Here is another fantastic article from Dave of DCSteps. I think you will enjoy this as much as I did.
~wr~

Urban Nights and Lights

So far I’ve been talking here about bird photography, but I thought I’d cover how to make use of some of the same equipment in an entirely different vein of photography. For most of my bird photography I use a sturdy tripod combined with a strong ballhead and a gimbaled head. If I take the gimbaled head off and substitute a wide-angle lens for the super telephoto used in bird photography, then I’m set for urban night photography.

I dabble in architectural photography, but really enjoy combining that with night photography. In some ways, getting a dramatic night shot is easier than getting a really “special” shot in the day time. The same rules of composition and perspective still apply, but the addition of artificial lights on a building seems to make things more dramatic, at least to my eye.

Well lit downtown areas tend to offer good subjects. One of my examples below is Radio City Music Hall in New York, which you might consider “cheating” to shoot something so iconic, but the other is Boston Avenue Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Thinking of the places that I’ve lived, the bridges in Jacksonville, the lit up buildings and streets of Dallas, Denver and Tulsa all offer great subjects. Try to find subjects locally but, when you travel to New York City or Vegas or Paris, pack the tripod.

In addition to the tripod, I also use a remote, wired shutter release to avoid any movement when I release the shutter. My DSLR has a function called “Live View” that puts the reflex mirror up and shows the scene on the camera back’s LCD. Raising the mirror and then using a remote release avoids any shake when the shutter is started and then closed. If you don’t have a remote release, then you might use your camera’s delayed release, combined with the mirror lock-up, if it has it. Point and shoot cameras don’t need to worry about mirror shake, but a remote release is still good, to avoid moving the camera as you press the Shutter button.

I use two primary methods for night exposures. Sometimes I use Aperture Preferred automated settings and let the camera calculate the exposure and other times I use the “Bulb” setting an experiment. When the subject fills a large part of the frame and you’re not trying to do things like catch blurred traffic in the same image with buildings, then the Aperture Preferred method generally works very well.



See DCStep for a larger image.

For this Boston Avenue Church image I used the Aperture Preferred method. Since the background was largely black and the building was brightly lit, I used -1EV to avoid over exposing the building. (Whenever a portion of a subject is well lit and most of the background is totally dark, the camera will typically over expose the highlights while trying to give you a good average reading). Remember, you can change the exposure after you look at the Preview of your image and it’s either too dark or too bright. Be sure to look at it large size (if your camera allows) to make certain that you didn’t over expose some small detail area, or didn’t have enough exposure to bring out shadowed areas. Generally you’ll have time to bracket up and down 1 or 2 EV, to see how it impacts your final results. Remember, once you’ve paid for your equipment, extra images are essentially free.

I screwed up on the Boston Avenue Church images, forgetting to bring my remote release on the trip. You can see that I got a nice shot, but I ruined a few others with camera shake when I released the shutter. I knew of this risk and took some extras to be certain that I had a sharp image.

I like to use a true wide-angle lens for most architectural photography. I use a full-frame Canon body (the EOS 5D MkII), meaning that the digital sensor is roughly the same size as 35mm film. The full frame sensor gives a wider field of view through my EF 24-105mm f/4L IS than when the same lens on my “crop-sensor” 7D. In fact, at 24mm on the 7D, the equivalent focal length is just over 38mm. I think that 17mm to 24mm is the best focal length range for architecture on a full-frame camera.

This image was taken at 24mm, f/8.0, ISO 100 and -1EV, resulting in a shutter speed of 2.5-seconds. The low ISO setting is critical, because large parts of the image are under exposed and will show much more digital noise at higher ISO settings. I could have used ISO 3200 or 6400 and handheld this shot, but the noise would have been very intrusive. With the low ISO the blacks are deep and rich, highlighting the building dramatically.




See DCStep for a larger image.

For this image of the iconic Radio City Music Hall I used the Bulb setting to get the building sharp, but allow the streaks of taillights from the moving traffic. As with the Boston Avenue Church image, I used a low ISO 100 to minimize digital noise. Once again I had the 24-105mm zoom lens all the way wide at 24mm because I like that perspective, but I used a smaller f/16 aperture which allowed me to leave shutter open longer without over exposing the building itself. I wanted the building well exposed, but I also wanted the lights of heavy traffic to be obvious in the image.

