Nikon D100 - I need night photography tips

<p>Hallo<br>

I have trouble figuring out how to take night photos with my Nikon D100.<br>

Can someone please advice me on setting and tips to do so please</p>

<p>Thanks</p>

<p>Renier, are you trying for general nocturnal photography or time lapse star trails photography?</p>

<p>To start off, use a tripod. Taking night shots is no different than taking day shots.</p>

<p>Kent in SD</p>

<p>There is no way to take worthwhile night shots without a tripod, as previously mentioned. If possible, use a cable or remote release, too, so that no camera movement is introduced. You will almost certainly have to use extended shutter time, so get used to using your camera in Manual mode. And as an earlier post asked, if you are looking at an exposure of longer than 30 seconds is required (for star trails, for example), you need to set your camera for Bulb mode and time it using a watch. finally, just try it. In this digital age, if you don't like what you see, make a change to affect the element you dislike and try again. Good luck.</p>

<p>If you don't have a cable or remote release, you can set the timer to a couple of seconds. By doing this the camera will no longer be shaking from pressing the shutter release button when the exposure starts. Obviously, you'll need a tripod for this. Night photography is a little more challenging, but a lot of fun!</p>

<p>You can start with f8 and six seconds of exposure (yes, on a tripod) and see if the exposure is good for what you want. Bracket your exposures (i.e., eight seconds and four seconds) and you should have a bit of a different looks -- depending on how bright the scene is or isn't.</p>

<p> </p><div></div>

<p>Just check around for the D100's longest usable shutter speed. Some of the older DSLRs don't have very good performance after more than a few seconds, i.e. hot pixels.</p>

<p>Here's a link to the Ultimate Exposure Calculator which should give you a good starting point for various night photographic settings. First of all...you should shoot in manual mode, not Program, Shutter or Aperture. Like others suggested, you will be most successful with a tripod and cable release. With my D100 I'm often able to get good results with my 400mm f/6.3 telephoto lens at night, but exposures may range from 1/8-30 seconds depending on the ambient light.</p>

<p><strong>Matthew Brennan</strong> - I will do both over the holidays to get some experience. I kinda understand by the help everyone gave me how to do a normal night shot but do advive was given for the time laps photography ... can you help out in this case?</p>

<p><strong>Kent, Randy</strong> - i have got my tripod and will start practising tonight before i actually go out in london and waist my precious time :))))</p>

<p><strong>Craig</strong> - thanks for the help cause i donyt have a cable release and this will solve my problem</p>

<p><strong>Stephen </strong> - Great advice .. thx</p>

<p>Jerry - thanks for the help its been noted and will be testing your advice laters ;) ... That is great photo BTW!</p>

<p> </p>

<p>The following images is a before and after auto exposure using photoshop<br>

F8, ISO 200 and shutter was for 30seconds</p>

<p>Now, why is the image so grainy? should i leave the shutter open for longer, will that help to get a more clear and crisp image result?</p>

<p>before:<br>

<img src="http://img683.imageshack.us/img683/6258/12828982.png" alt="" /><br>

after:<br>

<img src="http://img69.imageshack.us/img69/3908/62934545.png" alt="" /></p>

 

<p>Cannot tell from the above pix, one is just all black. </p>

<p>Well longer exposure does tend to increase noise. You can use noise reduction in software or in camera menu. </p>

<p>But foremost I think if it looks dark, then a longer exposure or a bigger aperture or a combination can work because a proper exposure can lessen noise. If the image is too dark it can emphasise noise. Like in the film days - get the exposure right in the camera. Don't believe you can botch it up in the software like CSI.</p>

<p>Harold Davis, who posts on this site, has a new book, Creative Night. Attended his weekend seminar at Pt Reyes Seashore last year. Amazing night photographer. It will open a new dimension of photography and for those who work during the day, adds more shoot time. Night is a whole new world.</p>

<p>Ass you all can see i got to reduce all or most of the noise using software but there is two<br>

blue'ish horizontal line in this image that i cant get to remove but what the heck is it? is there<br>

a problem with my camera (Nikon D100) maybe its a bit to old.</p>

<p>O'well, its going to be dark in a couple of hours and will spend allot more time trying to get my head around this .</p>

<p><strong>BOB- </strong> Thanks for your advice. I searched for harold and found some of his night photos he took and they are great.</p>

<p><img src="http://img683.imageshack.us/img683/5779/91155770.png" alt="" /></p>

<p>Here is one more experiment i did last night. I turned all the lights down in the sitting room and took the following picture.<br>

<strong>My camera was settings:</strong> bulb, ISO- 200, F8 and the shutter was hold for 207 seconds.<br>

<strong>Top image :</strong> original<br>

<strong>middle image: </strong> auto toned (photoshop cs4)<br>

<strong>Bottom image:</strong> final image agter 4x noise reduction using dfine 2.0</p>

<p><img src="http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/9544/97800233.png" alt="" /></p>

<p>Renier,<br /> Your problem is you are not giving the image enough exposure, so when you brighten things up in photoshop or what ever else you might be using instead, you get the posterization shown in your example. If this histogram looks bad in the camera i.e it is piled up on the left, you need more exposure. Also for long exposures you should have the Long Exposure noise reduction turned on. Look in the menus on your D100. I use to use one and used it to photograph people around a camp fire with a tripod and it worked well. The ISO was set to 800 so there was a fair amount of noise, but not too bad considering it was 10PM, overcast etc.</p>

<p> </p><div></div>

<p>Here is another one taken at night with my D3X, hand held, ISO 1600, 1/6 sec. (I was leaning against a brick pillar) f/5.6, Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8, focal length 31 mm. Higher ISO, but much cleaner image than with the D100. The technology has improved a great deal.</p><div></div>