Monday, January 18, 2010
Night Photo
Did a little experimenting with some of the camera settings. Darkened the darks slightly with levels in PS. I think I like the idea of a weekly assignment. It got me to turn the camera on again.
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I like the pic but the focus seems a little soft. Is that from being overexposed a bit or is it just the depth of field?
ReplyDeleteWhat do you mean a weekly assignment? Is there a message board portion to the site that I'm missing or have you just been chatting in person?
We have been informally discussing a weekly assignment - our first trial was "night photography." Hopefully someone will publish the list of other ideas soon...
ReplyDeleteAs far as the weekly assignments...What Brian said.
ReplyDeleteRegarding the image being soft. It's mostly because I don't know what I'm doing. If you have any suggestions on how it could have been handled better, I know I could use the lesson.
I'm right there with you. So much to learn. :^) That is why I post so much in these comments. I figure we can all learn from each other.
ReplyDeleteOne thing I didn't know about until not too long ago is that lenses have a sweet spot. If you have the aperture wide open the focus is going to be softer. Closing it down two or three stops will put it in that sweet spot for most lenses. Testing individual lenses is the best way to know where it is the sharpest but just stopping it down is a good start.
Once you get to the smallest settings you lose a lot of depth of field. There are also other problems that can crop up like chromatic aberrations. So ideally you want to stick somewhere in the mid-range for aperture settings.
I assume you used a tripod for that shot. The next thing is to use a remote shutter release. Nikon makes a nice IR remote for less than $15. Some cameras can use a cable release as well. The idea here is to not touch the camera to avoid any tripod shake.
If I don't have my remote then I set the self timer on the camera to three seconds. That way I can push the normal shutter release button and the camera will have a couple of seconds to settle before it takes the picture.
I didn't get the weekly assignment message :-|
ReplyDeletegreat shot though Phil :)
you may even try greater aperture(smaller hole) to leave the shots longer(slower shutter speed) to get longer trail of light
Thanks for the good information!
ReplyDelete