After I set up my tripod, I’d wait until traffic was coming and then, with the mirror up in my camera’s Live View mode, I’d hold the shutter open on Bulb for a few seconds. At the time I knew that I was holding the shutter open three or four seconds, but I had no idea that it was actually 3.2-seconds. I’d take an image, look at the Preview and either increase or decrease the exposure by a little. Shooting in RAW there’s great leeway to bring the exposure level up or down, but I tried to get the building lights about right.

If you look at the EXIF data for this image you’ll see that the camera was set at -2/3EV. That’s meaningless on Bulb settings. I’d taken a couple of shots of the building using the camera’s exposure, hence I set it at –EV to avoid over exposing the many lights. In Bulb mode you’re overriding all the camera’s calculation, so it doesn’t matter if it’s set at 0EV, -2EV or +4EV. I cropped this square because the building is kind of square.

By the way, my technique for setting the tripod position is to set the lens at the focal length that I want, then set up the tripod and look at the subject. If the subject is too small in the frame I move forward and if the subject is too large I move away. I didn’t end of standing in the middle of a street for either of these shots, but if I did, I’d change the focal length of the zoom lens. Getting close and using the lens’ widest focal length generally gives a more dramatic perspective. It usually only takes a little more effort to move the tripod rather than zooming in or out from wherever you happen to be standing, but I think the results are well worth that effort.

If you have a good tripod and a wide-angle lens for your camera, then you can take these types of shots pretty easily. The remote shutter release is a nice added accessory, but not absolutely required. I’ve started making night photography part of my travel plans by packing the tripod, even when bird photography is not on the agenda.

Happy shooting,


Dave

Today we I am pleased to have Dave Stephens as a guest blogger. Dave and I met through flickr. I was drawn to his amazing nature photos. He has some incredible action shots of some of natures most beautiful animals. In his blog he describes how he takes the photos and describes some of his incredible equipment. I have the opinion of my friend Jon Adams that the best camera is the one you have. Through Dave’s blog and flickr photo stream it is very evident that great equipment does help to make a photo that much better. I hope you enjoy the time reading Dave’s blog and that you enjoy his photos as much as I do.

Darrin asked me to contribute guest blogs, focusing on my interest in bird and wildlife photography. Let me briefly introduce myself and then I’ll blog about a recent photography.

I met Darrin on Flickr, where we both post. I live on the Eastern side of the Rockies, near Denver, and he lives on the Western side, so naturally we seem to like similar scenic images and we were drawn to each others’ photographic work.

I’ve been interested in photography for over fifty-years. Starting in junior high, I was lucky enough to take “Graphic Arts” under a teacher that spent a couple of six-week periods showing us how to make our own pen-hole cameras, load our cameras in the dark room, take a photo of our classmates and then process our negatives and produce our own prints in the darkroom.

Ever since that class I’ve been involved, off and on, in photography for fun. After a long “off” period, I decided that digital photography had developed enough for me to give it a serious try, so I bought Canon’s top end point and shoot camera of the time, a G7. That was followed by a G9 and then by my first DSLR in late 2008, the Canon 5D MkII.

In the spring of 2009 I was on vacation at Melbourne Beach, Florida when a chance encounter with an osprey fishing from the top of our hotel rekindled an interest in bird and nature photography. Soon thereafter I’d invested in a 400mm lens. I told myself that if I’d taken more than 1,000 images with the lens over the next four months that I’d keep it. I ended up taking 10,000 images in my “test period.”

Recently I took a deep plunge into wildlife photography by investing in Canon’s EF 500mm f/4L IS USM lens. It’s big, heavy, expensive and so powerful that I felt like I was “cheating” the first few times that I used it. In the few weeks that I’ve owned it I’ve taken close to 5,000 images. (We’ll discuss the need to take multiple images of wild subjects as I blog about specific images).

Click here to view my most “Interesting” images, as determined by some Flickr algorithm.
Click here to leave a comment for Dave.
Click here to view in large size.
Click here to view in original size.

This Roseate Spoonbill image was taken while I was recently in North Florida for my high school reunion. I grew up in Florida on the banks of the St. Johns River between downtown Jacksonville and the Atlantic Ocean, yet I’d never seen a Roseate Spoonbill. I knew they were there, but I’d just never sought them out.

While they are fairly common in Florida, they tend to cluster in rookeries that are deep in the swamp and literally surrounded by alligator infested waters. In fact, two popular locations to photograph them are at Gatorland, near Orlando and The Alligator Farm, in St. Augustine. I chose Guana Park, because it was near to where I’d be staying at Jacksonville Beach.

