec at F /8.0, Focal Length 24 mm, ISO 100

[Hui Song]

Hi Richard,
Thanks very much for your info. The remote timer is really what I need. The ebay one is from china and will take almost one month to get it. I just ordered one from USA. Can't wait to get my hands on it.

[Colin Southern]

I read the Nike D600 User's Manual. When using the speed "bulb", you have to keep the shutter-release button pressed until the exposure is complete.

Hmm - that's interesting.

Can any other Nikon shooters elaborate on this? Its my understanding that at least some Nikons have a feature where in bulb mode you press the release once to open the shutter, and then again a 2nd time to close it, but Hui Song is experiencing what I'd expect on a Canon. Does anyone know if it's a firmware option or only appears on some models?

Edit: Just did some Googling -- I'm wondering if this is a feature of the Nikon wireless remotes rather than the cameras?

[IzzieK]

Nicely done on both shots, Sui...I like your compositions.

[John 2]

Hmm - that's interesting.

Can any other Nikon shooters elaborate on this? ?

Just had a look at my D7100 manual. It seems there are two options. "Bulb" require you hold the shutter button down for the duration either manually or with a remote. "Time" operates in the way that you describe with the shutter button being depressed twice, once at the start and once at the end of the exposure. It raises the Q of why you would need both options. The "Time" option would seem to fit most situations.