Struggling with nightscapes - help welcome

Hi Simon,

Further to Manfred's mention of focal length, aperture and Depth of Field a good combination of these will bring, with an understanding of hyperfocal distance focusing, you shouldn't need (at 25mm and f/8) to focus on anything that far away, since everything from half 'that' distance to infinity should be sharp - theoretically. ;)

Cheers, Dave

I am wondering why no one has mentioned about using Daylight for WB for night shots...At least some did mentioned "Bulb". Also when I looked at your EXIF, as I have done many others including mine, why doesn't it say Spot or Matrix or Centre Weight? Why "pattern"? I can never understand that part of the metadata...can someone please explain...?

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Originally Posted by IzzieK

I am wondering why no one has mentioned about using Daylight for WB for night shots...At least some did mentioned "Bulb". Also when I looked at your EXIF, as I have done many others including mine, why doesn't it say Spot or Matrix or Centre Weight? Why "pattern"? I can never understand that part of the metadata...can someone please explain...?

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I don't know what you mean with using daylight for wb at night.
Bulb, don't ask me why, means the shutters stays open until you release the shutter button. Only available in manual and ss. Out off my head only practical with manual, otherwise your aperture will be full open.
Exif data are stored as numbers. Sometime you see differnt explanations for that number. Look at http://www.sno.phy.queensu.ca/~phil/...ames/EXIF.html and do a search for "metering". You find

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0x9207 MeteringMode int16u ExifIFD
0 = Unknown
1 = Average
2 = Center-weighted average
3 = Spot
4 = Multi-spot
5 = Multi-segment
6 = Partial
255 = Other

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In http://www.cipa.jp/std/documents/e/DC-008-2012_E.pdf multi-segment is called pattern.

George

Thanks George...my knowledge is from a long time ago research when I had the D300s. I was going to Florida and looked for articles on "how-to" shoot skies and shooting stars. One of the instructions is to shoot nighttime scenes using Daylight for WB. So I have always shoot the same way ever since. Also one time here at CiC when I was talking to Grahame (Stagecoach) about a difficult scene in a marshy area, I asked him about changing his WB to Daylight. He said he already had...and there were occasions when we were in a fly-in occasions where I was shooting parked airplanes in a darkish parking area at the Westcoast, I accidentally left my WB to Daylight. It turned out very well so I used it all night while I photographed my husband on the podium doing his speech at the banquet held in a big hangar. I was in the dark with another photographer away from the stage. He was having a hard time with his Nikon (I do not know if he still owns the same camera as I have not seen him since...) and I told him to get off from Auto and put his WB to Daylight. He was a happy chappy all night. So I remember those occasions that when it is nighttime and and your focus has some light,e.g., the moon, my WB should be daylight. At daytime, WB should be Cloudy. I do not know why but it works for me...

This is obviously not a shot where I had trouble focussing, but it is one where I've applied others' suggestions about base ISO, aperture and focal length. Thought I'd post it just so you know I'm paying attention, and doing my homework. Baby steps.

http://i63.tinypic.com/2i0rknm.jpg

Looks like big improvement. E.g., the clean sky.