Like any good expedition I needed to plan ahead. My weekend would be full visiting with family, friends and my old classmates. I only had one morning that I could dedicate to bird photography, so I needed to know where my subjects would most likely be. Fortunately for me, my brother still lives in Jacksonville and knew a birder/photographer that knew where to find the Roseate Spoonbills. One weekend before my arrival, my brother and his friend went to Guana Park to make sure that the birds were in their usual place and for my brother to learn how to get there.

It turns out that the birds were about a 45-minute walk from the park entrance, on a small, island, not too far from shore, but surrounded by swamp and alligators. With my brother as my guide, we arrived before sunrise and walked in to the East side of the birds as the sun rose, giving us great light. The last fifty-feet involved walking through a peat bog while avoiding snakes. When I set up my tripod it sank about 8-inches into the peat.

We spent about an hour photographing the spoonbills and the wood storks that shared the same rookery. The pre-dawn start assured us of good morning light. The park is large, but I could have found the birds myself, without guidance, but it would have taken several hours.

For wildlife and bird photography, knowing where to look is half the battle. When I see birders and/or other photographers I ask, “What have you seen and where.” We help each other. I’ve gotten some good results by taking off blindly into the woods and listening for birds and moving quietly toward them, but my odds increase when I have a plan.

For this image I used my Canon EOS 7D with the EF 500mm f/4L IS USM lens attached with an EF 1.4x Extender, all mounted on an Induro C414 carbon fiber tripod, with an Arca-Swiss Z1 ballhead and Wimberley Sidekick gimbal. (I’ll talk more about why I use certain equipment in future blogs). The exposure was at 1/2500-second, at Aperture Preferred f/8, ISO 800 and -2/3EV. The relatively high ISO resulted in a high shutter speed in case I caught a bird in flight. The -2/3EV was used to avoid blowing out the highlights in the very strong, direct morning sunlight. Whites and pinks are particularly prone to blow out in strong light.

Don’t be too daunted by the huge focal length equivalency that I’m using here. The 7D’s crop-sensor gives a 35mm film-equivalent focal factor of 1.6-times, such that a 100mm lens gives an image that looks like a 160mm lens would look like on a 35mm film camera. So my 500mm lens, plus the 1.4x Extender equals 700mm, times 1.6x equals 1120mm equivalency! As you might imagine, I need to crop very little. If you were there beside me with a 400mm lens on something like a Canon Rebel, you could have got a pretty nice image by using a lower ISO, slowing the shutter speed and cropping heavily. Particularly at internet sizes, your results can be pretty pleasing. My equipment increases my “keeper ratio” and results in a higher IQ (image quality), but for purposes of posting on the internet in relatively small images sizes, many people will never know the difference. The fun of the “hunt” is just as good, so long as you have a decent chance to get a pleasing image.

In future blogs I’ll talk more about the “keeper ratio” and how it’s simply a fact of life in wildlife photography.

Click here to view my most “Interesting” images, as determined by some Flickr algorithm.
Dave

Thank you Jon for a great Blog. Jon from reflectedpixel.com is an extremely talented photographer. I have enjoyed working with Jon and his father for several years now. They do great work.

I’d like to thank Darrin for the opportunity to be a guest blogger here at Wasatch Reflections. This is truly a great place to enjoy beautiful imagery.

I thought I'd give you some quick tips for making better images. So here goes.

1. Get Closer
Get in close and crop in tight. A tight crop will almost always have more impact than an image with a bunch of extra space. So don't be afraid to get in close.



2. Rotate
Your camera can take pictures no matter what direction it is pointed or rotated. Give it a try! The best time to take a vertical image is right after you've taken a horizontal one.


3. You miss 100% of the shots you don't take.
Don't let that great shot get away, take your camera with you and have it ready. The best camera in the world is the one you have with you.



4. Hold it still.
The number one killer of otherwise great photos is camera shake. Practice holding still or use something to help such as a tripod or monopod even a nice rock on the side of the trail or a wall to lean on can help.


5. Eliminate Intruders.
Just before you press the shutter, take a look around the edges of the frame. Are there intruding objects that will detract from your subject? if there are get rid of them by moving or zooming.



Thanks for visiting Wasatch Reflections. If you'd like to know more about me or see more of my photography, please visit reflectedpixel.com.
Thanks
Jon Adams

Let me know what you think, and if you like what you see please share this site and reflectedpixel.com with your friends and family.

~wr~